More Rent-a-Show Developments: Guggenheim and Louvre

This just in from Deutsche Welle, the German broadcasting news service:

Initially, around 600,000 visitors had been expected to view "The Guggenheim Collection" at the National Art and Exhibition Hall in Bonn, which opened in July 21, yet in the end over 800,000 came to see the show.

"We're extremely pleased," a museum spokesperson told reporters, not least because the 12-million euro ($15.6 million) exhibit broke even with the 600,000th guest and started making a profit after that.

A Guggenheim spokesperson, who did not want to be identified by name, told CultureGrrl that attendance was 811,022, to be exact. The spokesperson had no information about a "break-even point" and did not answer questions about how much the show had enriched the Guggenheim's coffers. The spokesperson added:

The Guggenheim...did not share in revenue streams, such as admissions revenue. The Guggenheim doesn't benefit financially from increased attendance levels. The real windfall for the Guggenheim is in the good press and great public reception of the exhibition which furthers our overall educational mission and strengthens our relationships with other institutions.

...not to mention the munificent rental fee that Bonn's Kunst-und Austellungshalle paid for past shows from the Museum of Modern Art and the State Hermitage Museum and now for the show that was "the most comprehensive exhibition to date from the Guggenheim's extended collection"---some 200 works, Impressionist to contemporary.

Meanwhile, back in Paris, the controversy over Rent-a-Louvre continues, with Henri Loyrette, that museum's director, defending himself yesterday in the pages of Le Monde. The latest developments are contained in Farah Nayeri's report in today's Bloomberg.

As of this writing, there are 2057 signatories to the petition posted by La Tribune de l'Art, supporting the opinion piece by three artworld luminaries in Le Monde, decrying the use of "works of art as currency of exchange."

UPDATE: Why didn't I think of this before? It's not Rent-a-Louvre; it's "Louez le Louvre." I need to extend my wordplay to foreign languages!