The document discusses the declining attendance and participation in fine arts institutions and activities in the United States. It notes that attendance for events like ballet, opera, classical music, theater, and jazz have all declined significantly from 1982 to 2008. The median age of attendees has also increased. On average, people now spend less than 10 minutes per week participating in fine arts. The document proposes a new vision and blueprint called S@SFO to help recreate fine arts institutions by making them more accessible, diverse, impact-focused, and innovative through strategies like becoming an arts concierge and cultivating young audiences.

1. RECREATING THE FINE ARTS INSTITUTION
Ramu Iyer
Last Mile Resource LLC
Ramu.Iyer@gmail.com
http://linkd.in/ramuiyer
Date: 10/18/2010

2. CURRENT STATE OF AMERICAN FINE ARTS
INSTITUTIONS
 The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) reports that between 1982
and 2008:
 Adult attendance declined in almost every art form
 Ballet attendance was down 31 percent
 Opera was down 30 percent
 Classical music was down 29 percent
 Nonmusical theater was down 21 percent, and
 Jazz was down 19 percent.
 The median age of people attending Fine Arts events has increased
dramatically.
 Time diary studies show people on average spend only 10.2 minutes per
week participating in fine arts activities, or just under nine hours per
year.

3. KEY CHALLENGES
 The primary issues facing fine arts are not
financial, but rather cultural and social.
 The fine arts organizations have lost touch
with the key American zeitgeist.
 Arts and music classes have been
downsized in most public schools.

4. THE WAY FORWARD

5. S@SFO – A BLUEPRINT FOR RECREATING FINE
ARTS INSTITUTION
 Sustainability
 Art and Therapy (@)
 SFO (Solution-Focused Outcomes) – airport
code for San Francisco, carefully chosen to
send home the message that, if we choose,
we can bring “Silicon Valley” innovation
mindset into any fine arts institution across
zipcodes

6. BECOME AN ARTS CONCIERGE

7. LET THE PEOPLE IN ON THE ACTION

8. CULTIVATE A YOUNG AND DIVERSE AUDIENCE

9. SET THE ART FREE

10. LET THE ART DICTATE THE SPACE

11. CREATE SOCIAL NETWORKS

12. FOCUS ON IMPACT

13. BE CREATIVE

14. RECREATING THE FINE ARTS INSTITUTION

15. A NEW VISION FOR AMERICA
 “We can save America. The union of political
freedom and economic power in democratic
capitalism can and shall create not a perfect
world, but a wonderful one. Such a system is
the only acceptable destiny for humanity,
because it represents the only possible way to
achieving the fullest flowering of freedom, a
world in which we shall study war no more and
in which poverty, privation, hunger and want are
dim memories of a long, suffering, upward
struggle.” (Mark Draper, Director of Curriculum,
The Institute of American Liberty, Nov 22,1996)