Visitor numbers at Finnish art museums and galleries remained at record levels in 2024. The previous year’s visitor record was broken again, according to visual arts statistics published by Frame Contemporary Art Finland. Gallery sales declined for the second year in a row.
Finnish visual arts venues – art museums, galleries and art events – received a total of nearly 5.3 million visits in 2024. The number of visitors increased by 80,000 from the previous year. The information is based on the ninth annual visual arts statistics report published by Frame Contemporary Art Finland.
Art museums remained the most popular destinations. In 2024, Finland’s 67 art museums received a total of over 3 million visits. The five most popular art museum destinations were the Ateneum (581,667 visits), the Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma (230,148), Amos Rex (228,303), the Helsinki Art Museum HAM (141,927), and EMMA – Espoo Museum of Modern Art (140,801) in Espoo. Outside the capital region, the most popular art museum was the Tampere Art Museum with 99,146 visits.
Over 600,000 visits were made to visual arts events, such as biennials and summer exhibitions. This figure includes 29 visual arts events organized in 2024. The most popular events were Lux Helsinki, the Ihmemaa X exhibition in Kerava, and the Porvoo Triennial.
Galleries are frequently visited, but art sales remain at low level
In 2024, there were 127 art galleries operating at 31 different cities in Finland. Galleries received approximately 1.6 million visits during the year, which was almost 50,000 more than in the previous year. A total of 2,800 artists’ works were exhibited in more than 800 exhibitions organized by galleries.
The sales of artworks reported by galleries declined from the previous year’s figures. The total sales of works by galleries responding to the statistical survey declined to approximately €5.2 million, compared to €6.9 million in 2023 and €9.8 million in 2022. In total 1,400 works were sold, almost 1,000 less than in the previous year. Most of the sales were made by private galleries.
“Art museums and exhibitions have established themselves as the most popular cultural destinations in Finland. However, the large visitor numbers do not translate to the economy of the visual arts. The economic situation is currently being reflected in the art market around the world, but in Finland, declining cultural funding and a lack of export support are also hindering the growth of the visual arts sector. The opportunities for visual arts operators to invest in exports, sales, and marketing require long-term support,” says Juha Huuskonen, CEO of Frame.
The Creative Economy Strategy published by the Finnish Government in June aims to strengthen exports and internationalization in the creative industries. Most recently, in September, Business Finland announced that its Exhibition Explorer funding, which galleries have also used to participate in international art fairs, will shut down this year.
Frame’s annual gallery statistics provide comprehensive information on the exhibition and other activities of galleries operating in Finland, visitor numbers, contract and fee practices, art sales and finances, as well as the activities of art lending services operating in connection with galleries.
Download the statistics from Frame website
The annual statistics produced by Frame provide information on changes in the visual arts sector and paint a picture of its diverse field of operators in Finland. As an information center for contemporary art, Frame develops statistics on the visual arts with the aim of producing continuous and comparable time series that enable the monitoring of changes and developments in the field and the forecasting of future trends.
Statistics on art museums, art galleries, and art events, as well as information cards compiled on the basis of these statistics, are published annually on Frame’s website. The information is based on data collected by Frame from galleries and events, museum statistics compiled by the Finnish Heritage Agency, and expert assessments conducted by Frame.
At the moment, statistics and infocards are available in Finnish.
Suzanne Mooney’s exhibition Shatter, Scatter at Photographic Centre Peri in Turku in October 2024. Photo: Anastasia Korpelainen