A climate of dwindling subsidies and fierce competition for corporate sponsorship has left many arts operators struggling to stay afloat, increasingly reliant on paying customers to sustain their practice. What’s more, that paying customer has become ever more problematic to win over. And neither is the proliferation of entertainment choices outside the ‘traditional’ cultural sphere aiding the ‘natural’ turnover in arts audiences.
Policies, strategies and programs are no longer pure theoretical construct, instead they are key survival mechanisms in building a robust collective audience for culture. Indeed, the understanding now is to build them or bust, and if they are built well the benefits are incalculable. How then does the sector overcome the variety of obstacles to maximize arts attendance?
