Building Public Will For Arts And Culture

Immersive Art Experiences Require Expansion Of Capacity And Vision

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ArtNews had a piece last month examining the world of Immersive Art shows.  You may have seen ads for these events which animate the works of Van Gogh or Monet and project them on the walls of a large space. To my surprise, those shows represent a small and decreasing share of the market compared to shows that animate the works of living artists or long term installation such experiences like those offered by companies such as Meow Wolf.

Immersive shows for Van Gogh and Monet are somewhat controversial based on the manipulation of artists’ work and the perception that the shows are lightweight and sort of dumb down the art viewing experience.

Museums that are interested in providing these sort of programs run up against capacity issues, both in terms of personnel and physical space:

Adapting or acquiring, and then equipping large amounts of space is one clear constraint. Size matters here. Small spaces simply do not have the same experiential impact. To compete with the big players, a museum will need to build out or otherwise secure several thousand square meters of floor space. Quality projection-based art often requires a 10-meter or even higher ceiling. These are halls that many existing institutions don’t have or can’t justify surrendering for extended periods.

Up next, new skills are needed. Creating an immersive art experience is akin to developing a branded consumer product. It relies on a multidisciplinary team to develop a single large-scale work…

On the other hand, Felix Barber, who authored the ArtNews piece suggests that the immersive art show can be taken out of the museum space to reach new audiences where they live. He cites collaborations in France where ” Grand Palais Immersif, in turn, joined forces with the Opera National de Paris to create an immersive space inside the Opera Bastille.” But also points out that other spaces like warehouses, empty spaces in shopping malls, and churches can provide the requisite physical space for these shows:

To find the space, a museum may not have to build at its existing high-cost, city-center location. Instead, it can look for a more affordable solution, while potentially engaging a new audience where they live. Many immersive studios work with real estate partners that are seeking to invigorate shopping centers and struggling urban areas. Others take over disused industrial premises. Culturespaces in Baux de Provence operates in an old quarry. Eonarium uses churches.

Ultimately those Barber interviews suggest that while museums in the current form will likely always be attractive, more options are becoming available to consumers who may prefer an experiential interaction versus standing in front of a work and reading a plaque.

In the end, it all comes back to the quality of the art. What will unlock museums’ interest in immersive experience is work that embodies beauty and meaning, presented at scale with a powerful sensory flourish.

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Even so, and no matter what, art museums now face new competitors. Sitting back and watching them capture audiences is not a promising option. Museums have to respond. One size will not fit all.

Providing Assurances Can Do 80% Of The Heavy Lift In Marketing

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Yesterday I saw a post on LinkedIn where Ruth Hartt was reinforcing the idea that people purchase the outcomes they desire rather than things.

In response, commenter Jay Gerhart wrote:

Reminds me of our first JTBD work with Bob Moesta when we simply showed a digital ad for virtual care with a person enjoying an event with their friends. We didn’t have to show them obtaining health care – we showed the result of it. 40% increase!

It happens that the night before, I started re-reading Peter Drucker’s Managing The Non-Profit Organization

On the second page of the first chapter, Drucker essentially says that nonprofit mission statements need to be focused on outcomes. He relates the story of helping an emergency room of a hospital create a mission statement for itself. He says it took them a long time to arrive at a mission statement and when they did, people felt it was ridiculously obvious – “to give assurance to the afflicted.”

And, much to the surprise of the physicians and nurses, it turned out that in a good emergency room, the function is to tell eight out of ten people there is nothing wrong that a good night’s sleep won’t take care of. You’ve been shaken up. Or the baby has the flu. All right, it’s got convulsions, but there is nothing seriously wrong with the child.’ The doctors and nurses give assurances.

…Yet translating that mission statement into action meant that everybody who comes in is now seen…in less than a minute….Some people are immediately rushed to intensive care, others get a lot of tests, and yet others are told ‘Go back home, go to sleep, take an aspirin, and don’t worry…But the first objective is to see everybody almost immediately–because that is the only way to give assurance.”

Framing an audience’s desired goals for an experience in terms of medical outcomes helped further develop my understanding of the concept Hartt has been espousing.  Given the choice, very few people would prefer to undergo a medical procedure vs. just going about daily life. While knowing you will enjoy competent care is important, what people really want to know as Jay Gerhart suggests, is that they will come out the other side with as minimal an impact on their daily enjoyment as possible.

Obviously the stakes aren’t as high when attending an arts and cultural experience (one hopes), but there can still be a related anxiety regarding whether the experience will be an enjoyable one. Focusing on how the experience will solve a problem like providing an escape from stress of the work week or providing an opportunity to spend time with family and friends.

I often cite this Lexus commercial as a good example. The parents continue to drive until the kids say they no longer have a cell signal and then the parents stop driving. The voice over says “…and feel what it is like to truly connect.” You aren’t buying a luxury vehicle, you are buying a method to reconnect with your family.

But it isn’t just enough to communicate that message. As Drucker says, it has to be operationalized in some way. But translating it into action isn’t necessarily complicated just as providing assurance in Drucker’s example meant a commitment to making an assessment in a short period of time.

 

Libraries Serve The Huddled Masses Yearning For Wifi Access

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In another refutation of the argument that we should stop funding libraries because no one reads books, on Friday there was a public radio piece from Marketplace illustrating the increased role libraries play in communities.

In this particular story, they featured a library in Taylorsville, KY where not a lot of people have internet access due to the sparse population and difficult terrain. The director of the library noted that the use of the library computers has decreased over time, but the use of their wifi has increased significantly due to people using their own devices.

Director Debra Lawson said that while those computers are used less frequently lately —patrons typically bring in their own devices — the Wi-Fi usage is “through the roof.”

“We leave our Wi-Fi up 24/7,” Lawson said. “So sometimes … I come in the next morning, check on the camera, and there’ll be people outside in 35 degrees in sleeping bags using the internet.”

The main focus of the story is that federal infrastructure bills are providing better internet to places like Tayorsville as well as helping underwrite 70% of the $9000/year bill the library will have when they get fiber optic internet in the near future.

But the value of the internet service to the community can be measured in those people sitting outside the building in 35 degree weather using the service. During Covid, many libraries re-positioned their wifi equipment to provide a signal into their parking lots so that students who didn’t have internet at home could do their homework while building access was denied them. Even as the buildings re-opened, libraries have continued to offer that service for students and the unhoused population. When I go to my local library, there are signs on the exterior of the building with the wifi information so that people can log in.

Libraries provide a good example of a non-profit/government service that is constantly revising the way they offer their services to help meet the needs of the community. In many ways, they are much more responsive and nimble than many other cultural non-profits or government services.

Prioritizing Hospitality And Accessibility In The Face Of Fear

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You may have heard that museums in Vienna, Austria offered free admission to Taylor Swift fans who were faced with the cancellation of the concerts due to terroristic threats.

My one quibble with this is their claim that admission is so expensive for young people —who paid the equivalent of $750 plus travel to see the concert (though apparently ticket prices dropped to about $250 in the weeks before the concerts).  There is an element to this situation where people saying things are too expensive really mean they prioritize spending much more on some experiences versus others. (There is also the fact that it says something about concert ticket prices in the US that even at $750 a ticket it was cheaper for US residents to fly to Vienna than to see a show in their own country where ticket prices are in the thousands. But that is another post.)

Otherwise, I appreciated that many of the museums took steps that reflected the interests of their audience like adding more English language tours and switching out the classical music tracks played in the galleries.

The museum also switched the soundtracks playing its in 20 historical staterooms from classical music to Taylor Swift albums, prompting several large singalongs that went viral on TikTok.

“I love classical music, I love Mozart, I love Beethoven, I love all these classical artists, but it was really nice to have a Taylor Swift singalong more or less in the state rooms that normally stand for something else,” Eisterer said, noting she had worked for The Albertina for eight years.

While I would personally prefer a different music choice, I have noted for years that not everything an arts organization does is meant for everyone. One museum went from having 2000 visitors on weekend days to an average of 5000 people a day from Thursday-Sunday. Another saw a 100% increase over regular attendance.

While theses institutions gave up admission revenue, they did see a surge in sales in their stores and cafes which helped to make up for the loss.

Revenue considerations aside, the museums saw the cancelled concerts as an opportunity to advance the perception of accessibility, relevance, and welcoming among a younger demographic. Not only for themselves, but the city as well.  This is the sort of approach that helps engender trust and engagement in arts and cultural organizations that I have discussed in some recent posts.  (I am still holding to my general philosophy about free admission though)

While the initiative may have been a temporary hit to museum revenues from entry fees, museum staff told ARTnews there were far more benefits, including merchandise sales, publicity, and greater accessibility to younger visitors.

“We didn’t think about the money or the losing the money at all,” Eisterer said, noting that its entry fees can be very expensive for young people. “It was, for us, important to set like a sign for this concert that had been canceled because of this horrible reason, and to give somehow a bit of hope and say to people, ‘Hey, we know it’s devastating. You can’t go to the concert, but hey, you can enjoy a bit of of art in Vienna, that’s what we can offer you’.”

“It’s helpful for our reputation,” Posch said. “it pays into the reputation of the city of Vienna, being friendly, being generous, being hospitable. And that is worth more, in the end, than not generating these few euros in ticket sales.”