Vermeer Has Dominated Global Museum Visits In 2023

Topline

The most popular museum exhibition in 2023 so far is the blockbuster show of works by artist Johannes Vermeer at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, the most complete collection of his works ever, drawing sold-out crowds.

Key Facts

Big Number

1.73 million. That’s the total number of visitors to the Rijksmuseum in 2022, according to data published by the Art Newspaper, making it the 23rd most-visited museum in the world. The top 10 most popular art museums in the world are the Louvre (7.7 million visitors in 2022), Vatican Museums in Vatican City (5 million visitors), the British Museum in London (4 million), the Tate Modern (3.9 million), the National Museum of Korea in Seoul (3.4 million), the Musée d’Orsay in Paris (3.3 million), the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. (3.3 million), the Metropolitan Museum of Art (3.2 million), Centre Pompidou in Paris (3 million) and the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg (2.8 million).

What To Watch For

Museum attendance figures are largely not publicized and there is no official ranking of attendance figures for museum exhibitions, making it difficult to gauge the most-visited exhibitions beyond the Vermeer show. Total attendance figures for museums are typically calculated on a yearly basis, so it’s also unclear what overall visitation figures look like so far in 2023. Additionally, some well-publicized exhibitions taking place this year are still going on and attendance data would not be available yet, such as the Met Costume Institute’s Karl Lagerfeld exhibition, which continues through July 16.

Surprising Fact

The National Gallery in Washington, D.C., removed the attribution for one of the Vermeer paintings in its collection, Girl with a Flute, in October 2022, saying it had determined after an extensive analysis that the work was actually painted “by an associate of Vermeer—not by the Dutch artist himself.” The painting still appeared in the Rijksmuseum exhibition as a work by Vermeer, however, with the Guardian reporting the museum had come to the opposite conclusion and said it was “crystal clear” the painting was authentic.

Key Background

Museums around the world are still coming back from the Covid-19 pandemic, when they remained shuttered for months, as tourism begins to rebound. A survey conducted by the American Alliance of Museums in March and April found only one-third of museums who responded to the survey have returned to pre-pandemic levels, while the other two-thirds are averaging 71% of their pre-2020 crowds. The Museums Association in the U.K. found museum and gallery attendance in the country went up by 158% in 2022 as compared with 2021, though attendance had not yet returned to where it was pre-pandemic.

Further Reading

Can European Museums Lure Visitors Once Again? (Hyperallergic)

There will never be another Vermeer show as great as this one (Washington Post)

Why Are So Many Once-in-a-Lifetime Art Exhibitions Happening in Our Lifetime? (Bloomberg)

Tickets to Sold-Out Vermeer Show Are Going for Hundreds (Hyperallergic)

650,000 People Saw the Rijksmuseum’s Blockbuster Vermeer Exhibition (ARTnews)