National Portrait Gallery finally cutting ties with BP

In 2019 five past winners of the Turner Prize including Antony Gormley, Rachel Whiteread, Anish Kapoor, Gillian Wearing, and Mark Wallinger were among 80 artists calling for an end to BPs sponsorship.

It also lost its position on the judging panel for the award in 2020, the first time it hadn’t been involved since 1997.

Outside of famous artists, the public has also shown its disdain for fossil fuel companies propping up the creative industry. The Science Museum faced criticism last year when it included a protest sign in an exhibition sponsored by Shell, for example.

Extinction Rebellion members covered themselves in fake crude oil in 2019 to protest the BP and National Portrait Gallery partnership. Most recently, 300 archaeologists and historians wrote to the British Museum urging it to cut BP off in a similar fashion to the gallery.

Even the British Museum’s own staff have voiced against fossil fuel sponsorship.

It’s clear that the public and industry insiders no longer deem it acceptable for oil companies to finance artistic endeavours in the UK.

This is especially true for educational institutions such as the British Science Museum –Shell is still a sponsor and has a ‘gagging clause’ preventing negative discussion of its brand – where factual objectivity becomes compromised.

As the climate crisis becomes increasingly severe and urgent, so too does the necessity to remove big oil firms like Shell and BP from cultural awards and ceremonies. They only serve to normalise our current practices – which must change if we’re to have any hope of reaching our 2050 zero emissions pledges.

I’d expect the British Museum to follow suit in the near future. It’s only a matter of time.