Ben Cameron, Program Director for the Arts at the Doris Duke Foundation and UNC-Chapel Hill alumnus, is probably the performing arts most prolific speaker - and for good reason. Mr. Cameron is an arts ambassador extraordinaire and a knowledgeable and passionate speaker. Barry's Blog, part of the Western States Arts Federation website and a great resource arts administrators, recently posted four big issues that Ben Cameron mentioned in a recent speech. I'm passing along Ben's words. Check out the full post with Barry's comments here.
In a recent speech to the Chamber Music America Membership Meeting National Conference on January 16,2009, (Ben Cameron) identified four areas that challenge the arts even more than the financial crisis that currently vexes us all. While all four issues have been with us for awhile, I (Barry) think it important to pass on his analysis. Rather than try to paraphrase his remarks, I (Barry) include those four points in his own words."First, concern about the increasing dysfunctionality of the 501(c)(3) model as organization leaders, increasingly overwhelmed by the demands of fundraising, of advocacy, of arts education policy formation, of board recruitment and donor cultivation—an expansion of a portfolio that often resulted in days and weeks passing without setting foot inside rehearsal halls, of engaging artists they never met and more, asked: “Isn’t there another way to finance and support the work we are called to do?”
Second, we heard about an impending generational transfer of leadership. A study supported by the Meyers Foundation in Oregon revealed that 75% of leaders in the nonprofit sector—including but not limited to the arts—will leave their jobs by 2012. And while many of us for years have wondered where we would find those individuals willing to work the long hours, accept the paltry compensation, in essence to embrace the social and financial masochism that were the accepted standards for leaders of my own generation, these conversations brought a new perspective to this issue. “There are more than enough of us ready to lead,” the young people in the room said. “But we are not interested in being the mere custodians of those institutions you have created. Unless we have the same degree of responsibility and autonomy to remake and refashion these organizations as you yourselves were given, we’re not interested”—a position that now places the issue more squarely on organizational flexibility, openness and capacity for change than on the identity of the heir apparent per se.
Third, we heard about the erosion of audiences in every field—declining subscription renewal, difficulties in attracting single ticket buyers, increased “churn”—a term reflecting the high percentage—typically 70–75%--of audience members who attend a single event in a season and do not return—the collapse in the window of social planning post 9’11, when seemingly overnight audiences shifted from committing, not two to four weeks in advance, but more typically purchasing on the day of or, if you’re lucky, 24-48 hours in advance—a disorienting shift that continues to plague box office and marketing departments who struggle to understand the implications on a Tuesday for a sparsely sold Saturday performance. Moreover, the ever accelerating pace of our lives is producing a populace characterized by over-scheduling and exhaustion—a time in which (according to a Yankelovich poll) more than half of consumers in every income level say lack of time is a bigger problem than lack of money, where 42% of men and 55% of women say they are too tired to do the things they truly want to do, and where the #1 answer to the question of most eagerly anticipated use of a free evening is no longer dinner with friends or a movie or a performing arts event, but is instead “a good night’s sleep.” Not surprisingly we heard in ever field that, after decades of growth, our audiences are shrinking and that our own financial needs, driven in many cases by escalating fixed costs of facilities, insurance, health care and more, in tandem with negative shifts in funding mean escalating ticket prices that threaten to place attendance beyond so many in our communities we wish to reach and serve.
Finally, and certainly related, we heard the struggle to understand more fully the impact of technology on the live performing arts. The potential of technology as a marketing device is, if anything, too effective: in trying to attract the attention of potential ticket buyers, we now compete with (depending on who you read) between 3,000 and 5,000 different marketing messages a typical American sees every single day. In fact, technology has emerged as our biggest competitor for leisure time: Gen Xers spend 20.7 hours of leisure time every week on TV and online combined, the majority TC; Gen Yers spend even more—22.8 hours, the majority on line—and last year, in 2007, computer games outsold movie and music recordings combined. Most profoundly, technology is altering the very assumptions of consumption: thanks to the Internet, we believe we can get anything we want, whenever we want it, customized to our own personal specifications. We can shop Ben Cameronat three in the morning or ten o’clock at night, expectations of convenience and personalization that live performing arts organizations—organizations who depend on set curtain times, specific geographic venues, attendant inconveniences of parking, travel and the like—simply cannot meet. And in an age where young people especially access culture on demand through YouTube and iTunes any time they want it and for little or no apparent cost, what will it mean in the future when we ask a potential audience member to pay $40, $50 or $60 for a chamber music when that consumer has been accustomed to downloading on the Internet for .99 a song or for free?"
Read the rest...
Recent Comments