The national contemporary art museum has hired a foreign director for the first time, amid protests of his history of censorship.

The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism said Bartomeu Mari, former head of the Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art, will now head the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art. Mari is the first foreign-born figure to head any institute under the auspices of the culture ministry.

The ministry said Mari will take over from acting director Kim Jeong-bae as early as Dec. 14, and his term will run through 2018.

The post had been vacant since late last year when Jeong Hyeong-min was dismissed over allegations of illegal hiring practices.

Mari has also worked as director of Witte de With, the Dutch Center for Contemporary Art. The ministry said Mari has been able to increase revenue at MACBA despite the sluggish economy in Spain and has also proven his management acumen by expanding cooperative ties with major international partners.

Mari's hiring is expected to cause an uproar in the South Korean art community, which already expressed its dismay at the ministry's decision to make Mari one of its finalists last month.

In March, Mari controversially canned an exhibition at MACBA titled "The Beast and the Sovereign," after two curators and an artist refused to remove a sculpture mocking former Spanish King Juan Carlos. Mari resigned in the aftermath and requested MACBA's board of trustees sack the two curators involved in the exhibition.

In an English-language statement on its Facebook page posted last month, the South Korean artists opposed to Mari's appointment took note of his "inappropriate and unethical decision" in Barcelona. (Yonhap)