Museum circles are rejoicing this weekend, as two very popular exhibitions close: At the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, Chihuly: Through the Looking Glass is on track to be the museum’s fifth most popular exhibit ever. Although we won’t know the final number until tomorrow, when it closes a day after originally planned, more than 360,000 people had seen the show as of Friday morning. So the final total could be on the order of 400,000.
In New York, Alexander McQueen mania is even more virulent. In horrible heat and humidity, people have been waiting four hours to get in to see Savage Beauty (right), as his costumes have been tagged. The Met has extended hours, and in a final flourish announced that it would stay open till midnight Saturday and today — something it has never tried before and a move I applaud.
The McQueen attendance last number I saw — it was unclear from the reports exacty when this was taken — was 650,000, the highest ever for a Costume Institute exhibition and, probably, the eighth most popular exhibit ever. It’s touch-and-go whether its attendance will move into the No. 7 slot, edging out last year’s Picasso exhibition, which drew 703,256 visitors.
Word of mouth and savvy marketng, as well as the shows’ content, have undoubtedly contributed to their popularity. In one of the strangest tactics I’ve heard, on Saturday the Wall Street Journal reported that the international component in the Met-McQueen lines was strong as “several people said airline pilots had advised them to check out the exhibit while they were in New York as their flights landed in the city.” That’s a new one.
All this seems like good news, a shot in the arm for both museums, who are benefitting from increased admission fees, shop revenue and memberships.
But let’s look at where these exhibits fit in the overall picture for both museums. In Boston, four exhibits have racked up better attendance records than Chihuly:
- Monet in the 20th Century (1998);
- Monet in the ’90s (1990);
- Renoir (1985-85)
- Pompeii 79 AD (1978)
Each of the first three attracted more than a half-million people, and Pompeii drew 432,000.
And at the Met, the top exhibits are:
-
Treasures of Tutankhamun (1978-79), 1,360,957 visitors
-
The Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci (1963), 1,077,521
-
The Vatican Collections: The Papacy and Art (1983), 896,743
-
Painters in Paris: 1895-1950 (2000-01), 883,620
-
Origins of Impressionism (1994-95), 794,108
-
The Horses of San Marco (1980), 742,221 (below)
-
Picasso in The Metropolitan Museum of Art (2010), 703,256
Notice anything about both lists? No, I’m not talking about the art on view, that all the previous top shows involve better art, in my view, than Chihuly or McQueen. That is true, but…
No, another scary thing is that all of those exhibits took place in the 20th Century, except for Picasso at the Met, and with Painters in Paris straddling. The 21st Century’s blockbusters are not only scarces, but also about craft and fashion. And one can’t blame population — Boston’s is growing, as is New York’s. So are the populations of the surrounding metro areas.
These statistics are either a commentary on museum attendance in general — which some studies show is declining — or on blockbusters, or lack thereof.
But let’s go back to those airline pilots. Were they asked to say something, or did word of mouth get to them, too? Probably the later.
To me, this all says that people will come if they’re excited enough about what they’ll see. At the McQueen exhibit, many people remarked about its theatrical presentation, for example. Art can be made much more exciting than museum often make it. Even as resources shrink, or level off, it’s a brave museum that attempts to cut back on presentation, programming or marketing. Perhaps a foolish one, too.
UPDATE, 8/8: The Met says the final figure for attendance at the McQueen exhibition was 661,509, and said that on Mondays, when admission cost $50, more than 17,000 people came — adding some $850,000 to the Met’s coffers.
Here’s more, from the press release:
During the run of the retrospective, more than 23,000 new Members joined at the Museum–more than double last year’s comparable numbers.
The exhibition catalogue has sold well over 100,000 copies to date through the Met’s book stores and website, as well as through other outlets, with distribution by Yale University Press. Popular McQueen merchandise in the Met Shops, including armadillo shoe ornaments, crystal skull paperweights, and tartan purses, sold out several times and were repeatedly reordered.
The exhibition could not be extended further because the galleries need to be turned over for the preparation of the exhibition “Wonder of the Age”: Master Painters of India, 1100-1900, which will open on September 28.