If you visited the recent Caravaggio exhibition at the National Gallery and thought it was quite busy, you’re not wrong. The gallery has revealed that it was their third most visited exhibition of the past decade.
The one-room display featured the last painting known to have been made by Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, along with the letter that uncovered its identity in the 1970s.
The free exhibition received a total of 286,298 visitors over 95 days. That is an average of 3,014 visits per day. That made it the 10th most visited exhibition in National Gallery history both in terms of total attendance and average daily attendance – as well as the third busiest of the past decade.
The combination of being a famous artist, and the clever branding of this as the Last Caravaggio in the marketing, and candidly, that it was a free exhibition doubtless all contributed to the show’s popularity.
National Gallery Director, Dr Gabriele Finaldi, says “Among the great masters of the past Caravaggio exercises a mesmerising attraction on contemporary audiences. A rare opportunity to see the work, Caravaggio’s own powerful storytelling and the engaging narrative around ‘The Martyrdom of Saint Ursula’ as the artist’s last painting made just weeks before his early death, help explain the success of the National Gallery’s exhibition.”
This article was published on ianVisits
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