Arts organisations could be forgiven for feeling between a rock and three hard places – less funding, reduced sponsorship, less audience income.
In the current climate, it is difficult to focus on much more than the potential negative impact on the supply side of cultural provision that the Government’s spending review will have. We are all bracing ourselves for this; but it is only one of three key principal sources or revenue to arts organisations.
Back in March 2009, Audiences London compiled ‘What to do in a down-turn’. This paper included analysis produced by Audiences South indicating how recession impacts upon the demand for culture and income from audiences. There are two key lessons in that analysis – there’s a 12 month bottoming-out of that downward demand and regions experience differing levels of reduced demand.
These economic forces mean that the arts sector is shaped by factors outside of its control. Knowing the extent of this external influence ought to enable autonomous organisations to define and address what is in their control – their offer and their position within a collaborative and/or competitive market.
Being able to model the impact of large scale economic forces and translate them to the context of individual organisations could play a strong role in ensuring arts organisations have income projections that are realistic and place investment and risk management on as solid a basis as possible.
There’s opportunity in the sector’s current situation to re-evaluate the assumptions of strategic planning, which are, modelling the evidence informs autonomy and clarifies the variables that are controllable. Seizing this opportunity would be to generate a deep understanding of the cultural economy measured in terms of money.
I’m inviting economists and arts organisations that are interested in this to get in touch and help me explore this area. jim.brewster@audiencessw.org
Jim Brewster, Acting Chief Executive, Audiences South West.
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