Behavioral study of one hundred museum visitors at the Matisse-Picasso

exhibit – in collaboration with the Cantini Museum of Marseilles (France).

Benjamin Courchia1, Sarah Guigui1, Elliot Kaminetzky2, Nicolas Cendo3, Jean-Paul Courchia, M.D4.

(1) Medical School For International Health - in collaboration with Columbia Medical Center.
(2) Yeshiva University, 500 West 185th Street, New York, New York 10033, USA.
(3) Musée Cantini 19, Rue Grignan 13006 Marseille. France.
(4) Hôpital Saint-Joseph. Département d’ophtalmologie. 28 Boulevard de Louvain 13008 Marseille,
France.

Aim of the study

In 2004, 44.28 millions people visited museums in France alone [1]. One hundred of
these visitors were observed and “measured” at the Musée Cantini in Marseilles. Wishing
to figure out the behavior of the visitors, we set out to answer a series of interrogations:
What behavior do visitors adopt during the time devoted to watch the paintings?
How much time, do we actually spend in front of a painting? Whether we are expert in
the field of art or just a curious individual; with or without any artistic knowledge.

Methodology
The Matisse-Picasso exhibit took place during the month of June 2004 at the Musée
Cantini in Marseilles. Twelve masterpieces, from the Orangerie Museum (Paris, France),
were presented to the public of Marseilles while the Orangerie was under renovation.
With the curator’s approval (Mr. Nicolas Cendo), we were authorized to measure the time
spent by each visitor in front of each painting. The investigator, sitting at a bench inside
the exhibition hall recorded (via certain parameters) the visits of one hundred visitors.
The time spent in front of each canvas was recorded using a stopwatch. Also, people who
did not stop at all in front of a painting, were still recorded (as zero seconds observation)
for the average time of observation calculations.
For calculations purposes, several factors were taken into account: sex, age (9-15; 16-40;
41-60; >60 years of age), entrance chosen (Matisse vs. Picasso entrance), whether the
visitors were alone or not, if they commented during the observation, and lastly their
general behavior. The first passage in front of the painting was recorded; subjects who
came back to look at a painting a second time, did not get their “second passage”
included in their observation time.
The paintings were hanged on three walls (Fig 1), twelve works from Henri Matisse (left
and central wall, M1-M10). Two paintings from Pablo Picasso (right wall, P1-P2).
Left wall: M1\ Woman with mandolin, (1921), 47cm x 40cm, M2\ Three Sisters (1917),
93cm x 73cm, M3\ Draped nude extended (1923), 38cm x 61cm.
Central wall: M4\ Odalisque in Red Trousers , (1923), 50cm x 61cm, M5\ Women with
sofa, (1921), 92cm x 73cm, M6\ The girl and the vase of flowers or Naked Rose (1920),
60cm x 73cm, M7\ Blue odalisque or the white slave, (1921), 82cm x 54cm, M8\
Odalisque with grey pants, (1927), 54cm x 65cm, M9\ Women with violin, (1921), 82cm
x 54cm, M10\ The boudoir (1921), 73cm x 60cm.
Right Wall: P1\ The big naked wrap, (1921), 160cm x 95cm, P2\ The large bather, (1921),
182cm x 101cm.

Figure 1: The room with the three walls (right, center, and left). At the entrance, visitors are faced with
the logo of the exhibition. On the left, a biography of Matisse illustrated with a photo; on the right a
biography of Picasso (also illustrated).

Results
(A) Sex:
Our sample was mainly composed of women: 74 Women versus 26 Men.
(B) Age:
The age categories were setup as follows:

Age Categories 9-15 16-40 41-60 >60

Number Of Subjects 1 42 39 18

Table 1: Number of visitors in each age category

(C) Alone or Accompanied?

55 subject were alone while 45 other subjects came accompanied by someone.
This less quantitative data has more to do with the the visit experience, but it is still an
important factor when it comes to the time spent observing the artwork.
We may, for example, evaluate the impact of a bored husband on the time his wife spent
looking at her favorite Picasso. If anything, this criteria must be subjected to some
thought when it is well known that, in 86% of cases, people are accompanied by someone
when they visit a museum (partner, children, friends or family).
(D) Matisse vs. Picasso entrance:
Upon entrance into the exhibit hall, the subjects face a white wall onto which the name of
the exhibition is written (fig. 1). On the left, a biography of Henri Matisse; on the right a
biography of Pablo Picasso. Each biography is illustrated with a picture of each painter.
The subjects are lead toward one of the biographies, and depending toward which one
they went their visit started from the Matisse or the Picasso “side”. From the entrance of
the room three Matisse paintings are seen on the left; on the right, two large Picasso
painting are clearly visible.
72% of visitors started their visit from the Matisse entrance, versus 28% of subjects who
entered through the Picasso entrance (Fig. 2). The sex of the subject was not a factor that
influenced this parameter since for the majority of both males and females the Matisse
entrance was favored.
If one “mode of entrance” predominates, it is maybe because the visitors chose which
painter they wanted to see more. This hypothesis is supported by the calculation of the
observation time in function of the entrance chosen (Fig. 3).

Matisse Entrance Picasso Entrance

Females 68% 32%

Males 85% 15%

Table 2: Comparison of the entrance chosen between male and female subjects.

16 15.36
14.57
Observation Time (sec)

12
28% 10.78
9.84

4
72%
0
Matisse Entrance Picasso Entrance

Figure 2: Entrance chosen by the visitors. Figure 3: Observation time in function of the entrance
Green: percentage of visitors who chose the chosen by the visitors. In Green: time spent in front of
Matisse entrance. Blue: Percentage who Matisse’s paintings. In Blue: time spent in front of
entered through the Picasso entrance. Picasso’s paintings.

Subjects who entered entered the exhibit from the left (Matisse) spent more time looking
at this painter’s work (15.36 vs. 10.78 sec); While subjects who entered from the right
(Picasso) looked at Picasso’s work longer (14.57 vs. 9.84 sec).
(E) Comments on Paintings:
These verbal observations are the result of the visitor who were accompanied during their
visit. Fifty comments were recorded; three comments made by males, and forty seven
others made by females (Fig. 4). Interestingly, no comments were made in front of the
Picasso’s paintings. The number of comments diminish from the first to the last work;
painting #8 excluded, which is the painting put on the exhibition’s poster (Fig 5). This
 8

6%

Number of Comments
6

94% 0

M1 M2 M3 M4 M5 M6 M7 M8 M9 M10 P1 P2

Figure 4: Number of comments per painting

Figure 3: Comments made according to
sex of the visitor.
phenomenon is not related to the subjects’ fatigue since if we analyze the commentaries
made according to the mode of entrance, we find a difference that is quite small. If the
subjects entered through the Matisse entrance the number of comments add up to 20
while if they entered from the Picasso entrance we counted 30 comments. Subject 5, for
example, a woman, enters from the Matisse side, comments on the first eight paintings
and then stops until the end of the visit. Subject 50, a woman, entered from the Picasso
side, starts making comments on M9 (third painting she observes) and then keeps
commenting on all the remaining works. The three most commented paintings are M1,
M2 and M4. Here are two examples of comments that were recorded:
Subject 35 on M3: “the sides that comes out, you have to like that...Matisse! that’s quite
something!”
Subject 48 on M4: “Oh I like that! Works from Matisse are so beautiful!”
(F)Observation Time:
The average time of observation for any given painting is 12.5 seconds ±14.4 sec (Fig 6).
The standard deviation can be explained by the fact that certain individuals did not stop at
all in front of certain paintings (0 seconds) and certain subjects remained in front of
certain paintings up to 2.24 minutes.
It can be noted from figure 6 that two paintings (M5 & M6) were devoted a larger
amount of time than the rest of the works. Women With Sofa (M5): 16.50 seconds and
Naked Rose (M6): 16.51 seconds.
The time taken by the visitors to read the caption of each painting (which increase the
overall observation time) [3] was not counted in the observation time calculations.
Correlations with the visitor’s gender, age or with the dimensions of the painting were
investigated.
- Gender: There is a significative difference (p<0.05) between male (10.46 sec) and
female subjects (13.23sec). Both groups devote more attention to the Matisse paintings;
this fact, though, is more clearly observed within the man population (Fig 7).
- Age: There are no significant difference between the different age categories when it
comes to the time of observation. It is still important to remind ourselves that only one
subject from the 9-15 age category was recorded; more data for that particular age
 17

Observation Time (seconds) 13

M1 M2 M3 M4 M5 M6 M7 M8 M9 M10 P1 P2
Paintings

Figure 6: Average time of observation for each painting. Legend: M=Matisse; P=Picasso

15
13.38 13.23
12.51

11.09
Observation Time (sec)

11 10.46

7.30
8

0
Women Men
Matisse Time Picasso Time Average Total Time
Figure 7: Time of observation according to gender. The average total time of observation is significantly
different based on the sex of the visitors. Also. the subjects devoted a greater amount of time to the painting of
Matisse in comparison to the time spent in front of Picasso’s (this difference is more obvious within the male
population).

group would have been interesting to analyze (Table 3). Aside from the 41-60 age
category, all the other subjects took more time looking at the works of Matisse.
- Size of the painting: Is a painting looked at longer if it is larger? Measuring the area of
each painting revealed that there were no significant differences between these two
 Age Matisse Picasso Total Average
Time

9-15 8.03 ± 2.8 sec 2.69 ± 0.8 sec 7.14 ± 3.3sec

16-40 12.5 ± 2.7 sec 10.5 ± 1.9 sec 12.19 ± 2.6 sec

41-60 12.7 ± 3.5 sec 13.5 ± 0.4 sec 12.86 ± 3.2sec

>60 13.7 ± 2.7sec 7.94 ± 2.4 sec 12.76 ± 3.4 sec

Table 3: Time of observation according to age.

parameters (Fig 8). The largest paintings of the exhibit (all by Picasso) did not generate
a longer observation. Furthermore, paintings M5 and M6 by Matisse received the same
average time of observation and have both two different sizes.

- Overall behavior: During their visit, the behavior of certain subjects were recorded (30
out of 100). On nine different occasions it was noted that subjects were distracted by
young elementary school students sitting on the floor, listening to their teacher. Visitors
bypassed these crowded works, sometimes not coming back to look at the paintings
they skipped. Subject 46 (woman) met her husband at painting M3 without influencing
his observation time. Subject 41, listened to the audio guide on painting M4 and thus
stayed over 1 minute in front of this work.
Subject 14 is an interesting case: Female, 19000
Surface Area (cm2)

over 60 years old, came alone, enters from 14250

the Matisse entrance, ignores the first four
paintings, looks at M5 and M6 9500
simulatenously for 14 seconds, ignores 4750
the last four Matisse, and looks at the two
Picasso for 2 seconds! Total length of 0
M1 M2 M3 M4 M5 M6 M7 M8 M9 M10 P1 P2
observation: 16 seconds. Subject 4 looked
Paintings
autoritarian, she “grabbed” her friend who
Figure 8: Surface area of each painting.
then switched painting and then talks to
her for thirty seconds. The two would then
come sit on my bench to talk about Picasso. Subject 8 enters from the Matisse entrance,
ignore the six first paintings, looks at M7 and M8, then turns back and leaves. Subject
71 observed each painting from a 10 meters distance. Subject 53 read every caption.
Subject 52 came back to look at M8, on which he remained a long time.

Discussion
This study is interesting because of the small number of paintings; it allowed us to obtain
the real time spent in front of a painting since there was no time constraint for the
visitors. All the visitors knew they would have enough time to look at the paintings since
there was only twelve of them. Even though the Musée Cantini offers a permanent
collection and during that period another exhibition (drawings of Fernand Leger) we can
be confident that the visitors observed during this study were not preoccupied by other
paintings they wanted to see in the Musée Cantini during their visit. This suggestion is
based on two hypotheses: the visitors had to buy a specific ticket in order to see this
exhibition and thus took the time necessary to get the most out of what they paid for. The
second hypothesis is that certain visitors came to “discover” the Musée Cantini, or the
Fernand Leger exhibition and ended in the Matisse-Picasso exhibit unwillingly. For
example, subject 28, who came alone, looks at M2 for 2.20 seconds and leaves without
looking at the other works.
The population in this study is mainly composed of women (74%), this data is higher
than the statistic provided by Museostat 2007 (64%) [1].
Do subjects choose the way they enter the exhibit hall based on their preference for one
painter or the other? Studies performed since the 1930’s have shown that the animal
behavior is influenced by experience. According to Krechevsky et. al., a rat in an
unknown maze trying to reach its goal (food in most cases) will turn only right, or only
left, based on its past experiences that yielded a favorable result [5]. Is it possible that
what is known as position preference (benefiting from previous decisions) [6], can be
extrapolated to museum visitors who decide to enter from the left or the right based on
the expected “pleasure” of looking at his (or her) favorite painter?
The time of observation of our sample is similar to the study carried our by Passeron et.
al. [5], who established that the average time of observation for 32 paintings at the Musée
Granet (Aix-en-Provence, France) is 12 seconds. Passeron was fascinated by the
briefness of the interpretation time: “Thus for a visitor, the paintings from both rooms did
not generate more than three minutes of observation.” This applies to our sample too,
since the total time spent looking at paintings adds up to 2 minutes and 50 seconds
(considering the first pass only, if there was a second pass).
Other studies [7] have shown that for 150 visitors at the Metropolitan Museum in New-
York, the average time of observation was 27.5 seconds. According to Smith et. al. [7] it
is visitors who are part of groups or tours that do spend the most time in front of the
paintings. According to the same author, and also to Locher et. al. [8], the observation of
a painting follows a sequence of events through which the visitor “estimates,”
“consummates,” and then “savors” the work. The intrinsic (availability, fatigue,
motivation) [8] and extrinsic (alone or not, access conditions to the paintings)
environmental factors modulate to the time of observation. The contents of the caption is
also a factor that increases the time of observation. If its content informs and imposes an
intellectual task (which would not have been present otherwise) [9] to the visitor. Lastly,
this idea also applies directly to audio guides [10].
It is interesting to note that the painting that was the most watched was not the one from
the billboard of the exhibition. The painting found on the exhibition posters (M8) comes
in fifth position. Our eyes (and to a certain extent our brain) are attracted to things that
are intellectually or emotionally stimulating. Eye movements studies confirm this idea.
Eye fixations are concentrated in complex areas [9] [10]. The two most observed
paintings by Matisse are complex. In the case of the “Naked Rose,” the painting clearly
lacks contrast, our eyes are hesitating when we are discerning between the pale tints of
the chair, the bathrobe, the window and the curtains. In “Woman With Sofa” (second
most observed Matisse painting) the overall scene is what is intriguing, with the body of
the women being barely contrasted, without any colors; letting us think of a night of
mourning. This pictorial enigma is probably responsible for the larger time of
observation.

Conclusion

Observing museum visitors shows how environmental constraints may influence how a
painting is observed. The subjects in this study go through the works quite rapidly. Their
appreciation of each work is accomplished in a matter of seconds, twelve to be precise.
This fact should catch our attention and make us think on two different levels:
First, as a spectator: what are the information collected during this time?
Second, from the artist’s point of view: the painting’s construction, the choice of colors
and shape turns out to be a crucial factor in order to captivate the attention of the visitors.
Finally, as Smith et. al. stipulate, the time spent in front of a painting may seem short but
the entire exhibition is what should be the “unit of analysis,” giving to each work a
limited amount of time.

References

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