AMSTERDAM.- This year, more than 1.6 million visitors have paid a visit to the Van Gogh Museum – despite the fact that the Kurokawa wing was not accessible to visitors as a result of the construction of the new glass entrance building at the side of Museumplein. Compared with 2013, this is a 10% increase. Biggest attractions were the Félix Vallotton : Fire beneath the Ice exhibition, the Emmy Andriesse photo exhibition, the spectacular new presentation of the museum and the successful Friday Nights.

More visitors, fewer crowds
Despite the large number of visitors, the public has experienced the museum as less crowded. Thanks to the online ticket sales with starting times (12% of the entire number of tickets sold), the museum can facilitate more visitors. This visitor distribution creates the best possible experience for the public. The extended opening hours, the extra evening hours on Fridays and Saturday in particular, also result in greater distribution: in addition to the regular Friday Nights, the museum was also open on Saturdays until 10 p.m. during the months of July and August; this relatively quiet Saturday night attracting many Dutch visitors especially. The Friday Nights with their special peripheral programming are immensely popular (an average of 1000 to 1500 visitors per evening). The majority of visitors are from the Netherlands (17%), Italy (12%), France (10%), US (9%) and Great-Britain (8%).

Leading online position
The renewed museum website was launched in 2014 and it immediately won the webdesign award Developer award and the Honorable mentionof awwwards.com. Visitors of the renewed website can now discover the entire collection by means of high-quality images: The entire museum collection can now be viewed full screen. The website focuses on the colourful stories about Vincent van Gogh and the museum collection, unravelled in many different ways. The website was visited 2.5 million times by 1.9 million visitors in 2014. The online Van Gogh Museum network also expanded exponentially: the fan base on Facebook increased from 200,000 to 500,000, on Twitter from 75,000 to 100,000 and as many as 4 million Van Gogh fans follow the museum via Google+. Subsequently, the museum holds a leading online position in the Netherlands, and with Google+ it even holds the number 1 position among museums worldwide.

Museumplein
The Museumplein – with the newly reopened Rijksmuseum, the new wing of the Stedelijk Museum, the programming of the Concertgebouw, the Koninklijk Concertgebouworkest and the new presentation of the Van Gogh Museum – has a unique overall appeal and has also attracted a huge number of visitors. The cultural institutions at the Museumplein have jointly attracted 5.7 million visitors this year. The number of people visiting Amsterdam – and in turn the museums – has increased. TheTourist Barometer of Amsterdam Marketing showed a 4% increase in the number of museum visitors in Amsterdam until October 2014.