A visitor views works on display at a special exhibition at the National Museum of Korea showcasing 52 paintings from the National Gallery in London. (National Museum of Korea)

The National Museum of Korea in Seoul ranked sixth in terms of its total number of visitors in 2023, in a survey of 100 museums and galleries worldwide.

According to the UK-based Art Newspaper, the figure for the state-run museum came to 4,180,285. The Louvre Museum in Paris topped the list with 8,860,000 visitors and the Vatican Museums followed with 6,764,858. The British Museum in London ranked in third place with 5,820,860 visitors followed by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York at 5,364,000. London’s Tate Modern art gallery ranked in fifth place with 4,742,038 visitors.

The report found the NMK was the most visited museum in Asia, followed by the M+ museum in Hong Kong and Japan’s National Art Center, Tokyo. They each reported 2,797,616 and 2,250,758 visitors, placing them in 15th and 21st place, respectively, on the top 100 list.

In 2023, the NMK and its 13 regional museums across the country attracted 10,471,154 visitors combined, surpassing the 10 million mark for the first time.

The all-time record was achieved thanks to special exhibitions held regularly at the museums, NMK officials said at the time, citing, in particular, a special exhibition of the collection donated by the late Samsung Group Chairman Lee Kun-hee, a prolific collector of Korean and contemporary art.