BEAUTIFUL, INTERESTING
OR USEFUL?

A study about art
museums visitors taste

by Federica Delprino
Supervisor: Emanuele Arielli

IUAV University
Multimedia Arts Undergraduate Degree

My interest towards the topic of my undergraduate thesis was born from some recurring thoughts in my head after a visit of an art museum: what will I remember in weeks, months, years? What did I really like? And mostly: why?

First chapters are a theoretical analysis about the artistic object itself, the concept of “taste” and “beauty”, judgment crisis according to epochs and stereotypes. 

Then I approached to real data: starting a conversation with different Italian museums, I focused on researches made on GNAM and Praz Museum in Rome, Sforza Castle and Civic Museum in Milan.
In particular, on visitors’ feedbacks.

​Considering these different approaches, I’ve made some interviews outside “Peggy Guggenheim Collection” and “Gallerie dell’Accademia” in Venice (also gathering data collected outside “Punta della Dogana” in 2014 for a previous paper).
I considered interesting comparing opinions about Ancient, Medieval, Renaissance, Modern, Contemporary Art.

Final step has been collecting Internet surveys, to take account of different point of views, acquired through a different method.

I understood better how people live their museum experience and what they await approaching to art pieces.