A Guide To Uffizi Museum’s Beautiful TikTok Presence

How one Italian museum referenced memes to showcase their collection during the coronavirus.

Museums have been hit hard by the social-distancing measures enforced across the globe due to the pandemic. As many companies and organizations struggle to maintain relevancy in this time, social media has become a greater tool to reconnect to patrons. The Uffizi museum in Italy boasts an impressive collection of timeless art and, as Insider and The New York Times reported, they are truly kicking butt on TikTok by straying away from conventional museum advertising and conforming to the platform’s culture. The museum’s TikTok account, which was started in April, has accumulated over 26,000 followers in a few months. Here’s some of the things they did right.

Addressing Coronavirus

This museum has chosen to take a light-hearted approach to the coronavirus pandemic and use the art in their museum to interact with the daunting subject. In one video, the account used “Spring” by Sandro Botticelli to comedically address social-distancing. In another video, a Caravaggio painting of Medusa is shown turning an illustration of the virus into stone and wearing a mask. Although this example doesn’t constructively address issues, it fits in with many of the absurdist memes on the platform and made their followers chuckle.

Bored In The House

In March, one TikToker created the Bored In The House song about self-quarantine and it has been used in thousands of TikTok videos. The Uffizi museum used the sound clip to showcase their painting “Lady in White” by Giovanni Boldini but added some lipsyncing to the painting. With both the sound clip and lipsyncing being popular on the app, the museum gained thousands of likes.

Gummy Bear Challenge

Adele’s 2011 song “Someone Like You” has been a popular sound used on TikTok and inspired the goofy Gummy Bear Challenge in 2018 making the song even more popular on the app. The Uffizi museum took advantage of the sound clip’s page views and featured a lonesome sculpture by Pietro Tenerani to match the song’s sentiment.

In My Feelings Challenge

In 2018, the In My Feelings dance was all the rage on TikTok and Instagram and, recently, on TikToker gained some traction for reminding the platform of the trend. Hoping on those sound clip views, the Uffizi used Drake’s song to show off one sculpture of a woman reading a letter to match the lyrics “Keke, do you love me? Are you riding? Say you’ll never ever leave from beside me ‘Cause I want ya, and I need ya.”

Blinding Lights

One popular trend to hit TikTok during quarantine has been the Blinding Lights Challenge which involves family members dancing an over-enthusiastic dance to the song “Blinding Lights” by The Weeknd. The hugely popular trend took a hilarious turn on Uffizi’s account when they uploaded a video of a naked Bronzino portrait leaving the painting and traipsing around some gardens.

Pride

In keeping with the museum’s theme, the Uffizi nodded to Pride Month using some spicy paintings and sculptures. Their captions were simple, light-hearted and were able to reach thousands of viewers.