A historic shakeup of Italy’s museum directors has been thrown into disarray, after the courts overruled a decision by the country’s Culture Ministry on the appointment of five new museum directors.

In 2015, the Italian government sought out 20 museum directors, seven foreign, to run Italy’s top cultural institutions with the hope of kicking its stuttering museums sector into gear.

An administrative court in Lazio however has ruled that five of the 20 appointments were null and void, saying one foreigner appointed should never have been eligible and that the selection process had not been transparent. The court also objected to the fact that some of the candidates were interviewed over Skype.

The Culture Ministry has disputed the ruling, saying in a statement that recruitment had been carried out "in accordance with not only European and national law but also with the highest international standards, as recognised by the International Council of Museums".

It also credited the appointments and change in governing structure with an increase of 7.5 million annual visitors to its museums between 2014 and 2017. Revenue has also increased by 38 per cent in that time, according to official figures.

"The world has seen Italian museums change in two years and now the tribunal cancels the appointment of five directors," said culture minister Dario Franceschini on Twitter. "I'm speechless."

The government has said it will appeal the ruling, but it leaves a number of museums without a director, with suspensions affecting institutions in Naples, Taranto, Reggio Calabria, Modena and Mantua. Austrian Peter Assmann, director of Mantua’s Ducal Palace, was the only foreign director affected.

“The international selection of the directors was made by an absolutely impartial commission made up of the director of the National Gallery in London, the director of Berlin’s most important cultural institution, the president of Venice’s Biennale and a person who had just been nominated as an adviser to President Macron,” said Franceschini. “There could not have been greater transparency and neutrality.”

The new change in direction is designed to bring Italy’s top museums in line with the world’s top museums and galleries. The shakeup in policy also seeks to give directors a larger influence over annual budgets and allow easier methods of raising private income in the face of drastic funding cuts.

Speaking at the time of the appointments, Franceschini said that the organisation of Italian museums would “turn a page and recover,” adding that Italy’s museums had taken a “historic step for Italy that will establish the basis for a modernisation of our museum system.”

An official decision will be made on 15 June pending an appeal. If the ruling then goes through, the five institutions left without a director will be managed by the heads of the museum groups in their respective regions.