Art as the hub

Stay with me . . .

I have a friend, nicknamed "O".  We have been friends for over a decade now, ever since college.  I have some other friends, Chris, Ryan, etc.  But the thing is I really only know them through "O".

So in this situation, my friend "O" is the hub . . . he is the person that connects a group of people together.

I think "O" and I will be friends for a long time, in part because of our relationship and in part because of all the connections I make to other people through him.

So what does this have to do with the arts?

In all this talk about declining audience, diminished subscriptions rates, low paid actors and overpriced tickets . . . I think we may have missed the point of the arts.

We keep talking about finding ways for people to connect with our particular art form.

But people don't want to connect to art . . . they want to connect to other people.

So instead of a theatre company seeing their performance on stage that night as the point of the evening, perhaps they should just see themselves as the hub . . . as the thing that connects all the people in the audience to each other.

Now I know many artists would hate to see it that way.  I mean the arts are about the artists right?  People pay good money to see directors and musicians and dancers!

Right?

I'm not so sure any more.

I think what people are willing to pay for is to be connected to other people.

And maybe one of the reasons that the arts is struggling is because we insist on being the focal point of the whole process.

Think about movies for a second.  Have a look at this.  It is the fan site for the upcoming Indiana Jones movie.

Is the point of the site to glorify Harrison Ford?  Is the point of the site even to sell tickets to the movie?

Nope.

The point is to allow Indiana Jones fans to connect.  Will that help ticket sales?  Of course it will.  But that's not why it is there.

If you run an artistic organization I want you to consider this.  When is the last time you actively tried to connect your audience members?

Not to your actors.

Not to your dancers.

Not to a playwright.

To Each other?

Think of what could happen if, for example, instead of just having ushers leading people to their seats, your dance company had people in the aisle introducing patrons to other patrons?

At that point your company becomes more then a place where people just watch what happens on stage.  It becomes a second home.  It becomes a gathering spot.

It becomes a hub.

Here's what I think . . . in the future the arts organizations that thrive will be the ones most skilled at turning their audience from an unrelated group of people into a community.

People want to connect to each other.

How is your art form helping that to happen?

 

Comments

[Nick Keenan]

At New Leaf, connecting people in a renewing environment is our mission, actually. Indeed, the specific play that we're doing at any given time is secondary to the culture that we're creating in the world of the play. They're both vital to each other, but putting a priority on a communal audience experience (in the round, intimate staging, a world that extends beyond the walls of the theater) does allow the play and the work to breathe in ways it wouldn't otherwise.

Personally, I find the nihilistic art that we all thought was so shocking in college to be empty and misguided these days. Clear-eyed hope and renewal is a much more challenging and worthwhile subject to take on in a world where the nihilism has crossed over into our lives.

I think the reason people are willing to pay for that connection is that we've become a disconnected society. Not to be a downer, but the problem is big - the U.S. is at the tipping point of becoming a dying empire of citizens engaged in pet interests and Iraq is the millstone around our neck. To say nothing of poverty here in town, to say nothing of a drowned U.S. city that we've all but forgotten.

We don't actually need the arts to remind us how much the world and the people in it have messed things up. The news does that job very well these days. We now need the arts to trace a workable path to a better American community and consciousness. Building real communities through art is the key to that path, and you're right - audiences want the truth and the hope that comes from really connecting with people again.

[Scott Walters]

I totally agree with you, and applaud wholeheartedly everything Nick said above as well. In Asheville, we have NCStage Company. Last spring when they were doing "Chesapeake," we set up a slightly different version of a post-show discussion that didn't involve any of the artistic personnel. It was all about the audience. We used the World Cafe approach: we set up a bunch of tables in the lobby with paper and colored markers -- four people to a table. As moderator, I first asked them to do a "free write" about topic connected to the show. After they wrote for a while, I asked them to share what they wrote with each other, either by reading it or summarizing it. Then the conversation continued. After about 10-15 minutes, three people from each table rotated to other tables, and the conversation continued. It was EXTREMELY successful. People got to meet each other and talk about what they had seen. Before they left, they wanted to know whether this would be done after each Sunday performance, because they wanted to be sure to come on Sunday. I love the idea of the play as a hub -- absolutely brilliant.

[Adam]

Scott,

I've got to highlight a part of your comment in case people missed it:

"Before they left, they wanted to know whether this would be done after each Sunday performance, because they wanted to be sure to come on Sunday."

So in raw business terms your theatre pulled off something that almost NEVER happens. Repeat customers within the run of a particular show!

I know that wasn't the point of the whole thing but it was a real nice side effect.

It also reminds me of something marketing guru Seth Godin said. 40-50 years ago companies were built on the strength and frequency of their advertising.

Now when you think of major new brands like Starbucks or Apple or American Girl place . . . NONE of them was built on advertising. They were built on the strength of the community they built.

[Tony]

That is part and parcel of Halcyon's Mission as well. We look at theatre as sharing a story with our audiences. Sharing a story is like sharing a meal, bringing people together.

We work hard to do that. Hopefully we're doing a sucessful job. . . One thing I am very proud of is the diversity of our audiences in both age and cultures.

A lot of that has to do with the stories from around the world we choose to share with our audiences. Being a hub for a certain group is nice, being a hub for a community is better.

[Nick Keenan]

That's a FANTASTIC talkback structure, Scott. Any offense if we steal it?

[Chris Casquilho]

I have a little heartburn with the tenor of these comments. Speaking out of turn with the intelligentsia - while "art for arts' sake" is a pretty goofy concept - syntactically and otherwise - if the mission of arts organizations is not to create art, then it begs the question: isn't there some better way to "connect people in a renewing environment?" (Ps. will the author of this mission please read the post "Talking about your mission" on this blog.)

Couldn't you easily succeed at that mission by offering classes on boat building, or starting a folf league? When push comes to shove, with no artists, there is no art. If your arts organization puts the needs of the community above the needs of the artist, you will turn your product into lukewarm porridge, lightly salted to taste.

From this blog. Note point #1:

Courtesy of Michael Kaiser from the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C.
1. Create Great Art
2. Market Like Hell
3. Build the Board
4. Ask for Money

[Chris Casquilho]

"Now when you think of major new brands like Starbucks or Apple or American Girl place . . . NONE of them was built on advertising. They were built on the strength of the community they built."

What built the community? Marketing.

[Tilmann Krumrey]

Hi Adam,
I think you really hit the ball. Connecting people by art is building tribes. Art happenings will become tribal gatherings and the artist is the schamanistic master of ceremony.
This does not at all mean missing the objectives of art. Art wants to shift expectations, change realities. Since all times that is exactly what the priest, the medicine man, and the artist had to do.

[Art]

Yup man definately i agree!!