Dartmouth Students Renew Calls To Remove Leon Black's Name From Arts Center

(MENAFN- USA Art News) Dartmouth Faces Renewed Pressure to Remove Leon Black's Name From Visual Arts Center

A student-led naming dispute at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire, is drawing fresh attention to one of higher education's most difficult questions: when does a donor's name become too fraught to keep on a building? Students are again urging the college to strip billionaire collector Leon Black's name from the Black Family Visual Arts Center, citing his ties to Jeffrey Epstein and the broader ethics of donor recognition.

The 105,000-square-foot center opened in 2012 with support from a $48 million gift from Black, a Dartmouth alumnus from the class of 1973. The building houses studio art, film, and media departments. Calls to remove Black's name first surfaced in 2021, shortly after he stepped down as chairman of the board of New York's Museum of Modern Art.

The issue returned to campus politics on April 5, when Oscar Rempe-Hiam, a Dartmouth undergraduate in the class of 2029 and a member of student government, raised the matter at the group's first weekly meeting of spring term. He said the college had shown no“sense of urgency” in addressing Black's dealings with Epstein and argued that student government should press the administration to act.

Dartmouth did not respond to a request for comment. Last year, a spokesperson said the college had“no current financial relationship” with Black.

Black's ties to Epstein have come under renewed scrutiny after the release of additional files by the U.S. Department of Justice. According to those records, Epstein served as director of the Black Family Foundation from at least 2001 through 2012 and was involved in charitable giving that included gifts to Dartmouth. Black's lawyer, Susan Estrich of Estrich Goldin, pointed to a 2020 Dechert investigation commissioned by Apollo Global Management, which concluded that Black paid Epstein $170 million for estate planning and tax advice and had no awareness of Epstein's criminal activity before his 2019 arrest.

Estrich also denied the allegations against Black, saying that of three civil lawsuits filed against him, one has been dismissed, one withdrawn, and one is facing a case-terminating motion for sanctions.

The controversy has widened because Dartmouth recently moved quickly to remove César Chávez's name from a fellowship after new sexual assault allegations emerged. That contrast has sharpened scrutiny of how universities balance donor naming rights, institutional values, and the pace of response when reputational concerns surface years after a gift is accepted.

For Dartmouth, the question is no longer only about one building. It is about how a university decides which names remain part of its public face, and which no longer do.

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