Why Do People Visit Art Exhibitions?

The research question presented in this video focuses on the experiences and motivations of visitors to an art exhibition or museum. In order to establish the motivation for exhibition visits, VOLKER KIRCHBERG explains, the research team combined a variety of methodological approaches: questioning the visitors, measuring their cognitive and emotional responses, and tracking their movements through the exhibition. They found three different visitor types – corroborating earlier studies – and also realized that long-standing assumptions about the motivation of people to visit an exhibition might be wrong. In contrast to established beliefs, the contemplative visitor type who wants to see and decode the actual art is by far a minority among the attendants of an exhibition. The researchers’ realization could have a practical influence on the decisions of exhibition curators who want to increase the number of visitors.