Voces del Prado

Coordinating a museum and attending to all members of staff

Francisco Calvo Serraller, Museum Director, 1993-1994

Something I considered to be dreadful was that the Museum was made up of a series of unconnected departments. And each department did its own thing. My first initiative was to create a Management Committee, because I wanted each department to have a representative for each section of the staff. It was a good idea and, instead of being a kingdom of different fiefdoms, the Museum began to diffuse all of these internal confrontations. If, in addition to external indifference, you have a Museum full of warring factions inside, it’s really the end. For me, the security guards were as important as the curators and restorers. In reality, all of them were pretty united because they were all in the same sinking boat. But the majority had a strong sense of vocation and they did their jobs well, although they were extremely neglected and very poorly coordinated.