In season one of 'Emily In Paris', the Vincent van Gogh immersive museum experience was an art exhibition highlight. Photo: AFP
Emily In Paris has established itself as a powerful trendsetter for fashion thanks to the extravagant outfits of its heroine, Emily Cooper.
Many brands clamour to be featured in the TV show in the hopes of boosting their sales. A phenomenon that has given a few ideas to the museums that make an appearance in the hit Netflix series.
Emily Cooper (Lily Collins) isn’t just a walking wardrobe: she occasionally visits one of Paris’ many art establishments.
In particular, she visited the Pop Air exhibition at the Grande Halle de la Villette with one of her on-again, off-again lovers, Parisian chef Gabriel (Lucas Bravo), in the seventh episode of season three.
We see the two posing amidst various works that Rome’s Balloon Museum put on show in the French capital for a temporary exhibit, or even throwing themselves into a gigantic “ball pool” that gives the impression of a strange effect of gravity.
As the online marketing prodigy the show characterises her as, Emily of course immortalises her visit to this Instagram-friendly setting with numerous selfies. In fact her companion tells her to stop posting before pulling her into the ball pool.
The third season of Emily In Paris was released on Dec 21 on Netflix, four months after the closing of Pop Air – An Inflatable Experience. So it couldn’t have contributed to the success that the exhibition had in Paris (723,000 visitors in five months).
But perhaps Darren Star’s series will drive Italians and visitors in Milan to the Superstudio Piu, where Pop Air is running until Feb 12.
Gabriel (Bravo) and Emily Cooper (Collins) have visited several museums in the series 'Emily In Paris'. Photo: Handout
“This second success (in Paris) kick-started the development across the Atlantic, generating global interest,” Roberto Fantauzzi, the CEO of Lux Eventi behind the show, told Artnet News.
The excitement is evident on the Balloon Museum’s social media channels, especially on Instagram. The museum’s publications featuring scenes from Emily In Paris have received significantly more “likes” than others.
Many Internet users are asking the Italian art institution to mount the Pop Air exhibition in their home country.
A marketing boost
This is not the first time that Emily In Paris has helped boost an exhibition.
The TV show already created buzz among the general public for the immersive exhibition on Van Gogh at the Atelier des Lumieres.
Emily visits it with Gabriel and his girlfriend Camille in the fifth episode of season one. A few months after the series arrived on Netflix, American moviegoers learned that two similar immersive experiences about the Dutch painter would be mounted in New York.
Both opened in June 2021, much to the surprise of some fans who confused the two exhibitions. They bought tickets for Van Gogh: The Immersive Experience instead of Immersive Van Gogh, the museum experience seen in Emily In Paris. About 50 of them then decided to take the matter to the Better Business Bureau, according to CBS News.
Rome’s Balloon Museum put on show in Paris for a temporary exhibit, which the characters Emily Cooper and Gabriel from 'Emily In Paris' visited. Photo: Handout
Despite this gaffe, it’s likely that many museums would like to feature as a setting for the next season of Emily In Paris and take advantage of the visibility of the series to boost visitor numbers – even if it can be difficult to measure the impact on ticket sales at the cultural establishments where some scenes were shot.
But above all, appearing in Emily In Paris would allow them to reach a mainstream audience that is not necessarily familiar with classical art.
The Louvre managed to successfully reach this audience, injecting its brand image with a shot of youthful energy by allowing American singers Beyonce and Jay-Z to shoot the video for the song APES*** in its galleries in 2018.
The video shows the musical duo in the midst of some 20 landmark works from its collection, including Theodore Gericault’s The Raft Of The Medusa, Jacques-Louis David’s The Consecration Of The Emperor Napoleon And The Consecration Of The Empress Josephine and, of course, Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa.
A genuine publicity coup for the museum: the video was viewed nearly 17 million times in 72 hours. The Louvre has capitalised on this public interest by offering a tour in connection with APES***. It remains to be seen if Emily Cooper has the power to trigger as many followers as Queen B. – AFP
