Mr. Luers doubled the provision of the museum, modernized its financial systems, extended its staff to 1,800 full -time employees, said the Walter Annenberg collection of $ 1 billion of French impressionist and postimpressionist paintings for the museum, and supervised the construction of new galleries, wings, exhibitions and public programs. When he resigned, the museum had a budget of $ 116 million, and the crowds that often exceeded 50,000 visitors on weekends.
In 1990, Mr. Luers organized Mr. Havel, who was conferreding with President George W. Bush on a state visit to the White House, to make a trip to New York to visit the museum. It was a moving meeting for Mr. Luers, who returned many times to the Czech Republic for meetings with old friends and Mr. Havel, who died in 2011.
After With, Mr. Luers was president and president of the United Nations Association of the United States, which provides research and other UN services for many years, also directed the Iran project, a non -governmental organization that supported the negotiations of the United States with Iran.
Mr. Luers, who had houses in Manhattan and Washington Depot, wrote dozens of articles for foreign policy and rookies magazines, including Times. He gave lectures widely and taught at the Universities of Princeton, George Washington, Columbia and Seton Hall, and at the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University. The past fall launched a memory, “unusual company: dissidents and diplomats, enemies and artists.”
“My greatest satisfaction was the success of Vaclav Havel,” he said in the 2022 interview. “Havel demonstrated my point that culture makes a difference, especially in international relations. The communist system was deeply burning. He underestimated the influence of cultural leaders” on people. “
Alex Traub Contributed reports.
