Brussels Just Spent €250 Million on a Museum. The Problem? Funding Is Vanishing.

Brussels is about to unveil a new art museum that’s been a decade and a quarter-billion euros in the making. Kanal-Centre Pompidou, set to open November 28th, is housed in a massive former Citroën garage from the 1930s. It’s supposed to be the Belgian capital’s only major modern and contemporary art museum. The only catch? The city is already cutting its funding.

A City Within a City (With Budget Cuts)

At 430,000 square feet, Kanal is designed less like a museum and more like a small city. It borders the low-income neighborhood of Molenbeek, and its Art Deco facade boasts a 90-foot-high glass front. Artistic director Kasia Redzisz calls it a “passage” rather than a single destination. Imagine a museum campus so sprawling that two actual streets cut right through it.

Over half of the space—215,000 square feet—will be entirely free to access. This includes workshops, libraries, an auditorium, a cinema, a café, a restaurant, a rooftop bar (because of course), a bakery, and even a playground designed by the Assemble collective. The idea is to create a “city within a city,” which sounds lovely until you remember the part about the funding disappearing.

The remaining space is split between offices and storage (85,000 sq ft) and dedicated exhibition areas (130,000 sq ft). Part of the exhibitions are curated in partnership with the Centre Pompidou in Paris, a collaboration set to last until 2031. Kanal is also building its own collection, currently standing at around 100 objects.

The “Megalomaniacal” Price Tag

Despite the grand vision, Kanal has been a magnet for criticism and financial woes. Lawmakers plan to slash the museum’s annual funding from €35 million to a paltry €10 million by 2029, part of Brussels’s broader austerity measures.

Critics are calling Kanal a poorly planned “vanity project.” Belgian parliament member Gaëtan Van Goidsenhoven warned that without alternative funding, the museum risks “accumulating disappointments, empty spaces, [and] periods of closure.” Which, if you think about it, is the exact opposite of what you want from a shiny new quarter-billion-euro art hub.

Yves Goldstein, Kanal’s founding general director, points out that the building alone costs about €10 million a year to maintain. They just secured a €60 million government loan to finish construction, which has to be repaid within a year. The pandemic and the war in Ukraine added €40 million to the initial renovation cost. Oh, and designers had to build entirely new, temperature-controlled “boxes within boxes” inside the existing structure because the open spaces weren’t suitable for most artworks. Not to mention the water leaks and unstable foundations.

The partnership with the Pompidou also costs €12 million over six years. Some local cultural leaders, like Dirk Snauwaert of the Wiels contemporary art center, see this as a “French-first initiative” that drains funds from Brussels’s own art scene. Pompidou director Julie Narbey, naturally, defends the partnership, citing “curatorial and artistic independence.” Because apparently, that’s where we are now.

Economist Jan Wostyn suggests Kanal was simply too ambitious, noting Brussels lacks the resources of Paris, a city politicians often try to emulate. Snauwaert called the whole thing a “megalomaniacal” political initiative that could starve local arts.

Kanal is currently the only cultural institution receiving significant subsidies from the Brussels-Capital Region, which has created understandable tension among other institutions operating on much smaller budgets.

Still, Goldstein remains optimistic, believing Brussels needs a major modern art museum. He's stepping down after the opening, hoping Kanal attracts people who wouldn’t typically visit museums. The team is now scrambling for alternative funding, exploring event rentals and sponsorships, aiming for €15 million in revenue from tickets, food, drinks, and private events. They expect 400,000 to 500,000 visitors annually.

Kanal’s inaugural exhibitions will feature over 250 artists, including a focus on local context and an exhibition exploring Citroën’s colonial propaganda. The largest show, “A truly immense journey,” will feature 350 works from the Pompidou’s collection, centered on themes of movement and migration.

Goldstein envisions Kanal as a “breakthrough for Brussels” that connects different parts of the city. He’s hoping for a “Guggenheim effect” by the end of 2027. We’ll see if the city’s accountants share his optimism.