German Museum Chief Quits Job And Leaves Britain – Because Of Brexit

The German Director of the Victoria and Albert Museum has said that he will resign his post and return to Germany because he didn’t like Britain’s referendum result.

Disillusioned by the result of the largest democratic mandate in British history, German native Martin Roth, 61, is expected to tell staff tomorrow morning that he will resign his post as Director of London’s Victoria and Albert (V&A) Museum.

He is expected to officially announce it publicly when he unveils the V&A’s latest exhibition, reports The Times.

Before the referendum, which saw the British people vote 52 per cent in favour of leaving the political bloc, the German spoke of his concerns that a Brexit vote “could ruin everything our parents’ generation achieved — a policy of peace, reconciliation and common thought”.

Mr. Roth, who worked in France, the U.S., and Germany before coming to London, said that he believed “in the long term, Brexit would mean distancing the UK from continental Europe”.

In an interview after the vote, he described Brexit as “a personal defeat”. Fearing that British art institutions might have to survive without European Union (EU) funds, he remarked: “I personally feel more affected on an ideological rather than an economic level”.

Likely to succeed him are thought to be his deputy, Tim Reeve, and Simon Thurley, who ran the Museum of London before becoming Chief Executive of English Heritage, which he left last year.

Mr. Roth ran the V&A for five years. He is a trustee of the British Council and is on the boards of the Royal College of Art and Imperial College London.

He is reported to have no job lined up in Germany.