Subsidy as the holy grail? Private museums challenging the sustainability of non-subsidized institutions

This research investigates the role of private museums in the museum sector, which is mostly populated by public museums, and the possible competition between these two types of organizations. The research focuses on Dutch and Flemish private museums that exhibit visual arts. This research is explorative, as it gives an impression of the Dutch and Flemish private museum market, by illustrating the different actors operating at the private museum market and their diversified business strategies and motivations to initiate a private museum. It is inductive too, as not much literature on private museums only exists. The research answers the question whether private museums are differentiated from public museums and whether they face competition with public museums. The main findings of the multiple case study, performed by several in-depth interviews with directors of private museums, are that all museums are initiated by a wealthy person or couple and therefore show a very personalized way of running their organization. Besides, private museums are diversified organizations compared to public museums and they do compete on the level of funding and audiences.