The Van Gogh Museum is bringing back Pokemon – Kommersant FM
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The Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam will resume selling Pokemon cards. The last similar event led to real chaos: the game card “Pikachu in a Gray Felt Hat” was sold out online, and huge queues lined up at the museum’s ticket office. As planned, collectible souvenirs were supposed to attract a teenage audience. As a result, museum attendance did increase, but the number of complaints also increased, so management suspended sales. Post-Impressionist Pikachu game cards will be available for online purchase again in February.
Can similar marketing campaigns be used in Russian museums? Kommersant FM art observer Dmitry Butkevich believes that visitors to exhibitions will not accept such an idea: “Of course, the choice of Pokemon as the headliners of the Van Gogh Museum’s movement towards young people is very surprising. It seemed to me that the heroes of this franchise were a thing of the past, but apparently for the Netherlands it is the present. I think this is a bit strange. They have resumed production of their Pokemon, which means they probably still have a demand for it.
If we talk about Russian museums, then, in general, we probably need to use some new methods to attract the public. True, it seems to me that in this case a person will buy these cards with cartoon characters in an online store, but he will not go to the museum.
I would say this is flirting with society. But Russian people tend to have a very serious attitude towards the world around them, including art. Therefore, I think this will not work for us.
In general, all methods are probably good for filling some financial museum gaps. If this works in the Netherlands, let them do it. But still, the psychology of different nationalities varies greatly. This is impossible for us, and with the help of cartoons we probably won’t be able to organize fundraising for the restoration of Vasnetsov’s paintings.”
The Van Gogh Museum began collaborating with the Japanese animation studio in June 2023. The institution decided to celebrate its 50th anniversary with such a collaboration. “Kommersant FM” contacted the heads of state museums and representatives of animation studios and found out how they feel about such projects.
Director of the Pushkin Museum named after. A.S. Pushkin Elizaveta Likhacheva: “Of course it is possible. Modern museums are looking for different ways to attract visitors, especially young people. Traditional art presentation is quite difficult for an audience that has been shaped and raised on moving pictures. Situational marketing is used. For example, some series or some event has exploded, and museums are trying to catch this wave. My personal opinion: everything is possible, art is the most free thing. The Hermitage, for example, sold NFT tokens of paintings from its own collection.”
Director of the Soyuzmultfilm film studio Boris Mashkovtsev: “We see that the integration of animated films into museum spaces is happening. But using, for example, Cheburashka to attract an audience if there is nothing related to animation inside is quite pointless. If you are doing a thematic exhibition, then why not. Last year we organized the exhibition “110 Years of Animation” at VDNKh, and at the entrance to the pavilion, visitors were greeted by a statue of Cheburashka, and in the pop art style. You need to determine exactly why you want to integrate animated characters into a classic museum space. If it’s just for advertising and there’s no philosophy behind it, then I think even the exhibition curators themselves don’t need it.”
Director of the Moscow Museum of Modern Art Vasily Tsereteli: “When interactivity and involvement appear, visiting museums becomes very interesting, especially for the younger generation. Finding Pokemon in the museum is a new theme. It seems to me that it could also take place in other countries too. In our case, for example, a company that produced equipment and telephones became the general partner of the museum. They provided funds for the development of the site, the opportunity to publish books, and exhibition projects. And we helped this company advertise itself through the creation of mutually interesting projects. I think the more such cartoons are connected with the museum, the more beautiful it will be.”
Director of the cartoon “Three Cats” Dmitry Vysotsky: “As part of the Black Square project, the management of the Erarta Museum came up with the idea that contemporary art is not very understandable, perhaps to the general public. So I came up with a character named Nemalevich, actually Malevich’s “Black Square” come to life. The museum released, I think, 12 episodes. The Russian Museum came up with audio tours for children, which were read in the voices of three cats, the horse Julius, voiced by me, and Krosh from Smeshariki. This was the experience. Although, in my opinion, there is some kind of destruction of the world of any animated series if an already existing character suddenly finds himself in some museum and begins to speak in words other than his own.”
In the fall, many visitors to the Van Gogh Museum tried to obtain limited-edition Pikachu cards for resale. On eBay, the cost of the souvenir reached €900. As a result, we had to limit the distribution: one souvenir per hand.
Everything is clear with us – Telegram channel “Kommersant FM”.
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