San Domenico. 70,000 for the portraits: "And the next exhibition will be really big"

A few days after its closing, it is time to take stock of the 20th major exhibition at San Domenico, 'The Portrait of the Artist', which ended with 70 thousand visitors. "A good result - comments Gianfranco Brunelli , general director of major exhibitions and vice president of the Carisp Foundation - especially if you consider that this was a complex exhibition".

Then he gets to the heart of the analysis. "We really appreciate the high participation of schools and groups, despite the decrease in individual visitors compared to those recorded in the Pre-Raphaelite exhibition. Our goal is to maintain very high standards from a scientific point of view, with exhibitions that are always unrepeatable". Over the months of the exhibition, a sample analysis was carried out involving over 800 visitors, in order to draw as faithful a portrait as possible. The majority of visitors are between 45 and 65 years old (39.3%), but the 24-64 age group is also high (37.5%), while 23.2% are over 65. The San Domenico public appears to be decidedly cultured, in fact 60.2% have a degree or equivalent qualifications and 30.7% have a high school diploma. The majority (74.2%) arrive in the city by car and 18.1% by train; 4.3% on foot or by bike and 1.1% by bus. 2.3% arrive by plane 'or other'.

Visitors to major exhibitions are true art enthusiasts, so much so that 48.5% said they had seen up to 3 exhibitions in the last 12 months, and 32.7% even more than 3; for 18.7% 'The Portrait of the Artist' was the first of the year. Furthermore, 68.4% of those interviewed said they had visited at least one other exhibition at San Domenico, "a sign – comments Brunelli – that there is a hard core that has been following us for some time".

Another plus: 93.5% of the sample was in Forlì to visit the exhibition and only a small percentage was in the city for tourism or other reasons, demonstrating that the temporary installations organized by the Foundation are an important catalyst for attention towards the city. "The experiment involving Gene Gnocchi also went well: the comedian held five semi-serious lessons in the refectory that were always sold out".

In the meantime, we are thinking about the future: "We are already working very actively on the new exhibition – confirms Brunelli – which will also be held from the end of February to the end of June. We will officially present it in August, but I can already anticipate that it will be a great exhibition in the true sense of the term: something comparable to the Pre-Raphaelites".