Boston media was abuzz with a new report last week outlining the arts audience and the value of the arts to its citizens. Among the key findings of the study (prepared by the Performing Arts Research Coalition…more on this later): More than three-fourths of greater Bostonians went to a live performing arts event in 2002, […]
Arts manager as evangelist
A few readers took issue (in consent and dissent) with my recent discussion of evangelism on the world wide web. I was suggesting that engaging a broad public in traditional forms of cultural expression (theater, symphony, visual arts, opera, etc.) had many similarities to engaging that same public in religious exploration. Both are a ‘hard […]
Let’s just call it negative growth
So much of what we do in America is based on the assumption of growth. Growth in value and market share are keystones of success in the for-profit world, of course. Among arts organizations and their funders, there’s a notion that success should be measured by the addition of new programs and an increasing annual […]
The old (sacred) bait and switch
What do you do when what you offer the world isn’t immediately appealing to a good chunk of the public? Or when, in fact, what you offer has negative social stereotypes that put people off? Well, if you’re part of an emerging group of evangelical sites (not arts…but wait), you rely on the old bait […]
Cash flow (or lack thereof)
An article in today’s New York Times highlights the cash flow problems of American Ballet Theater, a company who’s history is plagued by that common arts challenge. Similar doom and gloom came in this overview of the Denver arts scene, showing that for many Denver organizations, subscriptions are down, memberships are down, and attendance is […]
Only $6 per month for entertainment nirvana
The Register has a whimsical, number-crunching overview of a proposed music and movie distribution/compensation model from Harvard professor William Fisher. What are the benefits? To quote Fisher himself: Consumers would pay less for more entertainment. Artists would be fairly compensated. The set of artists who made their creations available to the world at large […]
The co-construction of the arts experience
Chris Jones offers this interesting but odd opinion piece in the Chicago Tribune about the changing behaviors of arts audiences, and the disconnect with traditional practices in presenting the arts. The core of his argument is as follows: ‘this is the age of arts consumer as an empowered co-generator.’ The piece is interesting because it […]
How people think vs. how we want them to
A seemingly unrelated news item about a new book speaks volumes about arts audiences, patrons, and friends. The book is by social/political researcher Katherine Cramer Walsh, about how people talk about politics (Talking About Politics: Informal Groups and Social Identity in American Life, for speed readers, here’s a news summary to get the gist of […]
Of local arts, casinos, and economic impact
My hometown of Madison, Wisconsin, is in a bit of a spin over a proposal to upgrade a nearby Native American bingo facility into a full-fledged casino. There’s lots of local color in the conflict — with equal enthusiasm both for and against the proposal (the pro-casino group promotes the large payments to the city […]
Enabling or unraveling ‘the big sort’
There’s some interesting stuff for arts and cultural mavens in Richard Florida’s latest salvo on the implications of the ‘creative class’ mindset. Sure, it’s a bit over the top and chicken-little-esque (that’s what polemics do, after all), but there are bits of wisdom along the way, as well. Florida is alarmed at the efforts of […]
