Public, Lured by Hype, Flocks to N.Y. Art Show

If you build it--even with elephant dung, bisected pigs and a severed cow’s head--and call it art, they will come.

They did by the hundreds Saturday at the Brooklyn Museum of Art, where the much-maligned and mega-hyped “Sensation” exhibition drew an overflow crowd of art lovers, scene makers and the merely curious at $9.75 each.

More than 9,200 people toured the show, filling the space to capacity. Police remained on site until the museum closed at 11 p.m., though authorities said the scene was calm.

The crowd began queuing up three hours before the opening, which attracted scores of angry protesters upset by art that was deemed religiously offensive or about animal cruelty. Several museum visitors said that Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani’s bitter opposition to the show had actually prompted them to attend.

“Rudy got me here,” Marvin Schneider said. “I was interested in seeing this after what he said.”

An early ripple of public-opinion polling indicates that the mayor’s attacks, which his opponents suspect have much to do with his expected senatorial campaign, may not be playing in the city. A Daily News phone poll of 508 New Yorkers, published Friday, found that 60% agreed with the museum’s position that withdrawing city funds violated its 1st Amendment rights. Nationally, the University of Connecticut’s Center for Survey Research and Analysis conducted a phone survey of 500 adults and found that 57% agreed that the museum had the right to show the controversial artworks.