A bit of good news, The Guardian put up an article this afternoon giving a bit of extra attention to this issue. 

Tate Britain has also removed the reference “the most amusing room in Europe” from it’s description of the restaurant. It also removed the quote-“long a whispered, greedy little secret among the capital’s bibulous”.

It has been replaced with new text that says the gallery is “working to become a space that is more relevant, welcoming and inclusive for everyone … Whistler’s treatment of non-white figures reduces them to stereotypes.”

A small step in the right direction, but by no means enough. If they truly want to work on inclusivity, they would remove the restaurant from the mural room. They have stated that ‘the mural was one of the artist’s most significant works and is part of a Grade I-listed historic interiors’ so removal of the panting is unlikely. So the focus should be to remove the location of the restaurant as not only is it grotesque to eat around such harmful racist content, it is fundamentally not something that any person of colour should stumble upon when trying to have a meal out in the capital. 

Lets keep the petition growing and put the pressure on the Tate, thank you for all your signatures and shares!  Black Lives Matter.