Evidence Is In: Arts Audiences Are Declining

“Following a sharp decline in overall arts attendance that occurred from 2002 to 2008,” one NEA report states, “participation rates held steady from 2008 to 2012” for classical music, jazz, and dance performances. However, ticket sales for non-musical plays continued to slip further during those final four years, and attendance at stage musicals—one of the few art forms that had been holding steady earlier in the decade—declined from 2008 to 2012.

What Does The List Of The New York Times’ Most-Read Stories Of 2014 Say About Us?

“Many of the most popular items from 2014 aren’t conventional news stories at all — they’re contributed content (Dylan Farrow’s open letter about Woody Allen), quizzes (2013′s “How Y’all, Youse and You Guys Talk was on the list for two years straight), and question-and-answer sessions (The Times’ Q and A on the Ebola crisis made the list).”

Measuring America’s Arts Audience

The NEA releases its latest study: “The latest SPPA compares arts participation rates based on surveys from 2002, 2008, and 2012, as well as regional, state, and metro-area statistics. Several of the findings are particularly noteworthy. Adults who attended performing arts or visited museums as children were three to four times as likely to see shows or visit museums as adults.”

Renzo Piano: Want To Preserve Historic Centers? Look To The Edges

“In the nineteen-sixties and seventies, the big challenge—in Europe certainly, but everywhere—was to establish as a principle that historic centers have to be preserved. But in the two-thousands—probably for the next three, four, five decades—the real challenge is to transform the periphery. If we fail in doing this, it will be a real tragedy.”

The Percentage Of Children Reading For Pleasure Has Plummeted In The Last Few Years

“Sixty per cent of the children who enjoyed reading more when they were younger put this down to the fact there are ‘so many other things that I now enjoy more than reading,’ and 47% blamed the fact that ‘I have to read so much for school that I just don’t feel like reading for fun,’ with others citing the fact they now have to read on their own, rather than being read to.”

This Is How Theatre Becomes Essential For Local Communities

“First, the theatre-makers must ensure they reflect those communities. Second, they need to be trained to work alongside the communities, to channel their lived experience into art, with skill and authenticity and often for community members themselves to perform. And third, the whole theatre industry needs to be open to members of different communities becoming new theatre artists themselves, and commit to supporting and encouraging that.”

Look, No, The Internet Isn’t Killing The Creative Class – It’s Just Hard To Make A Living In The Arts

“This Jane Jacobs-ish defense of the Comic Book Guys of the world is passionate but unconvincing: Are we really losing something essential with these ‘gathering places’ that isn’t made up for by Wi-Fi-enabled coffee shops (frequently havens of creative production, not just consumption) on the one hand, and online forums for critical discussion on the other? Does the labor of culture have to happen in a store?”