The Pitch for Blockbuster Exhibitions
Even if you are not interested in museums, you may have seen ads on buses, billboards, or even your social media feeds for museum exhibitions. These large-scale shows, often called blockbuster exhibitions, have become an important strategy for museums looking to attract broader audiences and generate significant revenue. Examples of this include The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s (MET) 2011 exhibition, Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty, which was one of the most visited exhibitions in the museum’s history, with 661,000 visitors. For context, this is close to the population size of Boston, Massachusetts. Blockbuster exhibitions are not only large-scale attractions but also essential strategic tools that enable museums to expand their audiences, increase revenue, and maintain long-term institutional relevance.
Blockbuster exhibitions attract not only a large audience but also many other financial benefits for a museum, such as increased retail and merchandising sales, corporate sponsorships, membership growth, and a broader museum audience. This can, in turn, convert people who would not normally be interested in attending a museum into museum lovers by breaking that initial barrier.
First, it is important to examine how blockbuster exhibitions significantly increase museum attendance and attract visitors who may not normally visit museums. By featuring well-known artists or culturally significant themes, these exhibitions generate excitement and media attention, attracting a much wider audience. We have seen this attendance not only in recent years but for decades. One of the most influential blockbuster exhibitions was “Treasures of Tutankhamun,” which toured multiple museums from 1976 to 1979, including the National Gallery of Art, the Field Museum of Natural History, the New Orleans Museum of Art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), Seattle Art Museum, The Met, and de Young Museum. This exhibition garnered over 8 million visitors across the eight tour stops listed. This level of attendance not only brought recognition to the exhibition but also financial gains. For comparison, SFMOMA reported about 8 million in ticket revenue for the entire year of 2023. When adjusted with inflation, LACMA’s 2 million in ticket sales from the Tutankhamun exhibition in 1978 would equal almost 10 million dollars today, which would mean this singular exhibition generated roughly 2 million more than SFMOMA’s total annual ticket revenue.
The benefits of a blockbuster exhibition do not stop there; we can also see an increase in merchandise sales and revenue. Blockbuster shows often come with merchandising and retail attached to the exhibition itself. Think T-shirts, posters, catalogs, and more; this is all to capitalize on the influx of visitors’ interest. An example of this is the Rijksmuseum's 2023 Vermeer retrospective, which did very well. Not only was this exhibition well attended, but it also led to an increase in retail sales, with 100,000 copies of the catalog sold.
In addition to the previously mentioned benefits of a blockbuster exhibition, another is that it attracts corporate sponsorship. High-profile exhibitions not only attract us, everyday folks, but also large corporations. By increasing visibility for a non-profit through blockbuster exhibitions, it may attract more corporate donors, especially those seeking visibility and cultural associations with prestigious institutions. We saw this in the Met’s exhibition “About Time: Fashion and Duration” in the fall of 2020, which garnered global media coverage, significant cultural impact, and attracted large audiences, and which the Met explicitly stated was sponsored by Louis Vuitton. By attracting corporate sponsors to exhibitions that directly relate to their brand identity, this creates a sense of public engagement that some of these luxury brands would not get with the average person who is not normally shopping in that price range. Blockbuster exhibitions can also result in long-term corporate sponsors such as the Met’s multiple well-known corporations, TikTok, Morgan Stanley, Bloomberg Philanthropies, etc.
Beyond immediate financial gains, blockbuster exhibitions also help build long-term institutional support through increased membership and repeat visitation. Many attendees visit the museum for a specific high-profile exhibition. This is strategically beneficial for museums. Blockbuster exhibitions can bring in the “wow-factor” and show visitors what they are missing. For example, Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination attracted over 1.6 million visitors. This contributed to a significant increase in museum attendance that year. Museums can capitalize on these visitors by promoting memberships during blockbuster runs. They might offer incentives such as merchandise and exclusive previews. High-attendance exhibitions consistently drive visitor engagement. They create opportunities to convert first-time visitors into long-term supporters. Ultimately, blockbuster exhibitions are not only financially beneficial in the short term. They are also essential for sustaining long-term audience engagement.
In conclusion, blockbuster exhibitions have become vital tools for museums to achieve both immediate and long-term success. Through increased attendance, heightened media attention, expanded retail opportunities, and valuable corporate partnerships, these large-scale shows provide a multifaceted boost to institutions. More importantly, they help reshape public perceptions of museums, welcoming new audiences and fostering deeper community engagement. As the cultural landscape continues to evolve, blockbuster exhibitions will remain an essential strategy for museums striving to remain relevant, financially sustainable, and accessible to all.
Written by: Brooke Olson
Edited by: Katie Breuche
Works Cited
“1,659,647 Visitors to Costume Institute’s Heavenly Bodies Show at Met Fifth Avenue and Met Cloisters Make It the Most Visited Exhibition in The Met’s History - The Metropolitan Museum of Art.” The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Oct. 2018, https://www.metmuseum.org/press-releases/heavenly-bodies-most-visited-exhibition-2018-news.
“About Time: Fashion and Duration | The Metropolitan Museum of Art.” The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 16 Feb. 2021, https://www.metmuseum.org/exhibitions/listings/2020/about-time.
Boehm, Mike. “Curse of the Blockbuster? - Los Angeles Times.” Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, 22 May 2005, https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2005-may-22-ca-kingtut22-story.html.
Hindley, Meredith. “King Tut: A Classic Blockbuster Museum Exhibition That Began as a Diplomati | National Endowment for the Humanities.” National Endowment for the Humanities, 2015, https://www.neh.gov/humanities/2015/septemberoctober/feature/king-tut-classic-blockbuster-museum-exhibition-began-diplom.
Janson, Jonathan. “Vermeer; The Retrospective - Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam (Feb. 10-June 4, 2023).” Essential Vermeer, 2023, https://www.essentialvermeer.com/misc/vermeer-amsterdam-restrospective.html.