Finland’s 154 professionally operated museums attracted a combined total of over 6.6 million visits in 2016. This marks an increase of over a million since 2015.
The five most visited museums in 2016 were the Ateneum Art Museum (397,198), the Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma (319,945), the Helsinki City Museum (315,334), Helsinki Art Museum HAM (253 522) and the National Museum of Finland (177 916). In 2016, Museum Card holders paid a total of 622,692 visits to museums.
Pirjo Hamari, Head of Development at the National Board of Antiquities, sees many reasons for this sudden surge in the popularity of museums, starting with successful new museum concepts, as well as recent exhibitions with wider public appeal. Another key change driving this growth is Finland’s new Museum Card, which gives card holders access to over 240 Finnish museums.
The National Board of Antiquities collects annual statistical data about the operations, finances and personnel of professionally run museums in Finland. The data collected for 2016 is based on preliminary statistics. The official Museum Statistics 2016 will be published later in the spring 2017.
Read more: National Board of Antiquities (article in Finnish)
Image: Sirja Moberg / Frame Contemporary Art Finland