The controversial merger between the Corcoran Gallery of Art, George Washington University and the National Gallery of Art, all in Washington, DC, has received the green light from the district’s Superior Court. In a ruling on Monday 18 August, Judge Robert Okun called the decision “painful,” but concluded that it would be “even more painful to deny the relief requested and allow the Corcoran to face its likely demise.”

Under the terms of the agreement, first announced in February 2014, the beleaguered Corcoran will transfer its historic Beaux-Arts building and its College of Art + Design to George Washington University. The National Gallery of Art will take over a substantial portion of the Corcoran’s 17,000-work collection, which includes paintings by John Singer Sargent and Frederic Edwin Church as well as celebrated photography holdings.