Tate Modern celebrated its 25th anniversary by launching a US-style endowment fund to help keep the British institution afloat. The struggles the director has faced this year have been more financial than existential, with Tate reducing headcount across all of its branches and facing strikes towards the end of the year from staff in a dispute over pay. Despite commentary over figures published this year that showed a drop in visitor numbers since 2019, and grumbling over its programme, Tate Modern remains one of the most visited contemporary art museums in the world. ‘If we weren’t being criticised,’ Balshaw told the Financial Times, ‘we wouldn’t be doing our jobs.’ Concurrent shows at the former power station – the touring show of Aboriginal artist Emily Kam Kngwarray and the sprawling Nigerian Modernism – followed the Tate’s recent agenda of mounting art-historical correctives, and there have been good responses to Ed Atkins at Tate Britain, but forthcoming shows skew more towards guaranteed crowdpleasers, with Turner and Constable just opened and Tracey Emin to follow in February.