The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) stands on the brink of transformation. As its long-awaited $720 million David Geffen Galleries near completion—a striking Brutalist concrete vision by architect Peter Zumthor—a parallel movement is taking shape within the museum itself. On October 29, more than 300 employees across all departments announced their intention to unionize, forming LACMA United under the AFSCME Cultural Workers United District Council 36.

This moment is more than an internal labor shift—it’s a cultural reckoning. The timing is poignant: just months before LACMA opens its most ambitious architectural project to date, its staff is demanding a foundation not only of steel and concrete, but of fairness and transparency.

A New Structure: Not Just Architectural, but Institutional

The David Geffen Galleries, a monumental reimagining of LACMA’s campus, are designed to dissolve traditional hierarchies between departments and disciplines. Its sweeping, organic floor plan is meant to invite fluidity, connection, and openness—principles now echoed by the employees calling for a similar reconfiguration of internal dynamics.

In a letter addressed to the museum’s management and trustees, the workers cite “fairer compensation, expanded benefits, and increased transparency in institutional protocols and resources.” Their words carry a quiet urgency, reflecting the realities of a city where the cost of living continues to outpace wages.

As we near completion of the new home for our permanent collection, ensuring the stability of our staff is equally crucial to LACMA’s future. Many employees are struggling with wages that have not kept up with the rising cost of living in the sixth-most expensive city in the world.

– The letter reads.

The call for unionization arrives amid growing strain: high turnover, unfilled positions, and workloads that have expanded without matching compensation. In short, as the museum builds upward, its workers are asking to be built up alongside it.

LACMA in the Broader Museum Labor Movement

LACMA United joins a national wave of museum unionizations that has swept across the United States in the last five years. From the Art Institute of Chicago and the Walker Art Center to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Frost Art Museum in Miami, cultural workers are increasingly vocal about the disparity between institutional prestige and the precarity of those who sustain it.

The movement, coordinated in part through AFSCME Cultural Workers United, has brought new visibility to the invisible labor of museum operations—educators, art handlers, security staff, curators, and visitor services representatives—whose collective work allows the public to engage with art’s transformative power.

At LACMA, the diversity of departments represented by LACMA United suggests a deeply shared sense of purpose. This is not a rebellion against the institution’s vision, but a reclamation of belonging within it. It is an insistence that those who preserve and interpret culture deserve stability and dignity commensurate with their contribution.

Architectural Vision Meets Human Infrastructure

Peter Zumthor’s new building for LACMA, characterized by its undulating concrete form and elevated presence, has been described as both a sculptural object and a living organism. It is designed to bridge Wilshire Boulevard, symbolically connecting the city’s diverse cultural arteries.

Yet even as this architectural icon promises openness and accessibility, the employees’ collective action underscores that true transformation must extend beyond design. A museum’s architecture may embody progress, but its people sustain it.

Museum leadership has received the letter from LACMA United. We are reviewing it carefully and very much look forward to continuing to support our amazing staff.

– Museum director Michael Govan, in a statement responding to the unionization effort, expressed measured optimism.

His response, while diplomatic, highlights the delicate balance between institutional vision and the shifting demands of its workforce.

The Changing Face of Museum Work

Across the art world, the myth of the self-sacrificing cultural worker—willing to trade financial security for proximity to art—is eroding. The new generation of museum employees is both idealistic and pragmatic, seeking sustainability as much as inspiration.

At stake is not only compensation, but also the ethos of cultural labor. What does it mean to work within an institution devoted to the preservation of human creativity if one’s own labor is undervalued or precarious? LACMA United’s emergence reframes this question as central to the museum’s mission.

By advocating for transparency, equity, and shared governance, the union is asserting that the human infrastructure of art institutions must evolve alongside their architectural and curatorial ambitions.

A Museum in Motion

LACMA has long been a symbol of Los Angeles’s ambition—a museum willing to reinvent itself to mirror the city’s restless energy. From Michael Heizer’s Levitated Mass to Chris Burden’s Urban Light, its collection often celebrates tension and transformation.

Now, transformation is happening within its own walls. The dual unveiling—of a $720 million building and a unionized workforce—marks a pivotal moment in LACMA’s history. Both are acts of construction: one visible, one structural; both designed to endure.

The success of LACMA United could set a precedent for how cultural institutions navigate the 21st century’s shifting economic and ethical landscapes. The question is no longer whether art belongs to the people—but whether the people who sustain art can finally belong securely within its frame.