Former director of the V&A
Born: January 16, 1955;
Died: August 6, 2017
DR MARTIN Roth, who has died aged 62, was a hugely influential figure in museums in the UK and Germany and was the first non-Brit to become director of the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. From the start, he made it his mission to raise the international profile of the V&A and was closely involved in the creation of its new museum in Dundee, which is due to open next year.
He first joined the V&A in 2011 after a distinguished career in his native Germany and made his mark with record-breaking exhibitions on David Bowie in 2013 and Alexander McQueen in 2015. He also developed partnerships with foreign institutions and initiatives such as the V&A's presence at the Venice Biennale.
However, his time at the V&A ended in some controversy. Last year, he announced that he would be leaving the post early, partly, he said, because of the result of the EU referendum vote and what he saw as the antipathy towards foreigners that had helped drive the result. The Brexit result was a personal defeat for him, he said.
“I can understand that people ask: how should we deal with Brussels?" he said. "But it seems crazy to me that this question should lead to smashing everything else. It is destroying the future of our children. That’s sad. A majority of older people have voted for the Brexit, while the younger generation wants to remain in the EU. That means the elderly have stolen the youth’s future."
Dr Roth had recently been working on a number of projects in Germany, where he was born in Stuttgart. He studied cultural sciences at the University of Tubingen and completed a doctorate on the history of cultural institutions in Germany, including in the Third Reich.
After further study in Paris, he joined the German Historical Museum in Berlin in 1989 and by the mid 1990s was president of the German Museums Association. He was also appointed director of Dresden's State Art Collections in 2001 and president of Germany's Institute for Foreign Relations in June 2016.
Nicholas Coleridge, chairman of the V&A, said Dr Roth would be remembered as a man of prodigious energy, a director with a global reputation both within the museum world and beyond, a committed Europhile and cultural ambassador with a philosophical turn of mind, as well as a devoted husband and father.
"As director of the V&A for just over five years, Martin made it his mission to raise the international profile of the museum, and under his leadership, the V&A was named 2016 Art Fund Museum of the Year," said Mr Coleridge.
Mr Coleridge said Dr Roth had been instrumental in the founding of the V&A Research Institute, which will look at new ways of displaying and accessing its collections, and the new European Galleries, which opened in 2015.
Dr Roth is survived by his wife and three children.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here