Jack Lang has been re-elected chair of the Institut du Monde Arabe (Arab World Institute, IMA) in Paris. Lang, who has led the Institute since 2013, was “unanimously” reappointed for a three-year mandate by a board of 14 Arab ambassadors and personalities named by the French government. His appointment was backed by President Emmanuel Macron.Lang was the only candidate after the former foreign affairs minister Jean-Yves Le Drian withdrew from the race to lead the French agency for the development of the Saudi province of AlUla (Drian was appointed president of the French Agency for the Development of AlUla earlier this year).His re-election was preceded by speculation that President Macron would renew his post (the newspaper Le Monde even surmised two days before his appointment that Lang’s mandate would not be renewed for more than a year). According to an official source, Macron wanted to avoid another age-related controversy after the French audit court criticised the decision by the French government to retain the contract of the president of Versailles, Catherine Pégard, aged 69. The French government has kept on Pégard even though she is more than two years over the official retirement age limit.Jack Lang is aged 84 but there is no age limit inscribed in the IMA’s constitution. He has recently expressed his support for Palestinian artists and victims of the war in Gaza. Against the backdrop of Gérald Darmanin, Minister of the Interior, expressing his intention to forbid all pro-Palestinian street demonstrations, Lang decided to extend a Palestinian season until 31 December, including lectures and debates along with an exhibition drawn from the collection of the National Museum of Palestine in Exile (according to the IMA website, the project for a Palestinian Museum involves compiling a collection based on “solidarity”, comprising donations by some Western artists).Jack Lang, who has announced a plan to set up a museum of Arab art in Jean Nouvel’s building on the bank of the Seine, has also developed educational activities and offered free entry to young people under 27. The Institut du Monde Arabe has about 700,000 visitors each year and a budget of €25m to €28m, with €12m being financed from the French state and the rest via commercial streams.
