I have been writing Butts in the Seats (BitS) on topics of arts and cultural administration since 2004 (yikes!). Given the ever evolving concerns facing the sector, I have yet to exhaust the available subject matter. In addition to BitS, I am a founding contributor to the ArtsHacker (artshacker.com) website where I focus on topics related to boards, law, governance, policy and practice.
I am also an evangelist for the effort to Build Public Will For Arts and Culture being helmed by Arts Midwest and the Metropolitan Group. (http://www.creatingconnection.org/about/)
My most recent role is as Theater Manager at the Rialto in Loveland, CO
Among the things I am most proud are having produced an opera in the Hawaiian language and a dance drama about Hawaii's snow goddess Poli'ahu while working as a Theater Manager in Hawaii. Though there are many more highlights than there is space here to list.
In general the tips are oriented toward investing your time and energy locally just as George Bailey’s Building and Loan had poured its members money into the local housing market.
Translated to 2025 this manifests as shopping locally, participating in local concerts, sports events, fairs, volunteering, helping your neighbor, etc.
Part of the general message aligns with the Greek proverb that a society thrives when old men plant trees under whose shade they will never sit.
The author cites the fact that It’s A Wonderful Life didn’t do well in the box office when it was released in 1946 but exploded into popularity after the copyright protection was mistakenly not renewed in 1974 and TV stations began to air it as an example of delayed recognition.
I am not sure this is the greatest example since it something of an example of broadcast companies exploiting a mistake. Unlike Mr. Potter who doesn’t get away with exploiting Uncle Billy’s lapse in the movie, the happy result of the movie becoming famous depends on the ubiquity of airings by entities who didn’t have to pay for rights.
This being said, the appeal of the movie is the celebration of the social bonds in a community. This message apparently continues to have a strong appeal as the screening we are hosting on Thursday has been sold out since last week–all 425 seats. You can see the movie in the comfort of your own home, on demand probably as well as on broadcast stations, but a lot of people are choosing to watch it in public and many are calling to ask if there are any secret unsold tickets.
Right now we are counting on people to be of enough good cheer to slide down and fill the empty seats between them and the next group so we can fit them all.
Marketing isn’t hype. Marketing is making a product or service that matters.
If you’re struggling selling the thing you made, it’s worth reconsidering the audience, the promise and the change you seek to make–and then be honest with your team about whether your offering is actually remarkable, or just the best you could do with what you had.
This reminded me of a post I made almost exactly a year ago about Godin’s thoughts about branding being a promise you make and so rebranding should represent a change in the promise being made and expectations consumers should have about your business. He makes a distinction between re-branding and re-logoing.
They think a rebrand and a re-logo are the same thing, they’re not. A rebrand happens when you change the promise that you make, and the expectations we have for you. A re-logo is cosmetic. Rebrand at your peril, especially when the old brand is trusted, iconic, historic and connected to a basic human need. It’s a mistake to focus on clicks, not magic.
That concept of branding being a promise has been living in my brain for the last year and resonating with a lot of what I have read and listened to about audience/community relationship and marketing since then.
h/t Artjournal.com which linked to a story about Lectures On Tap, a program of academic lectures being held in bars around LA, San Francisco, Boston, NYC, and Chicago. There are other similar programs operating in other cities under different names.
Academics lecture on a wild variety of topics including films,
…Taylor Swift’s use of storytelling in her music, how AI technology is being used to detect cardiovascular diseases, the psychology of deception and the quest for alien megastructures …
The sessions tend to sell out very quickly. I suspect it is partially due to the fact that the relaxed context of the setting offers a degree of freedom to both the attendees and lecturers.
“I didn’t go to college so I don’t have any prior experience with lecturing,” says Garber, 29, adding that he’s interested in film production and is a “big horror fan.” But the fact that “I get to sit and learn about something that I love doing with a pint? Like, that’s amazing.”
The relaxed environment allows the speakers to let their guard down as well.
“I can play with certain elements that I maybe haven’t used in the classroom,” says McClellan, who made jokes throughout his presentation. “It’s definitely looser and getting around people who’ve been drinking, they’ll ask more questions and different types of questions.”
I am always on the look out for programming ideas that create new metaphorical doors through which audiences can enter and this definitely fits the bill.
Back in January 2020 I met with a group hosting a storytelling series in bars about putting together a more curated version to host in the newly renovated reception space in our theater. When the pandemic hit, we ended up moving it into our main space so we could socially distance seating. Because audiences were literally able to see their stories being told on stage by people who looked like them and lived in their neighborhoods, the series ended up changing the narrative and perception about who was welcomed at the theater.
Every so often someone asks where the protest songs are during times of social unrest. Where are the songs commenting on social issues and fears?
It occurred to me that a lot of the songs people are thinking about when they make these comments were chosen by gatekeepers. From Woody Guthrie to Rage Against the Machine, hip-hop and rap, folk songs and rock songs, someone at a radio station or record label decided to play and promote these songs and not play other songs.
I am certainly revealing my generational biases when I mention songs like Nina’s “99 Luftballons,” Genesis’ “Land of Confusion,” Sting’s “Hope the Russians Love Their Children Too,” and Alphaville’s “Forever Young” as expressing fears about nuclear war.
There was a lot of social commentary in the early songs of U2 and Midnight Oil. Rush’s “Subdivisions.”
There are a ton more I can name but you’re not coming here to read an interminable list of my reminiscing.
There were obviously a lot of great artists whose work went unrecognized due to gatekeeping. And a lot of artists that got cheated out of what they earned by those taking advantage of their ignorance.
I certainly realize that even before people shifted away from listening to terrestrial radio stations, the use of algorithms to optimize listenership was already making radio playlists incredibly homogenous and also marginalizing talented artists.
But while streaming platforms like Spotify broadened access to music that suited consumers’ tastes and interests, they also introduced the tyranny of choice creating a tendency for people to gravitate toward what they already know.
The fact one can isolate their musical experience to themselves via headphones is probably also a factor. My musical tastes expanded and changed quite a bit thanks to roommates who introduced me to their favorites and accompanied me to concerts. (Not to mention, dorm mates blasting music into the halls. My first weekend in college, I was force fed the Beastie Boys.)
As I am reading the thoughts of other colleagues in the arts and culture industry on subjects like marketing, audience relations, programming, etc., there is an underlying message about a responsibility to create experiences that align with the expectations and needs audiences hope to fulfill.
To a great degree, professionals at exhibit and live performing arts organizations function as gatekeepers.
So I wonder if part of the reason there aren’t a lot of songs of protest and social criticism in popular music at times when there is social unrest is because there are no gatekeepers who feel obligated to pay attention to evolving tastes and interests of consumers.
I was curious to see what they may have been doing to realize that success. Most of the programming seemed typical for a symphony with a mix of classical and pops. Though it appears they have a speaker series on topics unrelated to the music they perform.
Their Fiddlesticks children’s music series is celebrating 35 years in 2026. It looks like they encourage kids to get up to sing and dance during these experiences. They also have a Peppa Pig themed interactive “My First Concert” event. Perhaps this hands on approach creates a welcoming context which permeates the rest of their events.
There is a Discovery & Drinks series in venues outside of their concert spaces which provides an opportunity to interact more closely with the musicians.
Their Impact report talks a bit more about the type of programs they offered last year. Their cellists collaboration with Yo-Yo Ma on an arrangement of Fred Rogers’ songs struck me as particularly well designed for local audiences. You may remember that Pittsburgh was Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood. They also had some other guest artists in Nas, Shaggy, and Ray Angry that probably engaged audiences who didn’t normally attend their concerts as well as shifted the perception for long time audiences about what a concert experience can be.
If anyone has attended PSO shows in recent seasons and can offer some comments about what they are doing right, let me know.
Davis says that the fact this is an increase over their annual auction last year is taken as a sign that the art market is healthy. However, it obscures the fact that artists are struggling more than ever with rising material and space expenses along with lack of health care because they don’t materially benefit when their works resell.
I have spent over a decade now talking about how economic activity is not a valid metric of the value of art and culture. Davis’ observation that it isn’t a valid measure of the health of arts and culture in society is a corollary to that.
The title of this post is a reference to the McDonalds signs that claimed billions were sold. Those signs were phased out years ago and I wonder if that might have been out of a recognition that the claim wasn’t providing compelling evidence of their success.
The purchase prices are often a reflection of costly signaling to peers by those who can afford the cost.
The opinion piece is fairly long and covers a lot of the unequal relationships artists and even galleries end up having with collectors. Davis lists some warning signs for artists that a collector may be pursuing acquisition of their work as a commodity to quickly flip rather than having a sincere interest in their work.
There was one section that seemed to echo some of the conversations currently occurring regarding the relationship between arts organizations and audiences and in some cases, donors. Many arts and cultural organizations employ a version of the “if you build it, they will come,” philosophy where they expect if they advertise an opportunity, people should come rather than positioning the opportunity as a solution to a problem the person has.
Davis says institutions often ask artists for art donations without really establishing a relationship, but expecting gratitude. One frequent complaint from audiences is that immediately after making their first purchase and attending their first event at an organization, a solicitation for a donation pops up in their inbox.
There has been discussion in arts and cultural spaces about allowing people to develop a relationship with your organization (and vice versa) before doing that, but there are still many places that continue to employ this practice.
Institutions ask artists to donate work, sometimes before ever engaging with them in any meaningful way. The ask arrives without context, yet the expectation is gratitude. The labor, time, and material investment behind the work is taken for granted. And collectors often imagine that acquiring a work once is enough to establish a relationship of care, but too many treat acquisition as a strategy rather than a commitment. They join boards, influence institutional priorities, and quietly use the language of stewardship to shape the future value of their holdings. The support is not always malicious, but it is rarely neutral.
This situation isn’t just an isolated experience for visual artists. Performers are often asked to donate their time and talent to causes. It has been awhile since I have heard anyone complain they were asked to do something for the exposure, but I am sure plenty of people are still getting some form of that request.
Davis notes that artists pretty much provide museums (and performing arts venues) with legitimacy and credibility rather than the other way around. If a museum is noted for their collection or their ability to secure interesting work, it is a result of the participation they have received from artists in the past.
Museums often present acquisitions as gestures of generosity toward artists, when in reality it is the artist who lends legitimacy to the museum. The language is always the same. The acquisition is framed as a milestone or an honor, but the truth is simpler. Institutions rely on artists to produce the cultural meaning they then claim to protect. Without artists, museums are storage. With artists, they become authorities.
One of of the big things they noticed was that people are traveling much more than in the past, but attendance at cultural organization had been dropping during 2025.
The reasons for this is that while they were traveling more people were spending a shorter period of time away from home. Because so many people making attendance arrangements once they are in town rather than in advance, that represents a smaller window of opportunity.
Another reason is because people are traveling for the purpose of spending time with family and friends rather than spending time at a destination so the orientation is on being with others rather than seeing sites.
Given that visiting friends and family is the primary decision-making factor for travel this upcoming holiday season – rather than taking part in a specific activity – it will be critical for cultural entities to keep their eye on the ball when it comes to reminding folks of our power to create meaningful moments between loved ones.
As readers might imagine, budgetary considerations also factor in to attendance plans at cultural organizations. Tangentially related to this, last week I noticed our bar revenue was down quite a bit over last year. Attendance at our events and those of renters has generally been within expectations over the last year, but apparently people were scaling back their spending in our bar and concessions.
There were a number of pieces of advice they offered for the holiday season and beyond. Among them were to lean into the traditional activities people engage in with family and friends around the holidays- Nutcracker performances, tree lighting, sing-a-long caroling, etc.
They also suggested looking at re-packaging and re-pricing experiences in order to position them as values. (my emphasis)
Introducing bundles of special experiences, highlighting membership loyalty tiers, and underscoring strategic, time-sensitive programs … To be clear, this is different than a discounting strategy! .. simply offering a discount ignores the fact that admission prices are rarely the primary cost-related obstacle for those interested in visiting a cultural organization. Instead, these cost and price-related strategies can help emphasize an emotional ROI – wonder per dollar, connection per hour.
Another form of re-packing mentioned is condensing an experience for people who are short on time. It may take the form of a shortened tour that will hit the exciting highlights of a gallery or garden and end with a holiday themed snack or interaction. In some cases it may just be advertising an existing experience as specially designed for time pressed groups/families with fussy kids.
One of our annual renters does something long these lines. In early December, they do a full performance of The Nutcracker at a venue about 15 miles away. Then in the week before Christmas, they do a 45 minute version focused on the “sugar plum” elements of the show at my venue sometimes cranking out 2-3 performances a day for some pretty good sized audiences.
Related to goal of saving visitors’ time was the suggestion of digital tools to support and facilitate the visit. For example, for admission, information delivery, wayfinding, parking, etc. It isn’t just a matter of having these tools. Communicating that these tools exist and are available to ease a guest’s experience can aid in the decision to attend an event.
Every hiker is intimately aware of their backpack. They picked it out, choosing from dozens of options. They know which straps are loose and which are digging into their skin. They can tell you if it’s lopsided, and what is in each pocket.
And yet…
Even after days on the trail, they probably couldn’t tell you a thing about anyone else’s backpack. Except, perhaps, that everyone else has one.
That’s the first step toward empathy: Realizing that everyone else has a backpack, and that it’s different from yours.
I would also add that for an activity that is pretty stripped down from the accoutrement of our daily lives, there are a lot of rules to learn regarding hiking. It requires some empathy to realize new folks may not be aware of the rules.
Usually those descending yield to those ascending. Everyone yields to horse, bikes yield to hikers.
Carry out trash and waste. (You folks leaving the bags of dog poop on the side of the trail to “pick up on the return trip” aren’t fooling anyone)
If you are going any distance into the hills and mountains, put your cell phone in airplane mode so that the battery doesn’t run down as it seeks a signal. If you encounter an emergency and have to a hike to a place where there is a signal, you’ll be grateful you preserved the charge.
While people might not be able to tell you everything about someone else’s backpack, you can often spot if they struggling with the weight of the pack because the straps aren’t adjusted correctly. Being willing to give people tips about how to ease their burden is a way of welcoming people into the activity.
There was a time I pointed out a guy was wearing his ice spikes backwards that immediately led me to recall when a couple hikers gave me advice about the best spikes to buy as I was gingerly edging my way down a trail.
This can all metaphorically be applied to other parts of life because they are practical applications of decency in everyday life.
Maybe it is because I have had street construction occurring around my venue since February (reaching my block December 1!) but my interest was piqued when I saw a FastCompany article about the effort to redesign the scaffolding used on construction projects in New York City.
The goal is to make the structures, also called construction sheds, less obtrusive and overbearing for pedestrians and more attractive overall.
I have written about efforts to make construction zones more welcoming in order to maintain a welcoming environment and sense of ease of access so that people continue to patronize businesses in construction zone.
While New Yorkers seem undeterred by the never ending construction they are surrounded with on a daily basis, the design concepts would most certainly facilitate the experience of people in other cities.
I will admit I never considered that there might be alternatives to the boxy, dark passages that loom over the sidewalks of cities. There is obviously a need to protect passersby from falling debris and separate construction zones from the streets. As the article notes, the scaffolding is not only an obstacle for pedestrians to navigate, but they frequently block building entrances and limit where people can exit their cars.
Some of the designs submitted are much more open on the sides and above allowing light to better suffuse the space. One design is even stronger than current structures even with fewer cross bracing. Others accommodate the current placement of benches, street lights, public art, fire escapes and other structures maintaining safety features and avoiding the need to remove amenities and attractions.
For me this was a little more evidence of how creativity and utility can intersect to improve quality of life for communities.
FastCompany recently had a post by Matt Mandrella, the music officer for Huntsville, AL advocating for cities to support house concerts as a method for stimulating economic and creative vitality. According Mandrella, Huntsville has a handful of people who have set up their basements and garages to host concerts.
This raised a lot of questions in my mind about how the neighbors were impacted by traffic, parking, and possibly noise.
Mandrella said cities shouldn’t just be building amphitheaters (Huntsville has one), they should be supporting neighborhood level cultural infrastructure which are more fan and creator focused.
House shows fill a different and equally vital gap. They empower artists to control ticket prices and profit margins, bypassing bar-sales-driven venue models. They create peer networking opportunities and act as incubators for emerging talent, offering artists the chance to book, promote and manage shows on a small scale, thereby building skills that can scale to larger venues.
Most importantly, house shows democratize music, embedding it in communities instead of keeping it behind ticketing paywalls. In short, they rebalance the live music economy.
He says among the things Huntsville is doing to support these small concert venues is helping people form LLCs in order to separate owners’ liability from their personal assets; advising on sound, lighting, and ticketing; having conversations about artist pay and sustainability.
And perhaps most importantly from the neighbors’ point of view – “Guiding artists through compliance with sound ordinances and neighborhood approvals.”
Mandrella also pitches vibrant house concert networks as a possible response to AI generated music in the sense that it creates local, accessible opportunities for people to connect with their neighbors and perhaps generate a sense of ownership and pride.
To some extent, this isn’t an entirely new idea. About 10 years ago I wrote about the PorchRokr Festival near Akron, OH where people hosted concerts on their porches. I subsequently became aware of otherporch based concert series around the country. This is the first time I have read about a city intentionally working to create an infrastructure to support and encourage house concerts as a going concern.
Rainer Glaap recently linked to a story about new legislation in the UK which will prohibit selling tickets for any amount above face value. (Apparently there was discussion about capping it at 130% of face value at one point.) Service fees on resales will be permitted, but there will be a cap on them to prevent them from becoming inflated.
There will also be rules against speculative sales where the reseller doesn’t actually have all the tickets they claim to possess.
Resellers will be prevented from listing more tickets than they could have legitimately purchased from the original point of sale under event-imposed limits. However, it’s unknown if promoters will be required to disclose the number of tickets held back from initial sale to promote a sense of scarcity.
My venue has encountered a variation of this recently. Typically we might have a call about purchasing tickets on a reseller site once every six-eight weeks from people who are concerned their tickets aren’t valid.
But that number always escalates as the Christmas holidays approach. Last week we had three calls in a single day. One person wanted to change her seats to sit next to friends. However, the information she received was that her seats were in the back row of the balcony. We asked her to find out what her specific seats numbers were.
When she called back the next day with the seat numbers, we discovered those seats were purchased at 1:30 am that morning. In other words, the reseller didn’t purchase the tickets until after the buyer asked for the seat numbers.
We have also noticed that resellers are promising people seats in the back row of the balcony betting on the fact those seats will sell last. In some cases, purchasers end up being the only one in that row of 25 seats with four empty rows between them and the next group of audience members.
We take a lot of steps to make people aware of the correct website to visit. There is a mention in our monthly email newsletter. There is a poster in the ticketing lobby and rack cards people can take with them. We also have slides on our lobby monitors and the pre-show slide show in the theater. Plus I mention the issue in my curtain speeches.
Still there are many people who end up purchasing from the wrong websites while insisting they were on ours. We are in the process of assembling a list of warning signs to make new posters and slides in the hopes of doing a better job of making people aware of the websites masquerading as ours.
Seth Godin recently made a post about recklessness which intersected somewhat with the concept of giving permission for failure, something that is a key element to the creative process.
In fact, that is the essence of the first example he gives after evoking a homophonic word play with wrecklessness
Worth noting that there’s no ‘w’ in reckless. We imagine there might be, since a wreck is entirely possible.
There’s the recklessness of creative generosity. This happens when we show up with our best work, regardless of how it might feel if it doesn’t land with the desired audience.
He makes similar statements about recklessness of connection, love, joy, solitude, radical honesty, and financial abandon.
I confess to not being entirely enamored of the idea of financial abandon. I am not sure if he is casting in a positive light or not.
He also raises the example of recklessness of unlearning which has been a recurring topic in the arts and culture world for most of my life. There has been conversation about not becoming dependent on existing audiences, donors, marketing methods, audience relations, and programming in the face of ever changing socio-economic conditions and expectations.
The recklessness of unlearning. When we deliberately dismantle our carefully constructed expertise and certainties to make space for new ways of seeing and being.
I will say there are a lot of people in the arts and culture learning, adapting, and executing new and interesting ideas and approaches. I am often delighted when I come across these promising practices. But it also seems like this stuff isn’t happening as broadly as it probably needs to which I attribute to lack of time and resources.
She starts by reminding readers that it wasn’t so long ago that even when you planned to stay in, you often had to leave your house to grab videos from the video store. Even in the early days of Netflix you often had to invest some time in picking what DVDs you wanted delivered to you.
Compared to those times, there is even less effort or commitment required. She notes that many people will be flipping through things on their phones while having a show or movie running on an in-home big screen.
She presents data showing that Americans in general have expressing an interest in staying home during the weekend has increased 56.8% since 2011.
The statistic of bigger concern is that among those with a high-propensity to visit cultural organizations, (both visual and performance based), the increase since 2011 is 79%.
In short, high-propensity visitors are the people who actually do visit, want to visit, or are likely to visit cultural organizations – and their preference to stay home over the weekend has risen a whopping 79% since 201
An approach Dilenschneider et. al. suggest is the same one that was advocated when people were involuntarily required to stay at home–activities, opportunities, marketing, etc., that keep your organization at the top of people’s minds. She writes that when people make decisions to engage in out of home activities, they gravitate toward those activities that are most familiar.
In a chart comparing how people were spending their time in 2021 with the first three quarters of 2025, the percentages are roughly the same for at-home activities so the trend has been relatively consistent. (Though fewer people are doing home repairs and gardening.)
While people are spending more time online, they are interacting with cultural organizations a lot more online as well. In a chart comparing end of year 2019 with third quarter 2025, visits to websites and social media pages has increased quite a bit in that time. Word of mouth and recommendations from friends are fairly high up in responses, though tend to be higher for performance based entities vs. exhibit based entities.
Having online resources which are easy to navigate and discover desired information is increasingly important.
…..the trend of increasingly high expectations for digital competence wasn’t created entirely by the pandemic but was accelerated by it. Audiences were already seeking out information about cultural organization experiences primarily via the web, mobile web, and social media before the pandemic and continue to do so today, particularly as AI enters the conversation. The hard work that cultural organizations have put in to engage their audiences online and show their relevance beyond their walls in the past five years has elevated those expectations even further.
One of the common issues he addresses is the minimal amount of sampling you can do while still being able to claim Fair Use.
Spoiler: The answer is zero.
Fair Use Myths That Get Creators in Trouble
Let’s debunk a few persistent myths:
“If I change it a little, it’s transformative.” Adding commentary or critique might be transformative. Just slapping on filters, cropping, or re-uploading isn’t.
“I only used 10 seconds, so it’s fair use.” Nope. There’s no magic number of seconds or percentage that makes a use automatically fair.
“I gave credit to the original creator.” Nice gesture, but credit isn’t a legal substitute for permission.
“I’m not making money, so it’s fine.” Non-commercial use helps your case but doesn’t guarantee fair use. Plenty of hobbyists have faced takedowns.
He explains that Fair Use covers a pretty narrow set of circumstances. It is perhaps most important to understand that there is no right of Fair Use of other people’s work. It is a defense against an accusation of infringement.
Firemark goes into detail about Fair Use and consequences of infringement claims in his two posts. The safest options are either licensing/getting permission from the rights holder or entirely using royalty free content.
A couple weeks ago I saw a blog post from Museums as Progress talking about how staff expertise isn’t necessarily relevant to visitors. The point they made was just because expertise is important to us as insiders, doesn’t mean that is what visitors directly value.
The visitor taking pictures of their kid having fun isn’t there to learn about your discipline. The couple on a date isn’t asking for engagement programming. People come to museums to relax, connect with others, discover something about themselves — and, yes, sometimes learn something new along the way or “engage” with the museum — but for most people, most of the time, the goals are manifold and your expertise matters only to the extent that it helps them achieve what they’re actually trying to accomplish.
Except I eventually realized what I was reading wasn’t a blog post, but a six paragraph description of a session they are holding next Thursday.
For a moment I wondered how effective such a long session description would be in attracting participants. But that was through the lens of thinking people have too short an attention span to bother reading six paragraphs promoting an event.
The fact is, they were informing people about the problem the session was meant to address and what type of conversation they could expect.
” — expertise becomes a shield against harder questions about relevance and impact. If we admitted that people’s goals differ from ours, we’d have to become students again, learning what actually matters to the communities we claim to support.
The challenge isn’t whether your museum has valuable expertise — it does. The question is whether that expertise can serve community progress in ways that generate institutional returns
In the first paragraph of this post I mentioned expertise may not be something visitors directly value. But I do think people value the product of that expertise without consciously realizing it.
I have mentioned that research has shown people perceive cultural organizations as more trustworthy than media outlets, government entities, and other NGOs. It is likely due to the care and exercise of expertise that has led people to regard cultural organizations in that manner. While people may not be driven to attend to learn more about biodiversity and colonial history, they probably want to be confident that what they do learn about these topics while visiting is reasonably accurate.
People don’t need to enter your business, or even interact with a person, to get their direct need satisfied which is why arts orgs need to emphasize all the ways in which they solve other problems people face.
Ruth Hartt advocates for employing this approach both in the way organizations market themselves and in the organizational culture they create to reinforce this in every plan and public interaction.
Godin writes:
Good, fast and cheap used to be the goals of a typical small business. Today, there’s probably a giant, heartless competitor who is gooder, faster and cheaper than you.
The way forward is simple: Be worth the trip. Be worth the price.
“You can pick anyone, and we’re anyone” isn’t going to be helpful going forward. Be someone instead.
While people may not need to enter your physical space or interact with your staff to acquire what they need, one practice that is likely to become valued is having someone with whom they can interact. As much conversation as there is about AI being the way of the future, there seems to be increasing recognition that the available tools are not meeting our expectations.
There is currently a competitive advantage in saving people from depending on some of the information delivered by web searches.
However, he said that a Guaranteed Income for Artist program in New York State launched in Spring 2022 ended up finding these people thanks to the broad criteria.
Eligibility for the program hinged on four simple criteria—self-identify as an artist/culture bearer/maker, age 18 or older, New York State residency, and income below the local self-sufficiency standard—and over 22,000 eligible artists applied. Almost 90 percent of the survey respondents were recruited through this program, and as a result, PoA provides unusually rich coverage of artists who are otherwise difficult to capture in conventional datasets.
I have been writing about basic guaranteed income programs for quite awhile and it never occurred to me, though it seems obvious in retrospect, that these programs can be used to identify individuals that might be missed otherwise.
One of the things Noonan takes pains to emphasize is the gulf between what these artists were making and what various other surveys measure. He notes the artists participating in the guaranteed income program had a median household income of $20,000, with 81% of participants living in NYC. (my emphasis)
Let that sink in: fully 81% of them lived in New York City on that income. And remember, these figures represent household income—not just the artist’s earnings. Compare this to federal statistics: the NEA touts median annual earnings of about $70,000 , but that’s individual income. The median household earnings from the ACS for artists runs closer to $122,000 per year. The gap isn’t just large—it’s a chasm that reveals how many artists federal data simply don’t see.
There are a number of charts analyzing who the people in the survey were demographically and type of work they were engaged in. One chart called out the large number of participants that were acting as caregivers alongside their creative practice.
To some extent it was surprising to see just how optimistic many of these artists reported in the questions about their well-being.
Here’s what makes this portrait especially striking: despite the financial precarity, the mindset is remarkably resilient. A full 73.2% “agree/strongly agree” that they lead a purposeful/meaningful life and 60.4% are optimistic about the future. Conversely, fewer than 22% disagree with the idea that they feel agency over their future and fewer than 30% disagree with the idea that they had good mental health last month. At the same time, only 45.8% believe the general public values their work, even as 86.7% report feeling confident articulating their creative process and labor
On The Argument, Kelsey Piper writes that solutions to poverty will require more than just giving people cash.
Multiple large, high-quality randomized studies are finding that guaranteed income transfers do not appear to produce sustained improvements in mental health, stress levels, physical health, child development outcomes or employment. Treated participants do work a little less, but shockingly, this doesn’t correspond with either lower stress levels or higher overall reported life satisfaction.
This was the case regardless of how much people were getting. There have been separate studies conducted on programs where people received $333/month, $500/month, and $1000/month and the outcomes were similar.
In each case, compared to a control group that was getting between $20 and $50 a month, there was little change.
…$1,000 per month for three years, while the control group got $50 per month. They found that participants worked less — but nothing else improved. Not their health, not their sleep, not their jobs, not their education, and not even time spent with their children. They did experience a reduction in stress at the start of the study, but it quickly went away.
To be clear, these studies found that people weren’t spending the extra money on “vice goods,” but rather on things they needed like food and clothing for their kids, paying down debt, etc. Different groups had different issues the money helped them with, and it definitely relieved some pressures but overall people’s lives and well-being didn’t improve.
Piper says that often journalists writing about these programs are cherry-picking those positive results from studies that are openly reporting the problems that have been observed. The promising news about these projects we often hear about are only part of the whole picture.
But the other side of this according to Piper, is that giving people money for very targeted purposes rather than a cure for all that ails a group do show promise. She cites programs giving cash to pregnant women to improve pregnancy outcomes and cash for parolees to prevent recidivism as among those currently under study.
So in that regard, the Irish program which was created to enable working artists to continue to be productive during Covid has been successful. The support has reportedly enabled artists to spend up to an additional 4 hours a week engaging in creative activities.
So a little bit of good news out of Chicago. For a few years now I have been posting data showing how visitation at arts organizations compares to 2019 numbers. Some organization types are approaching those pre-Covid numbers, others are struggling to get there.
However, it’s arts and culture programming that’s “driving the bus at the moment,” Edwards said.
[…]
“If anybody hasn’t been Downtown lately, they really ought to come down and check it out, because it’s not what they hear on the national news,” he told the Sun-Times recently. “We have more pedestrian volumes than we had in the past. People are using the district more as a social center than they are using it as a business.”
Past CLA studies show that more people attend arts and culture events than the games of all of the city’s professional sports teams combined. Chicagoans are also attending cultural experiences — like Broadway shows and art exhibitions — at a cadence well above the national average, too.
I was interested to read that people are increasingly using the district socially rather than for business. I imagine that is due to the reduction of people working from offices. It is really encouraging then to think that arts and cultural activities have increased pedestrian traffic beyond what they were at when workers were going to and from their offices.
One assumption I wanted to caution against is assuming attendance at arts and cultural institutions has increased above 2019 levels. Other than a quote from the Goodman Theater, there aren’t any claims to that effect. The definition they are using for arts and cultural activities may be broader than what readers may have in mind. There could be a number of Loop organizations who have not seen a return to 2019 levels.
One of the things he notes is that when someone puts money into a donor advised fund, they receive the tax deduction credit for that amount today, but unlike foundations there are no requirements to disburse any of the funds in any particular year.
Harrison notes that if you assume 3% inflation, by the end of 10 years $100 in a DAF is only worth $78.30 in buying power. On the other hand, the value of that tax deduction will be worth $134.39 in 2034 dollars due to that same inflation.
He also notes that while you can’t use DAF money to lobby, you can direct money to the lobbying arm of a non-profit which can spend up to $1,000.000/year on lobbying. So you are essentially getting a deduction to support lobbying. Generally, non-profit lobbying groups aren’t classified in such a way as to allow a tax deduction.
I have not double checked this suggestion that DAFs are permitted to give to non-profits without tax deductible status, but Harrison cites a piece on Rice University Baker Institute for Public Policy includes this among other abuses of DAFs including:
…, “DAF to DAF transfers” offered a particularly rotten result:
“…although they were recorded as grants to charities, charitable organizations did not receive funds as a result of these transfers.”
Other abuses include:
“Private foundations are not allowed to lobby, whereas publicly supported entities can spend up to $1 million per year on lobbying without penalty. If funds flow relatedly from DAFs to a variety of recipients, the donors can greatly expand the $1 million threshold.”
“the funds can remain in the DAF indefinitely because there is no required timeframe for distributions.”
“counting private foundation to DAF distributions as qualifying distributions has become a way for private foundations to circumvent the 5% minimum distribution requirement”
“a small group of donors may have disproportional impacts on charitable giving — including the cause, timing, and amounts.”
Apparently even the IRS has been having doubts about the value of DAFs according to a link to an IRS publication Harrison provides.
“The IRS is aware of a number of organizations that appeared to have abused the basic concepts underlying donor-advised funds. These organizations, promoted as donor-advised funds, appear to be established for the purpose of generating questionable charitable deductions, and providing impermissible economic benefits to donors and their families (including tax-sheltered investment income for the donors) and management fees for promoters.
impose section 4958 excise taxes on donors or managers of donor advised funds; and/or (d) deny or revoke the charity’s 501(c)(3) exemption.
Examinations of these arrangements may result in the following Service actions in appropriate cases:
disallow deductions for charitable contributions under Internal Revenue Code section 170 for payments to the fund;
Cultural Advocacy Coalition of Oregon is soliciting feedback through six in-person and one online forums and a survey of arts and cultural organizations around the state.
What caught my attention was the discussion of their advocacy schedule for 2026 and 20227 based on feedback they had received from the state legislature. I had not really seen a state advocacy group provide as much detail and insight about mid-range plans advocacy plans to its members.
Granted, the states in which I have lived may not have had legislative sessions whose lengths varied so greatly on alternating years as Oregon’s does.
But often communication from advocacy groups is along the lines of needing members to call/write representatives in the next two weeks about a specific bill and to turn out on advocacy day at the legislature. The effort in Oregon outlines what they are doing now and through 2026 in preparation for 2027.
According to Hildick, legislative leaders have said the 2026 session, which is limited to a maximum of 35 days, will not have enough time to consider any comprehensive reforms or programs, no matter how justified. That means the results of The Big/Rethink will be presented in 2027, when the semi-annual “long sessions” can last up to 160 days.
The information categories provided aren’t too different from what you might see if you plug your organization’s numbers into an economic impact calculator like Americans for the Arts’
However, the data they collected is only from entities:
….not controlled by a multinational corporation or a publicly traded company, and their primary mission is to present live performances to the public. This includes venues, promoters, festivals and more.
Each state either has a notation about the contribution to tourism or profitability. Some of the profitability numbers were interesting to read. For example, apparently only 19% of venues in NY reported being profitable. Most of the other states I clicked around on with this category reported were in the 30%-40% range. The only one that was lower was Vermont at 13%. Nationally, they report 64% of stages were not profitable.
The other thing that each state reported was the operational challenges across the nation. Based on the frequency they were reported they were:
Marketing and Bringing in An Audience
Artist costs driving higher artist fees
Staffing costs
Inflation
Monopolies
Rising Insurance Costs
Scalping and Reseller Platforms
Cost of Rent and Mortgage
Uncapped, unlimited performing rights organization fees
Decreasing alcohol sales
The second to last one about performing rights organization fees I am guessing may be groups like ASCAP, BMI, SESAC, etc charging high fees for the rights to perform songs. I didn’t see any specific explanation on the page or press release.
Many of these aren’t surprising since it is pretty clear many of these factors are driving up costs. I didn’t expect decreasing alcohol sales to make the top ten list. But that does have a certain logic to it.
For two weekends this month, the local Creative District is operating their annual artist studio tours. There are other associated activities, but the artists’ opening their spaces for people to wander in and look around is the focus of the event. And if people are moved to buy something, so much the better.
One of the features of the tour the president of the Creative District has been pushing artists to do is not sanitize their work spaces. She feels that when artists clear their materials away into closets and throw sheets over bookcases, it removes many of the interesting elements that can lead to a conversation about process.
I tend to agree. I visited a number of studios this weekend with more on my list for next weekend. In some cases I was able to stand right in the studio was people worked. Most of the time I was in a living room with all the furniture cleared out and the work hung on the walls, arrayed on display racks, or shelving.
Because I have some familiarity and knowledge, I was able to ask some questions about process and materials used, but many curious visitors would basically have had the impression they wandered into a home gallery.
Part of my concern is that seeing a person painting in their immaculate living room with a small tarp under the easel essentially reinforces the idea that art is done by a special breed of people who create things immediately without error.
When in fact, their studios are paint and clay splattered, with swaths of material shoved in to nooks and crannies, and metal filings and sawdust swept into piles. All testaments to their efforts. Not to mention photos, sketches, and early iterations that comprised their study and preparation of the final product leaning against the walls.
Galleries are places in which artists can control the context and perspective in which the visitors encounter their work. Studios tours provide an opportunity to let visitors encounter and better understand their process. There is a missed opportunity when studio tours are essentially replicas of the gallery experience.
About twice a month Colleen Dilenschneider and the folks at IMPACTS Experience release some interesting data they have compiled about trends they are seeing that may impact arts and cultural organizations. Recently they released an update on the recurring topic of what have audience preferences been since the start of the pandemic.
One aspect of this data I feel I have missed and not adequately emphasized in my previous posts on these articles is that they have been measuring the tendency of someone who regularly participated in an activity in 2019 to return to that behavior.
It means that people whose normal behavior in 2019 was to go to movie theaters report being less likely to return to movie theaters now. It means that people whose normal behavior was to go to public parks are even more likely to visit them now than they were before the pandemic.
Among exhibit based organizations, visitors have trended away from science and children’s museums and toward outdoor spaces like zoos and gardens as well as larger museum spaces which were perceived to have more space to move around during the pandemic. These latter groups have returned to their 2019 attendance levels more rapidly than science and children’s museums.
Live performance organizations have also generally seen a slower return to 2019 levels, except for live theater which is just shy of attendance numbers of six years ago. In some cases, those audiences shifted their cultural participation to exhibit based entities.
Folks who were interested in the symphony went to the art museum instead, and many Americans habituated away from these performing arts experiences. The challenge is and has been to do our best to shake the masses and wake them back up to the magic of live theater, the power of chamber music, or the grace of the ballet.
Demand is slowly inching back to 2019 baseline, but it may be happening too slowly to meaningfully overcome negative substitution.
The IMPACTS folks note that research has shown that on average habits are formed in about 66 days and it has been five years since the start of the pandemic. As a result there is a bit of inertia to contend with if you are trying to convince people to make you part of a new habit.
Tyler Cowen of the Marginal Revolution blog posted a short video meant as a preview of a long movie project discussing how we have eliminated ordinary beauty from our lives in the name of efficiency.
Sheehan Quirke moves about London comparing ornate, though mass produced objects from the Victorian era like lamp posts, door fixtures, etc., arguing that design has moved toward simple functionality and abandoned offering beauty in every day objects.
Perhaps the most striking example he provides is at the 6:50 mark when he introduces a location as being in Parliament before revealing the ornate room is actually located in a sewage pumping station, stating
Well people worked here and why shouldn’t people who work in sewers also have a beautiful place of work?
I have to think there is more to the story than the room being a reflection of Victorian sensibilities. Not too earlier he notes a neighborhood he was walking through was likely an overcrowded tenement area with sewage openly rotting in the streets. Beauty was not a priority everywhere.
As a commenter on the Marginal Revolution post noted, there is likely a bit of survivorship bias in operation where the really ugly sewage stations have all been razed while the gorgeous one has been preserved as a tourist attraction.
His point still bears considering. He didn’t mention it directly but I did start to wonder if the reduction of every day beauty in small things around us has resulted in an reduction of appreciation of art and culture. Perhaps even impacting the perception that one has the capacity to be creative.
So if a community wanted to start thinking about how to integrate small pieces of beauty into everyday life, that NEA program might be a place to start.
Things aren’t back to normal for the group. One of the musicians was already working another part time job and shifted toward full-time when the orchestra went bankrupt. Another musician spent his life savings to move across Canada only to find the job no longer existed and started doing handy man jobs having never played with the organization. Where the season was once 90 concerts, they are down closer to 19.
I am glad to see that news organizations are continuing to revisit the story from time to time just to keep the musicians and the travails they have faced closer to top of mind.
There is a summary video of some of each of their thoughts which is interesting to watch.
There are also longer individual video interviews with each that I have linked to each name above. I haven’t listened to all of them as of this posting time, but it is interesting to see what each valued and brought to the job.
Jane Chu talked about how her father died when she was 9 years old and she didn’t have the words at that age to express what she was feeling, but that art provided her with an outlet. A fair bit of her focus was on the importance of the arts for social cohesion and self-expression. She cited some examples of how recognition of creative intelligence reveals aspects of people that measures of academic intelligence don’t.
Dana Gioia was apparently the first chair who set a goal to have at least one grant in every Congressional district. He said that given every district has about three-quarters of a million people in it, there must be at least one organization in there that was doing something worthy of a grant. He said this changed the relationship of the NEA with Congress and the people of many districts.
Though he also relates an anecdote where he essentially strong armed a Congressman into attending an advocacy meeting where the representative realized a lot of his campaign donors were passionate about the arts. He makes the point that legislators’ view of things is filtered through their staff so often direct interaction and advocacy is necessary.
Jane Alexander faced something of a similar situation when she was appointed in 1993 during a big uproar over the types of work the NEA was supporting. She said she realized she needed to better communicate the work of the NEA. So she visited over 200 communities soon after she was appointed. She said once people understood that NEA funds were supporting programs in their communities that they and their families valued, they began to advocate for continued support to their representatives and senators. Like Jane Chu she cited meeting people for whom the arts provided an outlet for expression during troubled times in their lives.
Rocco Landesman seemed relatively optimistic about the NEA’s future existence. Though he outright criticized the current politicization of the NEA where some of the other chairs were a little more circumspect.
According to the story, one would have developed a $15 million civil rights museum and the other “….included a museum dedicated to freedom and democracy, featuring works by international artists as well as pieces of the Berlin Wall.”
Both proposals, which were among about a dozen others, failed to pass review by two committees on the basis “…. staunch neighborhood opposition, increased traffic congestion, and negative effects on quality of life in their neighborhoods. “
Many of those submitting proposals also promised to build things like schools, concert venues, affordable housing, and hotels.
Apparently, the proposed museums weren’t really an enticing feature and didn’t elicit much conversation among committee members. Though New Yorkers are likely a little jaded by the plethora of museums and galleries available to them. In other communities the museums might have been more compelling elements.
A competing developer suggested
“…that the inclusion of a cultural institution as an amenity was merely a cynical ploy for public approval, rather than a sincere effort to improve communities.
This said, the group that proposed the civil rights museum said they intended to move ahead with the project which they claimed had many supporters. Hyperallergic noted they didn’t comment on the site of the museum and who those supporters might be.
One member of the committee reviewing the proposals was concerned about the casinos competing with other cultural icons.
He ultimately opposed the proposal because he feared the resort would detract from the Broadway theater industry, and because he did not trust the applicant to keep promises for future housing units.
A former commissioner of the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs said that pairing casinos with cultural organizations wasn’t an absurd idea, but did warn that the association may mar the image of the museum.
“Museums have to be cautious about what this does to their reputation,” Finkelpearl said, predicting that cultural institutions “will come under all kinds of fire if they’re seen as the group that opened the door for this use that people don’t want in the neighborhood.”
Artsjournal.com just linked to a piece on Artnet discussing this very topic of how corporate sponsorship can be a fraught topic for museums.
“There is no clear line as to what is considered good money versus bad money when it comes to corporate sponsorship,” said Leslie Ramos, co-founder of art philanthropy advisory firm The Twentieth, …“How long is a piece of string? What is considered a potentially good company and reputable company today is not necessarily going to be considered a good company in 10 or 20 years time.”
I had always heard the superstitious reasoning that it either placated or suppressed the ghosts in the building to keep them from creating mischief in the dark theater. As a practical reason I had heard it marked the edge of the stage so people wouldn’t fall off into the pit or on to the floor.
This latter one always seemed the best explanation given that light switches are often not placed in convenient locations in theaters to prevent people from accidentally turning them on during a performance. Thus one is often obliged to wander around a little bit in the dark to get to the switches.
The article also mentions related reasons like a burglar snuck in to rob a theater, fell off the stage, broke his leg and won a big lawsuit. I have also heard the same story about private homes. Kinda makes burglary sound like a win-win proposition. You make money if you get away with the goods or if you fall through the skylight and get caught.
There is also a claim that the Actors Equity union list a requirement for the light to be placed on stage in their contracts. Though there is no indication such a rule has ever existed.
One explanation I found intriguing with a fair degree of possible credibility is that when theaters used gas to provide stage lighting, there was always a low glow of the footlights along the edge of the stage which were never fully extinguished so that pressure didn’t build up in the gas lines.
I was wondering if anyone had heard any additional interesting folklore about the ghost light.
Cowen talks about a lot of the debates around culture and art that still continue today.
One of the first things that caught my attention was the question of doing art which is challenging and hones the artist craft vs. doing it for commercial success which I mentioned in a post about Seth Godin’s thoughts about aligning organizational practice with the values it espouses.
Cowen said those concepts weren’t considered mutually exclusive by classical musicians and artists.
If you read the letters of Mozart or Beethoven, they’re obsessed with money. They seem to be quite good bargainers. They always want more money. You might think they’re greedy, but also money is a means toward realizing your art. How good a piano can I buy or how good an orchestra can I work with, or can I travel to give a concert in Prague or Vienna?
The more an artist cares about art in many situations, the more they’re going to care about money. It’s a very simple point. At the time or even still, you didn’t hear it much. It’s always money versus art rather than you can care about money as a means to your art.
In another interesting segment of their conversation, Cowen says that governments often facilitate the creation of great art at the inception of their efforts before things either become too politicized or made mediocre by the need to please the consensus.
All this came to a head in the 1990s, disputes over what the National Endowment for the Arts in America was funding. Some of it, of course, was obscene. Some of it was obscene and pretty good. Some of it was obscene and terrible.
What ended up happening is the whole process got bureaucratized. The NEA ended up afraid to make highly controversial grants. They spend more on overhead. They send more around to the states. Now, it’s much more boring. It seems obvious in retrospect. The NEA did a much better job in the 1960s, right after it was founded, when it was just a bunch of smart people sitting around a table saying, “Let’s send some money to this person,” and then they’d just do it, basically.
[…]
There are plenty of good cases where government does good things in the arts, often in the early stages of some process before it’s too politicized. I think some critics overlook that or don’t want to admit it.
The whole interview is a little over an hour and covers other topics like: great art needing great audiences; artist compensation; more discussion about pursuit of art vs. creating for the market; group consumption of art is bad, you want to appeal to individual; the fact that people having greater wealth means niche artists and shows can receive support by appealing to individuals, but at the cost of fragmentation of shared culture; and the usual debate about whether modern art sucks.
It is either interesting or depressing that it is often difficult to determine whether their conversation is about the state of things today or what Cowen was observing about culture the late 1990s. It sort of indicates we are struggling with the same questions we were 25 years ago and haven’t arrived at the answers we need to move us forward.
Just the same, it is gratifying to have economists discussing the conflicting interests and views that exist in the arts and culture sector. It is something of a validation that these are real topics for consideration and not issues that have been manufactured internally.
This seems to be the week for pictures on the old blog. About a month ago I wrote about an effort to use art projects to mitigate the impact of road construction occurring across five blocks of the busy downtown corridor of my city. As you could see from the pictures in that post, it didn’t require a lot of money to create interactive participatory projects. (Which is obviously good for construction project adjacent installations.)
Case in point, they spray painted a hopscotch pattern on the sidewalk opposite my office. Everyday I see kids, teenagers, people in their 20s, 40s, 60s, etc jumping on it. It is probably both the least expensive and most interacted with piece of the whole effort.
Last week they installed artist created selfie frames. The downtown development authority is encouraging people to find each one, and take pictures, and submit them in order to be entered to win a pretty nice package of prizes.
Here are a few I have come across in my travels. Unfortunately I am not eligible to win the prize.
I have written a number of posts in the last year about the value of labels in exhibits. There are a number of people who don’t think they are of much use visitors. The opinions of those who are against them range from the language being too academic for the layperson to the concept people should form their own impressions of a work rather than depending on the labels.
This being said, the local museum has a photography exhibition of cemeteries around the state of Colorado. The exhibition is causing some positive reactions among visitors and I think it may be in large part due to the artist, Sean Brubaker’s, comments on the labels. He offers his point of view on each of his images which makes them highly relatable.
For instance, in one case he talks about having a problem with the concept of diminishing returns when he lingered far too long in the face of a thunderstorm that sought to smite him.
(Out of copyright concerns for posting photos of the artist’s photos, I am only including the labels. I apologize to readers who feel they are missing the full context of the labels.)
In another he talks about the cemetery next to his middle school where he had his first kiss.
In another he acknowledges that people have good reason for decorating the graves of loved ones with fake flowers, but admonishes them to at least remove the bar code stickers. (This commentary is the museum director’s favorite.)
He acknowledges the creepiness inherent to graveyards and says what we are all thinking—are the heavy chains on mausoleums meant to keep people out, or the prevent the dead from escaping?
In the same vein, he states the three rules for a cemetery near Denver are 1-Don’t pick p anything sharp; 2-Don’t mess with the feral animals; 3- get the hell out before darkness descends.
Finally, I was amused by this one that asked if a mysterious cabal of artists is decorating headstones of children who died too young to have families of their own…or did the ghost of the child weave the crown which adorned the stone.
The CPR story primarily profiles a teacher who learned radio and video broadcasting to start a sports broadcasting class in order to qualify for funding.
Here at Mountain View, Jacob wants to use CTE to prepare his students for careers in technical theatre, so they learn skills like set design and sound mixing.
…Now he’s working on adding the necessary classes – sports broadcasting would be part of that – to make the program official.
“I jumped at the chance to connect my students to extra funds, to get them extra opportunit(ies), because that’s really what it’s all about,” Jacob said.
[…]
But CTE is changing the game for Jacob. Not only could his school receive funding for teaching these theatre-based classes, but students could gain the skills they need to make the arts their full-time gig after graduation.
“The fact that Colorado is saying we value theatrical design and technology as a pathway of career is a really good thing for arts teachers,” he said.
While he has to recruit at least 20 students to his program in order to justify his job, he feels that the prospect of having broad marketable skills like sound design will be more appealing to students than the performance experience most people associate with theater. The CPR story reports that about 40 districts around Colorado have technical theater programs.
While this whole situation sounds just marginally less tenuous than arts in schools have faced for the last 40 years, there is slight cause for optimism about a focus on the technical aspects of theater being a viable path for preserving arts education in schools.
Though the fact that “CTE is the new STEM” is cited in the story suggests that CTE may end up becoming a fad as well.
As the commentary I linked to on Science.org says:
Whipping and driving people into science careers doesn’t seem like a very good way to produce good scientists. In fact, it seems like an excellent way to produce a larger cohort of indifferent ones,…
SMU DataArts released their National Trends study for 2025 in the last couple weeks. At first there is a brief flicker of optimism when you read that earned and contributed revenue is returning to pre-pandemic patterns until you realize that refers to the ratio of earned to contributed revenue. Overall revenue has fallen below pre-pandemic levels.
Expenses are lower too, but that is due to reduction in personnel expenses. There was some good news for artists in that payments to them didn’t drop as much as overall personnel expenses. But unfortunately that seems to indicate organization staffing got cut back quite a lot. Indeed, SMU DataArts noted staff counts have dropped to their lowest point in six years.
On the other hand, attendance is growing even as programming is being cut back.
Our data shows a continued downward trend in the average number of distinct programs per organization, from 150 in 2023 to 83 in 2024. These findings indicate that arts organizations may be making strategic reductions to their programming while focusing efforts on attracting and retaining more attendees for each program.
It is somewhat encouraging to think that arts organizations are starting to do a better job of marketing and retaining audiences. There is some hope that some arts organizations may have a strategy that will enable their recovery. I would be interested to learn what steps organizations had taken to achieve that. I would be just as interested to learn that audiences are so eager to participate in these offerings, the arts organizations didn’t have to make much effort. (I am sure that is true in some communities, but unlikely true in general.)
My preference would be to stop reading on that page because the last section of the summary shows more organizations are running deficits or have an ever shrinking gap between revenue and expenses as well as dwindling reserves with which to cover deficits.
Seth Godin recently made a post on the question of “Who Is It For?” as a measure of the success of an endeavor. He says that while the concept of “maximizing shareholder value” is often cited, he has never met anyone who has adhered to this precept long term before finding it an empty measure.
I am a little skeptical that he is naive enough to think there are plenty of people who are completely comfortable employing that as a central operating philosophy.
He cites the example of a doctor who is focused on meeting patient needs and managers who reward employees for good customer service as instances when investing extra time is expensive short term, but can result in long term successes.
Godin goes on to detail a familiar debate in the arts world–the question of whether to produce works that engage the interest of visual and performing artists or works that will garner commercial success. He uses the example of visual artists and symphony musicians wanting to do challenging work which hones their craft and follow a creative path and the “audience is just one way to achieve that.”
He contrasts that with”
Others are eager to play crowd-pleasing programs, discovering that audience success rewards them even more than their own definition of artistry.
He doesn’t make judgments about which is the better approach. Rather he says that often the stated values can conflict with the values that are actually practiced which can create confusion and inhibit the effectiveness of the organization. (My emphasis)
The conflict, in any organization, is a challenge. We’d like our team members to use their best judgment, to find the satisfaction they seek in their work. But what happens when these definitions of success don’t align?
Too often, management simply conceals what they really seek, or lies about it. If “employees are our most important asset” then why not act that way?
Let’s be clear about who it’s for and what it’s for. It makes decision making more productive and communication and measurement far more effective.
Funding cuts for Philadelphia’s transit system known as SEPTA (Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority) is causing a lot of concern around that city. SEPTA runs both trains and buses. I have seen a lot of concern expressed by parents and schools about how students are going to be able to get to school.
I also recently saw an article discussing concerns theaters in the city have about how the cuts may impact attendance at performances. A survey by the Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance revealed a number of attendees either drove or took public transportation. Difficulty parking was identified as a major barrier to attendance and now there is a concern that lack of public transportation may become an issue as well.
As the technical report shared by the Alliance shows, 58% of people in the region drove to the theater venues, while 22% take public transportation, and 20% walk. The Philadelphia-only numbers are a little different — 39% of the city’s theater audiences drove to performances, a comparable 30% took public transit, and 32% walked.
The surveyed audience skews older: Most respondents were between 58 and 77, while only 7% of audience survey respondents and 11% of public opinion respondents fell into the Gen Z (18-25) bracket. Gen Z respondents named cost and the lack of transportation are the two biggest barriers to their participation.
The article notes that most respondents were white, a small number were Black. Latine and Asian participation in the survey was nearly non-existent.
I wanted to point out that while transit cuts potentially impacting 30% of audiences living in Philadelphia, the fact that 32% of people walk to performances says something about the walkability of the city and the distribution of theaters relatively close to residential areas.
Via a LinkedIn post by Rainer Glaap, I was disappointed to learn that Germany’s KluturPass program is being discontinued. (In German but most browsers can translate pretty well.) The program provided passes to 18 year olds that could be used to attend theater performances, cinema, purchase books, etc. The hope post-pandemic was to get young people out participating in cultural activities while also boosting the cash flow to cultural industries.
The KulturPass program has been criticized for being a poor use of funds and has had funding cut a few times. Recently it was apparently determined the government doesn’t have the authority to fund the program.
The reason for this is an assessment by the Federal Court of Auditors, according to which the federal government lacks constitutional authority to finance the project. Based on this assessment, the non-partisan Minister of State for Culture, Wolfram Weimer, sees little chance for the culture pass. “From now on, we will intensify other projects to promote culture for young people,” Weimer said.
According to another piece on the Politik & Kultur site to which Rainer linked, the implementation of the program was a little rough due to some young people not having the required Internet access and difficultly communicating the availability of the program due to privacy laws.
In a post Rainer made in 2023, he noted there were some pretty big hurdles to using the pass to purchase theater tickets. Apparently you could only use the pass through a central ticketing platform rather than reserving tickets directly with the theater. From what I understand, book stores had some of the best sales volume through the use of the app. It also sounds like a person would get a voucher rather than actual tickets.
Rainer wrote:
“However, anyone unfamiliar with the intricacies of booking may initially struggle to find the right price category and discount, both at Eventim and in the theater’s online shop..”
The writers at Politik & Kultur suggest that the program should be provided more time to work out the kinks and a commitment to more consistent support. They note that the parallel program in France started in 2021 and reaches 60% of 18 year olds (KulturPass got off the ground in 2023)
Folks may remember that in June 2024 the University of the Arts in Philadelphia pretty abruptly announced they were closing after about 150 years in operation. This came as a shock to faculty, staff, and students. Many students were left to scramble because the university hadn’t made any arrangements to help students transfer to other institutions.
One consequence I hadn’t really been aware of is that the school closed so abruptly that faculty and students weren’t able to retrieve the art they had produced. While security did walk them through some buildings, not all spaces were open for retrieval.
This past month there was a newspaper story about a salvage company which was going through one of the buildings that was offering to reunite students with their work before the building is converted to luxury apartments. Thunderbird Salvage was posting a lot of what they found on Instagram but warned people that they were removing so much that it was impossible to record every object.
Thunderbird’s Instagram post racked up several hundred comments within days, while Mathes warned users that the brutalist, nine-story classroom and workshop building had too much stuff inside to catalog.
[…]
Mathes says he’ll save what he can and haul it up to Thunderbird’s locations — a church on the 2400 block of Frankford and a hall on the 2800 block of Frankford — for a sale planned for mid-August. If an artist drops by with a credible claim to a specific piece, it’s theirs at no cost, he said.
[…]
What Mathes and Thunderbird don’t manage to save, workers from Richard S. Burns Waste Recycling Company are hauling to the company’s scrapyard. But Mathes soldiers on: The thought of junking items still precious to the artists, if not potential buyers, bugs him.
Source
*If you are thinking the title of this post sounds familiar, it was the name of an album U2 released in 2000.
Earlier this month, Hyperallergic had a short articleabout a video that actor Steve Martin made for the Frick Collection in NYC. What I appreciated was the way the information in the video was ordered.
The first 1:15 is focused on what the attendee might find interesting. The next 30-45 seconds talks about the “product features.” The remainder of the 6 minute video is about the history of the Frick collection.
I have to believe that this ordering was intentional rather than a happy accident of the way the editor pulled the information together.
That second part which I label as “product features” contains internally focused language that arts organizations would primarily use up until recently listing the qualities the organization thinks are important.
“..a singular New York City experience: A storied trove of art and decorative objects housed in a meticulously restored Gilded Age mansion….”
However, the video starts with the following which is externally focused and all about the visitor experience:
“Consider what you or I might be drawn to…maybe it is a gilded beard, or a velvet sleeve, a trend setter, a love triangle, a mysterious exchange…Maybe what you see reminds you of a friend or a place you’ve been, or a book you’ve read, or a show you’ve binged.
Maybe it jogs a memory or fills you with a sense of delight, desire, power, wonder, bemusement, or calm.
Maybe you need a moment to sit and think and escape. Somewhere peaceful. Somewhere with a view….this is what the Frick collection is for. For slowing down, following your eye, and getting closer to objects of beauty and awe…”
The structure of the video reflects an understanding of how people consume content online (and probably through other media experiences as well.) It starts out talking about what the visitor will enjoy. Then focused on the quality of the art and experience. And then if you are still curious and want to learn more, talks about the history of the collection’s founding by Henry Clay Frick in the late 19th century.
You may not have heard about the Savannah Bananas baseball team. Or rather it may be more accurate to say Banana Ball team because they play a game that is a heavily altered version of baseball. The game is limited to two hours. Score is kept based on points rather than runs. Audience catching foul balls count as outs. One of the pitchers bats and pitches on stilts.
I have seen a handful of arts professionals cite the team as an example of the rule breaking arts organizations should embrace to remain relevant in their communities.
Their games are in pretty high demand among audiences. They played two dates earlier this month in Denver’s Coors Field which holds 50,000 people and you had to register in November 2024 for a lottery that would allow you to purchase tickets.
One of the big elements to the show/game is the choreographed dances the pitcher, catcher, infielders, and sometimes the umpire execute.
Recently there was an interview with the choreographer, Maceo Harrison, in Dance Spirit to talk about how the dances come together. I thought it was a good indication of what the Bananas are trying to accomplish when Harrison talked about how they were recruiting players with performing arts backgrounds.
Have you noticed that as the Bananas’ exposure has grown, newer players tend to come in with more arts training?
Yes, this year we are seeing a lot of players that have a wide background of skills. We have guys that can play piano. We have Dalton Mauldin, who’s an actual singer, and we have Kyle Jackson (“KJ”), who has a musical theater background. We have a lot of athletes that have hidden talents—even dancing. So I think that’s definitely what we’re gravitating towards moving forward.
If you don’t intend to read any further in this post at least read this: Keep your website up to date and make sure it works well on mobile.
Looking at data from Baby Boomers, Gens X, Y, Z, the top three sources of pre-visit information, in order, are Mobile Web, Web (desktop/laptop), and social media. Level of use various a fair bit with Gens Y & Z hovering around 80% on each of these. Gen X around 75% for both types of web and 68% for social media. Boomers are around 45% for mobile and social media and 63% for web.
However, regardless of the level of these percentages these top three are far and away the dominant sources of pre-visit information. The fourth highest source, word of mouth ranges between 22% for Boomers and 15% for Gen Z.
It just underscores the importance of making sure your web content is up to date, inviting, and contains the information people are seeking to make their visitation decisions.
One interesting observation they make about peer-reviewed sites which come in as the fifth most popular source of info:
Interestingly, Boomers very slightly outpace other generations for using peer-review web sources such as Yelp and TripAdvisor. It is not a massive difference, but it may be enough to make senior leaders think twice about Google reviews not reaching more senior audiences.
Looking at how social media influenced people’s satisfaction during a visit, they found that people who referenced online content related to their visit while onsite had a greater level of satisfaction than people who didn’t check out online content. This level was slightly higher for exhibit based entities and performance entities. They attributed this to the lack of opportunity to access information during a performance vs. wandering around a gallery, garden, zoo, etc.
Providing people with content that allows deeper exploration related to their experience can be beneficial to their enjoyment.
Social media may cause an even greater bump than mobile web because social media encompasses sharing and allows guests to meld their own personal brands with a museum or performing arts brand. It allows us to say to the world “I’m the kind of person who attends art museums!” and to share the experience with friends, adding a layer of personal relevance.
In terms of what social media platforms receive the most engagement from high-propensity visitors: For performing arts entities it is Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, Twitter/X in that order.
Exhibit based entities are slightly different
For exhibit-based organizations, Instagram is a 4.3x more important platform for millennial engagement (i.e., likes, shares, comments) than is Facebook. For Baby Boomers, Instagram is 1.3x more important for engagement than Facebook. That said, Facebook beats out TikTok for the Baby Boomer crowd…but only the Baby Boomer crowd.
While I was scrolling through Reddit this weekend, I came across a post about a doctor’s office in the San Diego area prescribing visits to the New Children’s Museum for the poster’s 4 year old (New is its proper name, not an adjective. It opened in 1983 and changed its name in 2008)
In addition to advising daily structured and free play time, the prescription serves as a one year membership to the museum and encourages visiting once or twice a month. The program has lead sponsorship from GitHub, but the museum site also lists Dr. Seuss Foundation, The Parker Foundation, and First 5 San Diego as supporters.
I have posted quitea bit about social prescription programs in various locales around the globe. They typically include everything from passes/vouchers to arts and culture, outdoor activities, rail passes, and book purchases. I was glad to see an examples of one of these programs with pretty generous terms.
Obviously, if people attend twice a month for a year with a 4 year old participation is likely to turn into a habit. I imagine the museum is hoping that translates into paid memberships for at least another 4-5 years of a kid’s youth.
They compared The National Awareness, Attitudes, and Usage Study data from the 2nd quarter of 2022 to the second quarter of 2025 for both exhibit based and performance based cultural organizations comprising 11 different categories. The responses of those who answered that they agreed or strongly agreed with statements is presented.
Across pretty much every category there was a slight increase between 2022 and 2025 on questions about whether an organization had a political agenda. However, the percentages started relatively low in 2022 and only increased a few percentage. This is compared to the same sentiments about newspapers, non-governmental organizations and state agencies which all had high perceptions of having agendas.
In terms of cultural organizations being perceived as mission driven, the percentages responding agree or strongly agree were very high and there was little daylight between Republicans and Democrats.
There were similar results on the question of whether an organization “should suggest or recommend certain behaviors or ways for the general public to support its causes and mission.” The percentage of those agreeing was high in 2022 and has only increased in 2025. Again with only a few percentage points difference between party affiliation.
In terms of a question about whether a cultural organization was welcoming to people like themselves, the percentage of those feeling welcomed by an organization was very high. Unlike the previous questions where Democrats were more likely to agree/strongly agree by 2-3% over Republicans, in this case Republicans tended to feel more welcome. It was only 2-3% more for exhibit based organizations but for performance based organizations the difference was 6-7% more.
Based on the way the questions were phrased, it was likely people were responding about their perception of local cultural organizations with which they were familiar rather than organizations by category. So while there may be a general narrative on social media, etc that seems to reflect a significant divide in opinion about cultural organizations, it seems that people have a positive view of organizations local to them.
It should be noted that Dilenschneider & Co. observe that Democrats are more likely to report being high propensity visitors to cultural organizations (36%) compared to those identifying as Republicans (29%) or Independents/Unaffiliated/Other (35%)
I haven’t written about any of his posts for a couple years, but I have been following Gordon Firemark’s entertainment law blog for 15 years, if not longer.
At one point he wasn’t posting with great frequency, but recently he has been releasing quite a bit of content. A good deal of it has been related to online content.
For example, he recently wrote about making sure you have a “podcast pre-nup” in case one of the co-hosts decides to leave and take half the podcast with them. He cites an example of a client who came to him after making a couple mistakes and provides advice about how to draw up agreements to avoid these issues before they crop up.
He offers a mix of free and paid templates for podcasters to use. Another section of his site has forms for digital entrepreneurs which covers everything from media rights to providing coaching services.
Another topic he recently covered was Brand Deals for social media influencers. He notes there are a lot of legal issues influencers can run into and some forms of disclaimer may not be enough to fend off accusations of fraud or misleading claims.
He points out that that just because platforms provide resources and tools, it doesn’t mean one has unlimited use of them without proper licensing. Similarly, the platform rules are there to protect them and not you.
Platform Policies Are Not Legal Advice
Each platform has its own rules, but those are designed to protect them, not you. Just because a platform allows something doesn’t mean it’s legal. And just because a brand sends you a contract doesn’t mean it’s fair, enforceable, or protective of your rights.
Another recent post warned anyone using websites to support their business not to ignore the content of the site policy language in the website footers. Using the boilerplate language provided or copying the language from another site can get you into trouble.
Here’s why:
-If your disclaimer doesn’t match your niche (coaching, wellness, financial), you’re leaving yourself wide open.
-If your Privacy Policy doesn’t align with how you actually handle user data, you’re violating FTC rules—and likely breaking GDPR, too.
-If your refund policy isn’t clearly disclosed at checkout, you could be in violation of new “Click to Cancel” rules.
If you are looking for some basic information about the legal side of entertainment law in a number of different formats and media, stopping by his website to look at his posts and the issues addressed by his forms can be a good place to start. Especially in terms of giving you a sense of what sort of questions you should be asking.
Another article that caught my eye was about the Memphis Art Museum’s move from the suburbs to a new location downtown under the direction of executive director and Yale alum Zoe Kahr.
Kahr talks about some of the challenges the museum has faced over the years as well as the decision to move the museum downtown rather than expanding/renovating at their original site.
One of the things that really caught my eye was her reflection that pricing doesn’t equal engagement whereas relevant programming does.
We found that our traditional membership model was failing. When the offer was free admission, people weren’t connecting with us,” Kahr explains. “But when we spoke to them about a topic that either connected to their identity or was super interesting to them, people who had not previously been involved were suddenly coming to every event.”
The museum created affinity groups which resulted in greater engagement with the museum, but also greater connection between the group members which Kahr recognized as creating community.
The way she describes the layout of the new museum space, it appears it is intended to foster community and be a gathering space. She mentions that a lot of the museum will be accessible without paying an admission fee. (my emphasis)
The aim is to make the museum—and its art—part of everyday life in the city. “If you’re just ducking in to get some very good coffee, you’re also going to see a bunch of great art,” Kahr explains. Those drawn to watching the sunset from the roof garden while enjoying music and wine will be in a sculpture garden…
Kahr accepts that the art will be secondary for many visitors. “That might be perceived as sacrilegious in certain institutions….“If you’re a community art museum, your goal is to get people to come again and again and again and bring friends and see the museum as part of their core identity,” says Kahr. “To do that, you have to show them themselves, but also continuously expand their horizons about who they are.”
Over the last dozen years I have frequently written about Springboard for the Arts’ Irrigate initiative where they organized 600 artists to provide activity along the construction route for the Green Line light rail in St. Paul, MN. Businesses along the route were concerned that the 2-3 year span of construction would drive them out of business.
The goal of the Irrigate program was to get people into the shops and walking the streets along the construction route. The artists created performances, events, art installations, etc along the route and sometimes in the businesses.
So when the downtown district authority and city started talking a few years ago about their plans to dig up the streets along a five block stretch over the course of 18 months, I started to make the downtown authority and the creative district board aware of what had been done in St. Paul. I had a bit of a vested interest in keeping foot traffic up since the construction will be passing in front of my venue in October.
Construction started in February but starting this summer the folks from the creative district started painting messages on the sidewalk in front of different businesses. In one area they have a hopscotch pattern with a message about reliving memories of youth. Since this is right across the street from my office, I have seen a lot of people, both kids and adults handing off bags and water bottles and skipping through that section. Another place has a zone painted encouraging people to dance their hearts out. Other places have funny messages directing people to different businesses.
This Friday, they kicked things up a bit more and put silhouettes of dump trucks on some of the construction fencing and then painted rainbows coming out of the trucks, across the fencing and then spilling out across the sidewalk. They distributed ribbons to various participating businesses in the construction zone and are encouraging people to patronize the businesses. In return, people will get ribbons to attach to the fencing.
Theoretically, people will attach the ribbons to the corresponding colors on the fence. We will see how that works out. It may be hard to see in the bottom picture, but I helped to prime the pump by attaching ribbons right after things were installed on Friday.
I haven’t written specifically about creative placemaking in a little while, but as this project shows it hasn’t fallen by the wayside. This is another example of how artists can help mitigate/solve issues facing communities.
The creative district folks are installing another project tomorrow night. I don’t remember the details but hopefully I will get some good pictures for a future post.
Another set of stories referenced in the Arts Midwest newsletter was about a 2024 pilot grant program they had started to support 10 Midwest media groups’ capacity to tell stories of arts and culture.
One of the groups expanded arts coverage to rural Ohio counties they hadn’t reported from before. Another explored Lucha Libre’s role in helping collect the stories of Mexican immigrants in Iowa. Another series covered non-traditional and living maps in the Midwest. There were some quirky, but interesting and inventive topics covered. If you are intrigued, visit the project page.
The story project that really drew me in was Buffalo’s Fire reporting on dentalium shells. The shells are tusk shaped and were highly prized by a broad range of American Indian tribes in the Midwest. Since the shells were found on the shores of the Pacific Northwest, there was a robust trade that occurred. However, pandemics, armed conflict, and displacement broke up the trade routes.
The interesting twist on the story is that currently the trade is Indian to Indian–as in the sub-continent of India to American Indians. Fisherman in India are supplying the shell to American Indians. Buffalo’s Fire went to India and made a video interviewing some of these fisherman.
There are a half dozen stories and a few audio interviews discussing the traditional and current use of the shells, where to buy them, the history of the trade, the biology of the shells, etc.
One of the stories mentioned that the supply from the Pacific Northwest is limited today. I was wondering why the supply couldn’t be re-established domestically. I wasn’t clear if that was due to it not being economically worthwhile to harvest or perhaps something related to change of climate and habitat.
Clearly, that interesting connection between Indians and the misnamed indigenous people of North America piqued my interest in exploring deeper and Buffalo’s Fire provided a good range of content.
Came across a press release about a study conducted on Gen Z and Millennial perceptions of Broadway. The provocative title suggested that Broadway wasn’t overpriced, but rather undervalued. According to the study’s sponsors, No Guarantees Productions, once people learn everything that goes into a Broadway production, the amount they are willing to pay increases.
While many of the study participants indicated they were cutting back on their spending due to economic uncertainty, they were open to spending on experiences shared with friends vs. things. This has been a trending sentiment across many studies, especially since the scaling down of pandemic restrictions. These experiences are perceived to provide a greater emotional return on investment than purchasing things affords.
The study includes direct responses from participants and really illustrated the amount of thought people were putting into curating these experiences for others. Some people were thinking about the music a friend/family member liked, others wanted to take friends to their first Broadway show and were thrilled to provide friends with their first theater attendance experience ever.
As seen in the chart below, the study used a number of prompts to determine how much people were willing to pay to see a Broadway show, then provided the context of the expense for a typical vacation trip, then provided the context of how much it cost to run a Broadway show each week. With the addition of each bit of context, the amount people were willing to pay increased from $141 to $286 to $512.
This does align with previous findings that people are more interested in purchasing goods or experiences if there is an engaging story associated with it.
While respondents said they would attend more frequently if the tickets cost less, about 63% said that discounted tickets made them suspect the show’s quality was low or the seats were bad for some reason. No Guarantees suggested that discounting didn’t necessarily make a show more attractive.
In fact, some people responded they would rather pay a little extra to ensure they would have an enjoyable experience:
For Nikki, trading up for a more memorable experience trumps ticket price overall. She explains “If we’re going to spend money to go see a concert or game or a show, we’d rather spend the extra $100 and get the better seats and have the better experience than sit in a nosebleed section,”—a sentiment in line with the artisan economy and the intentionality people are prioritizing in experiences today.
One response type that was interesting to me was that the perception that Broadway shows run forever was resulting in a lack of urgency. I am sure it would dismay a lot of Broadway marketing teams to learn that it regardless of how much buzz they generate about the opening of a show, there are a lot of people who think they can always see it later.
Nikki is a great example of having high interest in Broadway, but low urgency to go to a show. “I would love to see Hamilton, it’s been on my list for a while. I hear it’s the most amazing show, but they’re not taking it off anytime soon. So, I just haven’t gotten around to getting tickets to go see it.”
It’s true that, relative to many other entertainment experiences, Broadway feels static. The perception that the same show that’s been playing for twenty years will go on for another twenty hinders the opportunity for attracting new audiences. This is particularly true at a time when a constant stream of new content has become an expectation for younger generations
No Guarantees suggests one solution for Broadway would be the creation of social clubs and locals-only events. One of the respondents said social clubs targeting her and her friends is what has gotten her to attend a number of events at Lincoln Center.
One thing to note is that most of the respondents were from the NYC area or tri-state region (NY, NJ, CT) with fewer from the national sphere. So many of them may have been plugged-in or at least highly aware of opportunities even if they indicated they didn’t attend frequently. While I imagine that people living in other parts of the US may have a similar perception of the value proposition and would be willing to pay more if they had similar context, the differing range of opportunities available and expectations about participation will likely impact the amount they would be willing to pay and degree to which they would engage.
Arts Midwest sent out their monthly newsletter this week which included stories they had published on their website during July. One of the pieces was a quick set of case studies of small arts organizations making efforts to prevent burn out among their staff and volunteers.
Another piece included three examples of arts organizations’ efforts to create community advisory committees. The experience of one organization in particular, 825 Arts, caught my attention because it emphasizes the importance of being specific when recruiting for committees. It is something that seems obvious, but is seldom recognized and put into practice.
Essentially, they tried to recruit a group to advise them about how best to serve the Frogtown and Rondo neighborhoods in St. Paul, Minnesota. They had a hard time recruiting and retaining people to the committee because people didn’t quite understand the purpose of the group.
Once they shifted their messaging and communication about the group, they saw more involvement.
…they changed the name of the group from “Community Engagement Committee” to “Neighborhood Dream Team.” The new name captured the spirit of the group’s new goals: dreaming and visioning on programs and their potential for their neighborhood.
They also decided to shift formats, engaging members through an ongoing text thread in addition to in-person meetings. The text thread allowed members to respond and contribute on their own time, while the bi-monthly meetings focused on larger proposals and the bigger picture.
825 Arts found success with their community advisory group by honoring members’ time, adapting to their preferred communication styles, and establishing a clear, shared goal.
Among the advice 825 had for others was to make sure people not only understand how they are contributing to the organization, but how those contributions have shaped the final result of things that have been implemented.
He addresses a number of topics, including balancing the mission and purposes of museums against their need to be sustainable. He gives a number of examples, including how the Met had spent seven years preparing a Michelangelo exhibit that was on display for three months. He says it advanced the mission of the museum, but was not a good financial decision.
It was interesting to get his perspective on this balance. Especially since during his tenure The Met made the controversial decision to eliminate the pay-what-you-wish admission fee for anyone who didn’t live in New York. Weiss talks about how he had enjoyed free admission at the National Gallery when he was an undergraduate in Washington, D.C., and how when he attended Yale, the director of Yale University Art Gallery argued the Met should be free given how wealthy it was.
However, he said once he took the helm of the Met, he discovered the budgets were more constrained than most people imagined. Apparently admission revenue had declined by 67% over the previous decade.
He was also faced with a significant amount of deferred maintenance. Apparently, the skylights over the European Painting Gallery were supposed to have been replaced during President Lydon Johnson’s administration. As you might imagine, deferring repairs was undermining the infrastructure of the building and not just threatening the collection with leaks. It ultimately cost $150 million to replace the six acres of skylights and associated HVAC, roofing, etc. He says there was not much philanthropic support for the project so I infer that the admission revenue is helping to pay down that cost.
I've been to a few of the Science on Tap events, though I never gave a talk at one of…