Imagining New Futures
Thursday, April 8, 2021
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After a three-year hiatus, the International Society for the Performing Arts (ISPA) is back with Insider! Featuring the voices of our members, Insider is a quarterly newsletter that explores
timely topics of interest to the global performing arts community.
In this issue, four ISPA members share their ideas on creating more sustainable futures and opportunities that may be available.
At the Virtual Edition: 2021 ISPA Congress earlier this year, we came together as a community to imagine the arts and explore the future, after an unpredictable and devastating
year that shed light on existing inequalities and an urgent need for change.
We sensed a desire from the delegates to continue this conversation. The majority of delegates who completed the post-congress survey said they’d like us to focus on the topic of sustainability at future congresses. We thought, why wait until then? The
term sustainability encompasses many of the topics that the performing arts sector has been challenged to contemplate over the past year and consider changing in the future - economic vitality, ecological integrity, social equity, and institutional
governance.
The theme for this issue is Imagining New Futures to account for the many different ways in which the pandemic has impacted each region, each organization, and every person. And therefore, the many different ways in which we’ll choose to change
as a result of this experience.
Quicklinks:
Given the past year, how do you envision a sustainable future for the performing arts sector?
Many would regard last year as a turning point in history, for the COVID-19 pandemic has changed life for the whole world. This is not just attributed to the fatality and extremely infectious nature of the disease, but the suddenness of its occurrence,
its lasting prevalence, and its recurrence in a highly malignant way.
As arts administrators, we all have the courage to cope with crisis, and the belief that “crisis creates opportunities”. Interestingly, the word crisis in Chinese (危機) inherently embodies opportunities so the two elements are already combined.
We are all eager to make changes, and feel the urgency to pave the way for a new future out of this unprecedented crisis. There is an urgent need to revitalize society, certainly including the performing arts sector, by creating new jobs. People have
become more sensitive about hygiene and more manpower is required to uplift both the hardware and software of performance venues for preventing the spread of the disease. The significance of technology in the performing arts sector is further recognized
and more focus has been put on the management and arrangement for live-streaming of stage performances, not just to minimize social contacts but also to maintain a balanced involvement of local and international artists and the diversity of art forms.
We are more conscious of distributing resources fairly and meticulously for ecological integrity and equal accessibility of different genres to the public. After all, developing appropriate policies to address the needs of artists and audience is
most crucial for the sustained growth and vitality of the performing arts.
What’s the biggest obstacle in your way to achieving this new future?
We understand that building a new future is a formidable task and is full of obstacles along the way. The biggest obstacle for us in this venture is the scarcity of resources. The government has been spending tremendous amounts on initiatives to combat
the COVID-19 pandemic and providing direct subsidies and rental concessions to institutions, organizations, and practitioners of various sectors. We anticipate a cut in public funding and that arts philanthropy will continue to experience a tough
time until the economy is revived. In the foreground of the performing arts scene, the social distance requirement, for instance, the limitation on use of space or seating capacity, seems to be a measure that will continue in the foreseeable
future, which also consumes/sacrifices many resources.
That said, obstacles can always be overcome by creativity, innovation, and perseverance. The morale and aspiration of us arts administrators remains high, and our artists are ready to unite to step on through and start a new life.
Instead of getting stuck on what we cannot control and arguing with the whole world about it, we shall take charge and work on elements that can make a real difference to our project and its outcomes. Individuals start getting used to the idea that life
is constantly changing. Atoms combine to make a compound, creating strength and energy, and getting the very best out of each other. We will work together to stay resilient, and it is in this belief that the magic lies.
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Photo by: WeyYinn
Given the past year, how do you envision a sustainable future for the performing arts sector?
This is a difficult question because I think sustainability is always the biggest challenge in the performing arts sector. We work alongside many different sectors (education, entertainment, and tourism), and there’s a two-way impact. There’s the social
and economic impact that the performing arts creates as well as the impact of the social and economic change on the performing arts as a result of the pandemic.
Before COVID-19, I heard about funding being cut around the world and the situation has now worsened in places without funding pre-COVID-19. This critical COVID-19 situation has created even more challenges, but artists never stop creating, so the problem
we face is more about how arts are being consumed and how people reach the arts. It’s more of a sectorial and structural problem, but amidst the challenges, there are opportunities as well.
- Now is the time for the sector to look into cross-sector collaboration and partnership, and lobby for resources from different sectors. For example, we’ve long been talking about how arts influence education and vice versa, but the education system
has yet to actually work alongside the arts so maybe policymakers in the arts and those in education can come together to combine resources for the benefit of both sectors.
- This is also an opportunity for more inclusivity because boundaries change in the digital space. Once we go digital, boundaries aren’t what we understand them to be as before. We are all in the same country in the virtual world.
- This is also an opportunity to explore how the arts intersect with technology. How does digital technology transform audience consumption behavior? How audiences consume the performing arts has changed rapidly because of COVID-19 and the consumption
rate has risen because people are relying on online platforms.
What’s the biggest obstacle in your way to achieving this new future?
The challenge is to adapt and cope with this situation. Since I started my career as a producer, I’m constantly living in the future and trying to plan and prepare for it, but because of the pandemic, you can’t do that. There’s always changes no matter
how well you predict or prepare for the future. To begin, we have to find a level of calm in this very chaotic situation that will allow us to restart.
Another challenge is opening up the conversation about the intersection of arts and technology. We might have lots of creativity in the arts, but there’s insufficient structural support from the tech world being shifted into the arts, so we really need
cross-sector understanding and collaboration.
Another challenge to overcome is that we’re constantly compared to film, TV, and gaming when the performing arts is put online and we don’t actually want to turn ourselves into filmmakers or TV producers. At the same time, how do we keep that “live” feeling
associated with the performing arts?
My work has always been about touring, international collaboration, co-creation, and commission work. There are many people who mention that international travel won’t resume until 2023 at the
earliest, so there’s this level of uncertainty. How do we tour a work? There’s this concept of touring whereby the work of art travels, but not the individual.
The biggest obstacle to redistribution of income is waiting for policies to shift and structures to change. If that change happens, then everything would speed up much more quickly. Practitioners in the arts have to work harder to have our voices heard
at the political level. The arts and humanities is playing a big role in helping people recover from this pandemic, but the sector has never been prioritized so maybe if these voices were heard, it would help to speed up this process.
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Photo by: Sören Vilks
Given the past year, how do you envision a sustainable future for the performing arts sector?
In Sweden, culture is now at the top of the discussion list because this is one of the sectors that has suffered the hardest during the pandemic. As a result of the shutdown, people realized that culture is a big part of their lives, but also the government
has realized that this sector is sorely needed, so the sector has received crisis money to take care of the loss of income. Freelancers have suffered the most.
The government has decided to investigate how to restart the culture sector. The good thing is that they are starting from the point of making the changes that needed to be made for so many years. How do we reach the many people in our sector that we
haven’t been reaching? All of us in the sector need to try harder to reach new audiences. Digital performances are a good example of reaching new audiences. It takes bravery and creativity to create new performances and reach new audiences.
In Sweden, you can see that the big cities, as in every country, have the big institutions. Right now, you read more and more about people moving from the big cities out to the rural areas. In this case, what you need then is culture wherever you move.
Sweden has taken this on. It will be quite empty if there’s nothing more than your wonderful house and distance meetings in these rural areas. You will need people and live performances. In the coming years, we have to see how we can bring culture
to and from these areas.
We do need to talk more about how we can keep some of this extra sectorial crisis money that we received over the past year to make these changes because it needs to be put towards changes for the coming years, not just now.
What’s the biggest obstacle in your way to achieving this new future?
I think it’s our own lack of bravery. How many conferences have we attended and heard about what we should do and how artists don’t have the same possibilities, or heard about the audiences that we don’t reach, etc.? We have so many ideas, but what do
we need to make a change? What do we need to see our big institutions in a different way and change them?
Riksteatern is owned by 230 associations and its 40,000 members. We do about 40 productions per year and 1,100 performances around Sweden, big and small. It’s different and the decision making
about the next four years is made every fourth year at a big congress. We do have to ask ourselves the same question – how can the sector reach new audiences? Will an association in a small village be brave enough to book something that will reach
a new audience? And will producers be brave enough to produce theatre for a wider audience?
In the last five, six years, there’s been a huge change in Sweden. We have a lot of new citizens. The interesting thing is that these people are or will be well-educated. When they receive the rights to be in Sweden, they go directly to the universities.
What will this mean after four or five more years? They will be in charge and what would they like to be a part of and what will they be interested in?
We can’t just go on in our traditional way. How can we find a balance? I think the lack of bravery is the biggest obstacle - we aren’t brave enough. We have to be braver.
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Craig Hassall AM, Chief Executive
Royal Albert Hall (UK)
Given the past year, how do you envision a sustainable future for the performing arts sector?
Sustainability is a key part of our business plan for 2022-2026 and we had a long conversation on what that means to us. Environmental sustainability is obviously very important, but it is also about the sustainability of the industry or the practitioners,
and how we make them sustainable.
When I think of sustainability going forward, what this pandemic has shown us is the inter-connectivity of the industry. When a venue like the Royal Albert Hall is closed, all the freelance
individuals that rely on us being open are compromised. So, sustainability for us means activity, and activity, for me, means live experience.
The reality for us is that we have a 5500-seat venue to fill, so for us to be sustainable, I need to put on shows, events, and concerts at the Royal Albert Hall, and therefore, give work to all the people and cultural nourishment to audiences.
The other part of the question is, we need to talk about the pipelines the industry creates for up-and-coming artists. I think venues our size are really important because we have a critical mass of activities for satellite operations to create such a
pipeline. In fact, coming out of COVID-19, we are putting more focus into this area. We are looking to turn some of the back-of-house spaces into creative spaces for performers, writers, and musicians to just come in, hang out, and create work. For
us to be a valid contributor to the ecology of the performing arts industry, we, as a venue, want to create these opportunities to ensure the pipeline for the future.
And obviously, there is the environmental aspect of sustainability. We joined the International WELL Building Institute (IWBI). IWBI is about how a building should be designed or re-designed
to improve health and human experience. And when COVID-19 hit, they expanded into a whole COVID-19 safe Kitemark, looking into how you make buildings COVID safe. We are now looking
at how a 150-year old building like Royal Albert Hall, can be COVID-19 safe. We are looking at things like ventilation, measures at the back of the house, and getting our COVID Kitemark from IWBI. And hand in hand with that goes environmental
sustainability. So, we are looking at our carbon management plan and a whole range of things to get up to speed so that the building is as sustainable as possible.
What’s the biggest obstacle in your way to achieving this new future?
It is no secret to any of us around the world that this pandemic has been hugely impactful on our operations. The ecosystem is really broken and people have left the industry. That for us, coupled with Brexit here at the end of last year, is very disjointing
at the moment. To rebuild the performing patterns from before is going to be complicated because we are just one venue and a lot of our events are part of a tour. It is rebuilding the international network of promoters, venues, agents, artists, and
support staff. All of these need to be rebuilt before we can get back to a kind of regular pattern.
On a smaller scale over here in the UK, we have a really intricate and successful touring network in regional theaters. The theaters are all in a terrible financial state now, so they can’t take a financial risk. It is going to take some time for these
venues to build up their reserves to a point where they can take a financial risk of presenting tours.
I also worry that there’s going to be a move to look more inward after the pandemic. That people will be afraid of travel, to go on planes, nervous about foreign countries, and becoming more introspective and nationalistic, which will affect cultural
outputs as well.
On the one hand, you have the practical problems of getting international touring back up. On the other hand, you’ve got, possibly, a public disinclination for foreign acts coming into the UK, and both things are really unfortunate and not helpful for
recovery.
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