Audiences

IMMA’s 30th birthday and extensive programming presented a variety of opportunities to build IMMA’s profile among new audiences across national media throughout 2021.

Highlights included:

• The launch of the new creative partnership with The Dean Arts Studio in February attracted much media attention with representatives from IMMA, the Dean and the Resident Artists being interviewed on RTE News, Six One, Morning Ireland as well as featuring in several print publications.
• IMMA was chosen by the RTE One travel programme No Place Like Home presented by Kathryn Thomas, to be the home to their second programme in the series. The show was broadcast from the Formal Gardens on 29 August and has been repeated twice since. This was a very competitive process to be selected as the Dublin venue for the series and our success is a result of extensive engagement with Fáilte Ireland, who back the programme, over the past 18 months.
• IMMA was featured prominently on the special opening segment of the Late Late Show for Culture Night. The piece which began in the courtyard before moving through The Narrow Gate of the Here-and-Now by torchlight, highlighting a number of the new acquisitions, including a live performance of Yellow by Amanda Coogan.
• IMMA received a slot on the popular radio programme On the Record with Gavan Reilly on NewsTalk, focusing on the history of IMMA on the occasion of our 30th birthday in a report by historian Donal Fallon. IMMA at 30 was also covered by the Three Castles Burning podcast which discussed IMMA’s historical journey ‘from an idea to a reality’.

IMMA ran its first year-long digital marketing campaign to celebrate its birthday and promote the institution. This included our new IMMA30 logo, IMMA’s first ever animated logo, designed by Thinkhouse, and social media branding to reflect four ‘seasons’ of content which encapsulated IMMA’s ethos: IMMA Embraces; IMMA Reflects; IMMA Activates; and IMMA Connects. As a result of this campaign, IMMA was selected to present at the Digital Museum Next Conference in November. IMMA at 30 Digital Marketing Campaign: A Case Study was presented to over 2,000 international industry peers. The live response to the presentation was exceptionally positive and the campaign was commended for its innovative and creative approach.

Although audiences were understandably reduced due to Covid-19, the 138 events and four commissions that made up the IMMA Outdoors programme, attracted 180,205 visitors of all ages to the site, an increase of 280% on the 2020 pilot initiative. Thanks to IMMA Outdoors, visitor figures over the summer reached 80% of pre-pandemic attendance, much higher than the industry standard. As IMMA Outdoors moved into Winter at IMMA, the appetite for outdoor events remained strong, culminating in the highly acclaimed commission DREAMSPHERE by Aoife Dunne which continued to bring large numbers to the site right through the winter.