Controversies
- In the 19th century, there was dispute over the acquisitions made with the Chantrey bequest and accusations that favouritism resulted in the purchase of dull work by Royal Academicians
- In 1971, an exhibition by Robert Morris called Bodyspacemotionthings was closed after five days due to health and safety concerns
- In 1972, the Tate Gallery purchased a work by Carl Andre called Equivalent VIII. During a 1976 exhibition of the work, The Times newspaper published an article using the work to complain about institutional waste of taxpayers' money. The article made the piece infamous and it was subjected to ridicule in the media and vandalism. The work is still popularly known as "The Bricks," and has entered the British public lexicon
- Each year, the Turner Prize is held at a Tate Gallery (historically at Tate Britain) and is awarded to an artist under 50 who is either British or primarily working in Great Britain. It is the subject of great controversy and creates much media attention for contemporary British art, as well as attracting demonstrations
- In 1995, it was revealed that the Tate had accepted a gift of £20,000 from art fraudster John Drewe. The gallery had given Drewe access to its archives which he then used to forge documents authenticating fake modern paintings that he then sold
- In 1998, Sir Nicholas Serota, director of Tate, conceived 'Operation Cobalt', the secret and ultimately successful buyback of two of the Tate's paintings by JMW Turner that had been stolen from a German gallery in 1994. See Frankfurt art theft (1994)
- Charles Saatchi stated that an offer of a major gift of works was rejected by Serota. Serota responded that no such offer had been made
- In 2005, the Stuckists offered a donation of 175 paintings which had been exhibited at the Walker Art Gallery. This was rejected and the Tate was accused of "snubbing one of Britain’s foremost collections"
- In 2005, there was a scandal over the Tate's purchase of its trustee Chris Ofili's work The Upper Room for £705,000, and accusations of conflict of interest In July 2006, the Charity Commission completed an investigation into this and censured the gallery for acting outside its legal powers
- In 2006, a legal opinion was given that the Tate and National Gallery have no legal right to ownership of the Turner Bequest, as Turner's conditions for that had never been fulfilled and are still binding
- In 2006, it was revealed that the Tate was the only national-funded museum not to be accredited to the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MLA), as it did not wish to abide by guidelines that deaccessioned work should first be offered to other museums. The MLA threatened to bar the Tate from acquiring works under the Acceptance in Lieu (AIL) scheme, whereby works are given to the nation to settle inheritance tax. A total of 1,800 museums are accredited with the MLA
- Tate has been criticised for its partnership with BP. Environmental campaigners Art Not Oil have called for a protest against the petrol company's sponsorship of the 2012 Cultural Olympiad.
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