museum. In a period of economic crisis and government cutbacks on funding for culture, longtime director Anne Baldassari still managed to raise $41 million for the makeover by exporting artworks for exhibition abroad. The Musée Picasso raised between €1 million and €3.5 million a year between 2008 and 2011 from the touring exhibition "Masterpieces from the Picasso Museum". The tour helped fund the refurbishment of the museum and included the De Young Museum, San Francisco, where attendance topped 335,000, the Chinese Pavilion, Shanghai, the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, and the Palazzo Reale, Milan. Upon re-opening, the museum is expected to finance more than 60 percent of its annual budget. Governance In 2014, Baldassari was dismissed by Aurélie Filippetti, the French minister of culture, after mounting criticism of her management. New director Laurent Le Bon reopened the museum in September 2014 following a €52 million five-year renovation dogged by delays and escalating costs. Expansion By the end of the ongoing construction work, the museum’s public space was to nearly triple, to around 58,000 square feet, by moving staff offices to a newly purchased building. The expansion project, whose budget doubled to almost $70 million, was supposed to be completed in two years when it began in 2009. But as it grew in scope and size, reopening dates were announced and delayed several times. After a five-year closure the museum reopened on 25 October 2014. See also Museu Picasso (Barcelona) Museo Picasso Málaga List of single-artist museums References External links Buildings and structures completed in 1659 Museums with year of establishment missing Picasso Picasso Modern art museums in France Monuments historiques of Paris Picasso National museums of France Le Marais Buildings and structures in the 3rd arrondissement of Paris Pablo Picasso