Under the claim “Let’s put Sequeira in its rightful place”, an appeal was made to persuade every Portuguese to contribute to the cause. This way, everyone would be trying to help keeping the work of art in the national museum, a place where everyone could appreciate it.

From the combination “a painting + the whole national population + digital channel” came the idea: a mini-site that represented the work of art, virtually, divided into 10 million pixels (the approximate number of Portuguese inhabitants).

Each of these pixels would be sold at 6 cents (10 million inhabitants X €0,06 = €600k). For every 6 cents received, a pixel would light up. The pixels’ selection was based on a gamification structure, because once chosen, on mouse-over, the pixel would highlight the name and photo of the person who sponsored it (by f-connect login).

Because the motive of the painting consisted in several concrete elements (mainly human figures), the motto of the communication was to ask which part of The Adoration of the Magi people would sponsor.

The goal was ambitious: €600,000 in 6 months.

The result? The whole country got involved around the cause and raised more than €745,000.

Results:

• €600,000 raised in less than 6 months (something that has been tried for over 4 years, without success).

• After reaching the objective, €145,623 extra were donated, an increase of +25% to the desired value.

• All major (and minor) media channels covered the initiative, with 629 news and 723 publications on social networks with 91 million impressions, resulting an estimate of more than €2M Advertising Value Equivalency with a favorability rate of 4.8 out of 5.

• As a final result, there was a sense of democratization of Culture, since Domingos Sequeira and “The Adoration of the Magi” became well known to the general public. There was a massive involvement of the Portuguese population with culture in general and with the MNAA in particular.