Montreal Museum of Fine Arts Attendance Up 42% Over 2016

The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA) is proud to announce that in 2017, 1,323,837 people visited its installations, exhibitions and collections, in addition to enjoying a wide range of activities. These unprecedented numbers represent a 42% increase over 2016.

For the third year in its history, the MMFA has surpassed the one-million-visitor mark. The MMFA attributes this major growth to exhibitions that wowed the public, projects that brought people together on the occasion of Montreal’s 375th anniversary, an increased array of cultural and educational activities, and the development of innovative wellness initiatives, all of which made it possible to welcome larger audiences.

The Museum would like to take advantage of this announcement to thank the 121,300 VIP members who support its activities. With this number, the Museum crosses a historic threshold as the MMFA becomes the museum with the largest community of members in Canada, and ranks seventh among art museums in North America according to the Association of Art Museum Directors.

"We would like to extend 1,323,837 thank you to our audiences, who showed up in large numbers in 2017. One year after the inauguration of the Michal and Renata Hornstein Pavilion for Peace, the museum’s new galleries and educational spaces were especially well attended in 2017. Our main exhibitions, including Chagall: Colour and Music, and our many cultural, family, social, musical, and educational activities, have also attracted large crowds. Over the summer, numerous tourists also visited our city to enjoy Montreal’s 375th anniversary celebrations. We wish to thank them profusely, since our audience is important to us in the same way as art is our source of inspiration. Let’s keep the Museum engaged with its city … at the service of our citizens, now more than ever!" states Nathalie Bondil, Director General and Chief Curator of the MMFA.

New Spaces and Colourful Exhibitions

The year 2017 was notable for the swift success of Chagall: Colour and Music (from January 28 to June 13). The largest exhibition ever dedicated to Marc Chagall in Canada closed with an exceptional attendance totalling 302,992 admissions, making it the 5th most widely attended exhibition in the history of the MMFA.

During the year, audiences had a chance to revisit the spirit of the 1960s with Revolution (from June 17 to October 9) and to discover the evolution of the Western genre with Once Upon a Time … The Western: A New Frontier in Art and Film (on view until February 4, 2018), in addition to numerous exhibitions dedicated to artists such as Leila Alaoui, Adel Abdessemed, Meryl McMaster and Nadia Myre.

The MMFA also celebrated the closing of the world tour of The Fashion World of Jean Paul Gaultier: From the Sidewalk to the Catwalk, a retrospective exhibition viewed by more than 2 million people around the globe, featuring the French fashion designer’s most beautiful wedding creations as part of Love is Love: Wedding Bliss for All à la Jean Paul Gaultier (from May 27 to October 20).

Visitors showed up in droves to see the new Michal and Renata Hornstein Pavilion for Peace, which was inaugurated in November 2016 and features 750 works from the Museum’s international collection, along with the other pavilions that host its collections of decorative arts and design, Quebec and Canadian art, and world cultures.

A Unifying Citizen Project to Celebrate Montreal

As part of Montreal’s 375th anniversary celebrations, La Balade pour la Paix: An Open-Air Museum attracted 229,300 visitors from home and abroad as they walked along Sherbrooke Street West, which donned the colours of around 200 world flags. The route, which spanned more than 1 km in the heart of downtown, was designed and organized by the MMFA with the support of McGill University, and gave viewers a chance to admire 72 sculptures and photographs by Quebec and international artists to celebrate Montreal’s humanist values.

Activities for Everyone

Audiences got to enjoy the newly expanded spaces of the Michel de la Chenelière International Atelier for Education and Art Therapy and participate in a wide range of educational, cultural, and wellness activities.

The program includes: film screenings related to the MMFA’s collections and exhibitions; lectures and conversations with artists and experts; music events and concerts programmed by Bourgie Hall in collaboration with the Arte Musica Foundation, in residence at the Museum; and a wide range of free activities for children, families, and seniors in addition to art classes and workshops taught by professional artists and open to the general public.

This is in addition to the numerous custom programs created for people with special needs, developed in collaboration with around 450 partners in the socio-community sphere, and art therapy workshops presented by the Art Hive (with more than 2,000 participants in 2017) – a creative space that provides numerous opportunities for dialogue and sharing among people from a variety of socio-economic backgrounds, ages, cultures, and abilities.

Source: Montreal Museum of Fine Arts