Leonard Lauder Gives Whitney Museum $131 Million

NEW YORK—Leonard A. Lauder, cosmetics mogul and chairman of the Whitney Museum of American Art, announced that his American Contemporary Art Foundation will give $131 million to the Whitney, the New York Times reports. $125 million of the donation, which is the largest in the museum's history, will go toward the Whitney's endowment, increasing it from $70 million to $195 million.

As a condition for the gift, Lauder stipulated that the museum not to sell its current building, designed by Marcel Breuer and completed in 1966, for an extended (but unspecified) period of time. Last year when the institution announced that it was planning to open a satellite museum downtown in Manhattan's meatpacking district, speculation arose that it might sell its current space.

Adam D. Weinberg, the director of the Whitney, said of Lauder's donation, "It will now be the first time our endowment will be large enough so that the Whitney can maintain its commitment to living artists and to adventurous programming."