The Louvre Abu Dhabi was cancelled in September the ‘premiere’ of ‘his’ Christ of Leonardo da Vinci without giving any reasons or time limits
The museum of a thousand million
The Louvre Abu Dhabi, a whim of the late emir sheikh Zayed bin Sultan al Nahyan, celebrates his first year of life with more than a million visitors. A substantial figure for a peninsula so blessed with the manna of the petrodollars as an orphan until now art. Its anniversary also marks the rotation of a portion of his collection to arrival of the capital gala.
The statistics of pilgrims who have passed by the branch emiratí -located on the island of Saadiyat, to the shores of the sea and about a five-minute drive from the centre of Abu Dhabi – had been a taboo during these first 12 months. “I’m not surprised but I’m happy with the breakdown of visitors. The 60 percent are foreigners who visit the country and 40 percent of the residents in the United Arab Emirates, both emiratíes as expatriates”, declares Manuel Rabaté, director of the museum.
The classification of those who arrive from abroad to peek into the rooms of the Louvre of the desert is led by indians, followed by French, germans, chinese, british and americans. Since it opened its doors last November, the institution has received a thousand school trips and 5,000 guided tours and has scheduled 115 cultural events, including film screenings, concerts and symposia with the participation of 400 artists from 22 countries.
The first anniversary -whose party has been in charge of the british singer Dua Lipa, of roots, and Albanian kosovars – has also served to balance the geography of a museum designed by the architect, frenchman Jean Nouvel, with a dome silver from 180 metres long, which filters the light through a canvas of 8,000 star metal and blanket a maze of 23 permanent galleries, exhibition rooms, temporary, a children’s museum, an auditorium, restaurants and a center of research by mimicking the intricate physiognomy of an arab medina.
“The data are very interesting because the major museums of the world act as magnets of tourism. Our figures reflect a balance between two goals: to be a museum for the people here, a place of education and enjoyment for residents while also plays its part in the development strategy of Abu Dhabi as a tourist destination,” confirms Rabaté. The statistics amounted to a newcomer among the 70 most visited museums in the world and the first in the region, ahead of the 400,000 souls who trample in 2017 the rooms of the Museum of Islamic Art in Qatar.
Visitors at the Louvre of Abu Dhabi. GIUSEPPE CACACEAFP-PHOTO
Your data, however, are far from those of its parent. The Louvre in Paris, the largest art museum on the planet, managed to the past year, and 8.1 million visitors, an increase of 14 percent in comparison with their previous records. The most visited in Spain, the Reina Sofia in Madrid, received for example in 2017 3.8 million visitors.
The subsidiary of the arab Louvre reported a mouth-watering amount of money to the coffers galas. In exchange for 400 million euros, the United Arab Emirates will use the name of the institution in paris for 30 years and six months. The country disburses also 1,000 million euros in concept of advice and management to the Louvre and other museums of the capital of the Light.
Fruit of the controversial agreement, the emiratíes have access to the loan collection of painting, archeology and sculpture of 13 museums gauls. In total, some 250 works from the old continent living now in their rooms with the own funds of the emirate, composed about 600 works acquired to the beat of petrodollars since a decade. The royal family hopes to make the surroundings of the Louvre in an oasis of culture imported directly from the West with the establishment of a franchise of the Guggenheim sculpted by Frank Gehry and a third museum hatched by the british Norman Foster, both still under construction.
With the first anniversary precisely expires part of the loan and inaugurates the system of rotation agreed upon. Some of the works that are exhibited today in their rooms -as the self-portrait of Vincent van Gogh and the works of Cezanne and Matisse – will return home while it is shipped to the arabian peninsula a new package of 40 pieces, among them Madame Louis Joachim Gaudibert by Claude Monet and The dance hall in Arles by Vincent van Gogh, exposed until now in the Musée d’orsay.
the address of The museum has expedited the acquisitions, aimed to provide the centre with a collection based on the influence of cross-cultural and the pieces that illustrate milestones in the history of art. Recently announced 11 new purchases while maintaining the suspense around Salvator Mundi, a painting attributed by some misgivings Leonardo da Vinci, which was sold last year to a saudi prince for a record $ 450 million and that the Louvre Abu Dhabi was displayed in their galleries. Last September she cancelled her presentation in society and has not provided a release date.
beyond the controversies, the museum will host from next February 14, the temporary exhibition Rembrandt and the golden age of the netherlands, which will bring the works of the SEVENTEENTH century, on loan from Paris and the private collection in Leiden, a treasure located in New York, 250 Dutch paintings who earlier this year traveled to Russia. In the spring, will stage a photo exhibition in collaboration with the Museum of quai Branly, Jacques Chirac, an institution of ethnological located in the VII District of Paris.
Since the beginning of November, the labyrinth of the Louvre’s arab hosts the exhibition ” Roads to Arabia-archaeological treasures of Saudi Arabia, a show of cultural diplomacy of the neighboring kingdom who has toured european cities, american and asian since 2010 and which landed in Abu Dhabi when the saudi monarchy litigates with the discrediting international which has resulted in the murder of the saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, in the consulate of saudi arabia in Istanbul.
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