Arts organizations across the country are facing a real crisis, one that has been growing for decades. Attendance is down, while costs are up. At the same time, changes in politics and philanthropy now threaten to deprive organizations of essential income. One of us was a board member and donor turned museum director, and the other runs a longtime funder of performing artists and presenting institutions. We came to art in different ways and have very different perspectives on the sector. While we are both passionately committed to the power of the arts and recognize the importance of arts funders, we are beginning to wonder if they have failed to keep up with a changing world.
While it is clear that approaches to cultural production, audience tastes and methods of engagement are in the throes of constant evolution, the reality is that most of us continue to support and present the arts and culture in ways that have remained largely static for more than a century. For visual art and other museums, the dominant approach to presentation has been a large and ever-growing “box.” Within this box is usually a significant and ongoing investment in the acquisition, preservation and maintenance of a permanent collection, as well as a range of business and curatorial practices that are sometimes more object-focused than public-focused.
In the performing arts, the story is largely the same. A large “box”—this one with a stage—focuses on completing a season, often by dated standards and under the guidance of an artistic director who, like a curator of the visual arts, possesses near-exclusive authority over what counts as worthy art and valid artistic interpretation.
Many of those who fund the arts—including us—have supported these practices, helping organizations expand those boxes, furnish those positions, and fill those basements with objects and stages with performances. The results are often sublime. But the net effect is to reinforce the primacy of practices and norms that now threaten the survival of the very organizations we love, as well as the powerful social mission of the arts.
You cannot change programs without changing practice
Some foundations and donors have recognized the need for something different. They have embraced new visions of artistic production and presentation and invested in people and institutions willing to adopt them. But they often fail to ensure that those shared ideas—for a more socially conscious art or place, to take two examples—will continue when their funding ends.
This is a classic innovation gap. New ideas, even good ones, require sustained support to thrive. This is because cultural barriers are more enduring and insidious than barriers to conception. In other words, having a good idea is only half the battle. To keep this idea alive requires a sustained effort and a special skill.
Supporting innovation should mean supporting innovators
Other funders have supported innovative leaders and institutions seeking to fulfill their missions in exciting new ways, whether with cutting-edge programs or mission-related goals such as workforce development and community engagement abroad. But when the worm turns and the work is criticized or resisted by traditionalists, other funders and the press, innovators have few places to turn for support.
Like entrepreneurs in legacy industries, innovators in the arts often find themselves attacked, not praised. Existing audiences often don’t want to lose the narrowly defined experience they want. Most trustees and donors sign to preserve and protect the institutional identity they recognize. Colleagues may fear change. Even the art press often adopts restrictive standards of the areas they cover and examine. And executives who were hired and funded to do just this kind of work find themselves isolated, and sometimes out of a job.
What can funders do to better support sustainable innovation?
First, we can assign a higher initial priority to innovation itself (we define innovation as new ideas to serve the public while promoting the sustainability of the organization itself). Comparing (and criticizing) new ideas to the status quo imposes an immediate hurdle that most leaders cannot overcome. That’s why nearly every sector of the nonprofit world has attracted philanthropic support for innovative leaders through awards and accelerator programs, including Echoing Green, Ashoka, and the Draper Richards Kaplan Foundation (which supports Rimuse). It is a model that has rarely, if ever, been applied to art.
Second, foundations can provide cover for innovators through recognition and appreciation. Even stakeholders who are not resistant to change may be reluctant to adopt new, sometimes controversial, approaches for fear of censure. But foundations have the resources and prestige to give status to leaders who ask the best questions. In a field where status rests, to a large extent, on social approval (and can be lost with a negative title), foundations can use their resources to identify leaders who can shape the future and then give them the resources to prove themselves. To take one example, consider how the MacArthur Fellowship (labeled a “Genius Grant” by the public, not the foundation) provides not only recognition but validation—and some degree of well-deserved insulation from criticism—to its winners, forever.
Third, foundations and funders can address both the isolation and cost of innovation by enabling individuals and organizations trying new approaches to work together. Mellon Foundation”The future of the American theater group“is a perfect example of this approach. Mellon awarded grants to five small regionally based theater companies to experiment with new programmatic approaches. Along with the grants, Mellon supported organizations to come together to share resources and knowledge in a spirit of cooperation with moral and bottom line benefits.
This month, we’re launching something that aims to apply all three of these insights and examples. vanguard combines a price, risk capital, expertise and a community. The program will annually recognize up to 10 leaders of cultural institutions, who have new ideas that focus the public on their work. The program will provide $100,000 to each winner, intended to act as a “carrot” and cover, helping to convince their boards, peers and the public that they have a leader worth supporting. Fellows will also participate in a year-long accelerator, applying evidence-based practices of disciplined entrepreneurship to help them refine, implement, evaluate and share their ideas.
A premise of this work is that, while institutions are best suited to define their own missions, they may need support to work in ways that are as novel, creative, and spatial as the artists whose work they present. This includes external investment and support to help bring in their stakeholders. The Vanguard also aims to confront the key paradox of innovation – that while individual ideas may not last, they will not be born without giving leaders the time, space and resources to think differently.
The power of the arts is the dynamism that comes from an uneasy relationship between the past and the future. Great arts institutions manage perennial commodities not by freezing the status quo, but by challenging themselves to be relevant in unconventional ways. This is especially true during times of major public, philanthropic, and political transitions, where uncertainty causes fear and defensiveness, but also creates opportunity. It’s time to celebrate and support bold leaders with new ideas for engaging the public with the arts and ensuring their organizations can outlive us all.
More expert knowledge
