Recovery and Transformation in the Wake of COVID
2022 Conference Blog
Tram Nguyen
“We are not at the tail end of a pandemic, we are at the beginning of a structural transformation.”
So begins the framing for Thursday’s session on How Can Funders Leverage COVID Data for Sector Recovery and Transformation?
I was immediately drawn to this breakout session because my own sector of public health has of course gone through massive changes and seen massive impacts to our clients and communities and the way we deliver our services.
Like you all in the arts, we are dealing with similar questions of what to do after the influx of one-time moneys that have been used to stabilize communities and provide emergency public services. What are the pros and cons of accessibility in the more virtual, hybrid delivery system of services we’ve come up with since?
And, as panelists also highlighted in this breakout, the impacts of the pandemic and the shutdowns in the cultural and arts sector hit hardest among artists and organizations that already were underserved and facing structural barriers.
For us in public health during this time of transition—of rolling back mandates and states of emergency, of receding and shifting resources—the main challenge is supporting those who are most impacted and most marginalized to not get left behind in the recovery.
I was struck by the sea changes wrought by the pandemic to the cultural and arts sector that Michael Greer of ArtsFund shared from a study his organization produced. The COVID Cultural Impact Study drew from surveys of hundreds of arts and cultural nonprofits and individual cultural participants from spring to fall of 2021.
Some of the troubling trends seen across the board:
Significant reductions to revenue for arts organizations. According to Elizabeth Rouse of ArtsMemphis, their grantees are still seeing a 70% reduction in revenue compared to pre-pandemic.
Big shifts to virtual programming. In some cases, organizations reported a 70% shift to virtual programming and the likelihood that this is a permanent change.
Loss of the cultural workforce. In Memphis, artists reported a 64% reduction in their income, and an overall decrease in the number of people considering themselves full-time artists; 31% of cultural workers are considering leaving the sector completely. Not to mention staff turnover at nonprofit arts organizations.
Audience reductions. Audiences for performances and events are down about 40% from Washington State to Boston and the Midwest in between, as the panelists reported. This is being impacted by societal and cultural forces, such as rising violence in some places spurring fear of attending downtown venues, and of the revolution underway with online, social media-driven entertainment. Yet, big audiences and a full house is still possible—depending on the programming and the experience, such as immersive art shows—though circumscribed by resources.
So, we have massive changes and massive challenges, many of them likely to be a permanent part of the new terrain. How will we pivot and reinvent a way forward?
As the moderator, Michael Greer, posed to the breakout participants, “How do we, as grantmakers in the arts, act now to support a more robust, equitable, and resilient sector tomorrow?”
Many of the panelists underscored the importance of flexibility and removing barriers for arts grantees, to be as responsive as possible to their needs during this time.
“Living through this shift means focusing on a strategy of one on one unrestricted support for artists and organizations,” said Elizabeth Rouse.
ArtsMemphis and others created emergency funds to give out money to individual artists and are prioritizing ways to give unrestricted operating support, preferably multi-year.
Torrie Allen of Arts Midwest highlighted the silver lining of the pandemic, which forced funders to lower barriers and find more underserved organizations to access federal relief dollars. This greater accessibility and cooperation born of necessity is a feature of surviving the pandemic that has been true across many nonprofit and public sectors, and we would be wise to build it into our future models of operating.
According to the COVID Cultural Impact Study, the pandemic’s upheaval “has made the essential role of arts and culture more expansive and urgent” than ever. Now is when we need our artists and cultural workers, and the organizations supporting them, to be healthy and whole, ready to play a vital part of healing communities and imagining the solutions we collectively need to recover.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Tram Nguyen joins us from Oakland, CA for the virtual track of the 2022 GIA Conference.
She currently works in the Health Equity, Policy, & Planning team in the Office of the Director, Alameda County Public Health Department.
ABOUT THE CONFERENCE
The 2022 GIA Annual Conference begins on Thursday, October 6 and runs through Wednesday, October 12. In the meantime, get familiar with our virtual portal and check out the in-person sessions!
You can follow the convening and join the conversation using the hashtags #ConvergeTransform and #GIArts2022 on Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Facebook. And, don’t forget to visit the Conference Blog for stories and reporting from the in-person and virtual conference tracks throughout the week.
