tiff picture palace

TIFF is pulling the plug on their ambitious new exhibition

A jazzy new exhibit at TIFF Bell Lightbox is calling it quits two months earlier than expected, due to low attendance.

TIFF's Picture Palace—an immersive, selfie-driven exhibit about the world of film—only launched in early March, but will be wrapping up next Sunday instead of at the end of July. 

"Attendance has been less than anticipated, so we have decided to close the show earlier than its original July 28 date," said TIFF's Artistic Director, Cameron Bailey, in a statement. 

Apparently, not enough people were feeling (or even knew about) Picture Palace, which offered visitors a chance to do stuff like operate a camera dolly and dance a Bollywood number in front of a green screen for $18 a pop on weekdays, $20 on weekends. 

"All the signs were very good at the launch of TIFF Picture Palace," said a spokesperson for TIFF. 

"The audience is the arbiter of success for any new show or experience and, unfortunately, TIFF Picture Palace hasn't built enough word of mouth to maintain momentum among the city's experience seekers."

The exhibit took over Lightbox's ground-floor sprawling event space with nine different stations. It's unclear how much the exhibit cost TIFF to make. 

"We will learn, and have learned, much about our audience from the exhibition." 

Lead photo by

TIFF


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