Arts Alive grants boosting audiences

Arts organizations receiving grants in the first year of the PNC Foundation's Arts Alive initiative saw audience size increase an average of 70 percent, according to a study conducted by the foundation.

Arts Alive, a five-year, $5 million program launched in 2009, is focused on helping arts organizations broaden audiences through new programming, marketing, and use of technology.

The study, conducted by Open Minds L.L.C. of Pittsburgh, reported that not all projects resulted in audience gains, but 73 percent of the 19 organizations that received grants for 2009-10 saw increased audience size.

The grants seemed to have a lasting, or at least lingering, impact. Following the end of the grant period, 86 percent of the organizations reported a continuing increase in audiences they had specifically targeted.

"We're very gratified by these first-year results," said Jean Canfield, PNC senior vice president.

"We want to continue to monitor what the results are. But we feel . . . we've achieved what we hoped to achieve."

Broadly speaking, each grant targeted plans crafted to corral broader audiences. Some organizations received funds to subsidize ticket prices. Other groups came up with specific marketing plans aimed at a particular audience - young people, for instance, or people over 55.

Others groups sought to use technology - cellphones, the Internet, social media - to both spread the word about performances and enhance performances or exhibitions.

Bay Atlantic Symphony, for instance, received a $40,000 grant to subsidize ticket prices. The Bridgeton, N.J.-based group was able to reduce ticket costs by 35 percent.

"Our funding helped them keep ticket prices at $25," said Canfield, who is in charge of Arts Alive for PNC.

In other cases, she pointed out, funding allowed for completely free performances, sometimes in unusual public places.

Group Motion Dance Company staged such performances near public art sites on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway and at City Hall. Music was transmitted by iPods and audiences were composed of a diverse group of devotees and startled and intrigued bystanders. Group Motion received a $35,000 grant.

Spiral Q Puppet Theater received a $25,000 grant to stage its 10th-anniversary puppet-making workshop and parade, known as Peoplehood, in West Philadelphia. The grant supported the actual costs of the project, but also helped Spiral Q spread the word about the free events. Participation increased from 497 to 741 people, 49 percent.

Grants also served to subsidize transportation to events, stage a variety of free performances throughout the city, and provide cellphone audio tours and more robust use of the Internet.