Two Pace Gallery Executives Resign After Major Layoffs

What Happened

Two senior Pace Gallery executives have resigned in the aftermath of a major restructuring that has reshaped one of the world's largest commercial galleries. Amelia Redgrift, Pace Gallery's chief communications officer, and Danielle Forest, senior sales director, have both left the organization, with sources telling Artforum that both have secured high-level positions elsewhere in the arts and culture sector. The departures follow a round of layoffs in June 2026 that eliminated 50 of the gallery's 250 staff members and dropped 50 of its 135 artists from the roster.

The June restructuring, described by Pace Gallery CEO Marc Glimcher as a necessary correction to an art market that had grown unsustainable, sent shockwaves through the commercial art world. At the time, Glimcher told the New York Times that the whole art gallery system had become too big, too commercial, too impersonal, and too corporate. The cuts at Pace were part of a broader wave of contractions across the gallery sector, with several major galleries reducing their rosters and staff levels in response to slowing sales and changing collector behavior. Redgrift and Forest were not among those laid off in June, but their subsequent departures suggest that the restructuring has created a climate of uncertainty even among senior staff who survived the initial cuts.

The Executives and Their Tenure

Both Redgrift and Forest joined Pace Gallery around 2019, bringing experience from rival top-tier galleries. Redgrift came to Pace after a six-year stint at Hauser and Wirth, where she held a senior communications role. Forest arrived after nearly three years at Marian Goodman Gallery, one of the most respected galleries in the non-profit-adjacent sector of the market. Their hiring was part of a period of aggressive expansion at Pace, which included the opening of a new $100 million flagship space in Chelsea in 2021 and the launch of new initiatives in digital art, publishing, and cultural programming. Both were promoted following an earlier restructuring in 2021, reflecting the gallery's desire to professionalize its operations during a period of rapid growth.

Forest told ARTnews that her time at Pace was invaluable, adding that she had many wonderful years working closely with the Glimchers, their inspirational artists, and innovative team. She indicated that she looks forward to the next chapter of her relationship with the gallery and bringing that wisdom to her new role. Redgrift similarly described feeling privileged to have been part of Pace's evolution. Marc Glimcher acknowledged both contributions, stating that Redgrift helped build and define the culture of Pace over her tenure and would be greatly missed, while calling Forest a great and dynamic member of the team. Glimcher also indicated that the gallery would be working with Forest in a new capacity, suggesting that her departure may not represent a complete severing of ties.

What This Means for the Gallery Sector

The departures come at a challenging moment for the commercial art market, which has contracted significantly since its pandemic-era peak. Global art sales declined in 2025 for the second consecutive year, according to the Art Basel and UBS Art Market Report, with the contraction concentrated in the middle market where Pace and its peers operate most heavily. Several major galleries have reduced their footprints, closed satellite locations, or reduced their rosters in response to the downturn. The contraction has prompted debate about whether the gallery model that emerged in the 2010s, characterized by large staffs, global expansion, and diverse programming, is sustainable in a more constrained market environment.

Pace's restructuring is particularly significant because the gallery has been one of the most aggressive expanders in the sector. Under Marc Glimcher's leadership, Pace opened spaces in Hong Kong, Seoul, Geneva, and London, expanded its New York flagship, and added more than 50 artists to its roster between 2018 and 2024. The June cuts represent a partial unwinding of that expansion, and the departure of two senior executives suggests that the internal culture of the gallery has been affected by the contraction. The art world will be watching closely to see whether other major galleries follow Pace's lead in reducing their operations, or whether the gallery's restructuring proves to be an outlier driven by specific circumstances rather than a broader industry trend.

What Comes Next

For Pace Gallery, the departures create vacancies in two critical areas of the business at a time when the gallery is attempting to rebuild its identity around a smaller roster of artists and a more focused program. The chief communications officer role is particularly important at a moment when the gallery needs to manage its public image following the layoffs, while the senior sales director position is crucial for maintaining relationships with collectors in a softening market. How Pace fills these roles, and whether the gallery looks internally or externally for replacements, will signal its strategic direction in the coming years.

For the broader gallery sector, the Pace departures are a reminder that the human cost of restructuring extends beyond the immediate layoffs. When a gallery cuts 20 percent of its staff and 37 percent of its artists in a single round, the message sent to remaining employees is clear, and retention of senior talent becomes a significant challenge. The fact that both Redgrift and Forest have reportedly secured positions elsewhere suggests that the art world continues to value the experience and relationships that senior gallery professionals accumulate, even as the institutions that employ them undergo significant change. The gallery sector is likely to see further consolidation and contraction in the coming months, and the ability of galleries to retain key personnel during this period will determine which institutions emerge from the downturn positioned to compete.

The wave of gallery contractions that Pace has been at the forefront of reflects a broader reckoning with the business model that dominated the commercial art world during the 2010s. That decade saw galleries expand aggressively, opening outposts in multiple cities, hiring large staffs, and adding artists to their rosters at a pace that often outstripped the underlying economics of the market. The model was sustained by rising art prices, strong demand from new collectors in emerging markets, and low interest rates that made speculative art buying attractive. When these conditions shifted in the mid-2020s, galleries found themselves carrying overhead costs that their sales could no longer support. The restructuring at Pace, which included closing some of its satellite spaces, was a direct response to this mismatch between costs and revenues.

The departures also raise questions about the future of the gallery's artist roster. When a gallery cuts 50 artists from its roster, the remaining artists may question their own security, and some may choose to leave before they are pushed. The artists who were dropped in June must find new representation in a market that is contracting, a process that can take months or years and can significantly disrupt careers. The artists who remain at Pace face a different challenge, as the gallery's reduced capacity may mean less attention and fewer exhibition opportunities. The gallery has indicated that it intends to focus more deeply on a smaller roster, but whether this strategy will produce better outcomes for the remaining artists remains to be seen. The experience of other galleries that have undergone similar contractions, including Hauser and Wirth and David Zwirner, which have generally maintained larger rosters, will provide a useful point of comparison.

For the commercial art sector more broadly, the Pace departures underscore a shift in the balance of power between galleries and their employees. During the expansion years, senior gallery staff were in high demand, and compensation packages rose accordingly. In a contracting market, the leverage shifts back to employers, and senior staff may find that the opportunities available to them are less lucrative than the positions they are leaving. The fact that both Redgrift and Forest have reportedly secured new positions suggests that the market for senior art world talent remains relatively strong, but the terms of their new roles may reflect the broader market correction. The art world has always been characterized by high turnover at the senior level, but the current wave of departures and restructuring may represent a more fundamental reshaping of the gallery business, one in which the large, corporate-style gallery model that Pace pioneered gives way to something leaner and more focused.

The long-term implications of Pace's restructuring will depend on whether the gallery can rebuild its culture and its business around a smaller, more focused operation. Marc Glimcher has framed the cuts as a return to the gallery's roots, emphasizing the importance of personal relationships with artists and collectors over the corporate model that the gallery had adopted. Whether this rhetoric translates into practice will be evident in the coming years, as the gallery navigates a market that is likely to remain challenging for the foreseeable future. The departures of Redgrift and Forest are part of this transition, and their successors will inherit the challenge of defining Pace's identity in a post-expansion art world. The gallery's ability to attract and retain top talent in this new environment will be a key indicator of whether its restructuring has created a sustainable model or simply deferred deeper problems.