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The live streaming of theatrical performances to cinemas has become increasingly common in recent years. The practice offers potentially positive returns for audience reach, audience development, revenue streams and global cultural exchange (Cochrane and Bonner, 2014; Nesta, 2011; King, 2016). However, the conceptualisation of live performance transmissions remains under-explored. The purpose of this paper is to review critically selected literature on event experience and apply it to the growing practice of live-streaming theatre (LST). In doing so, the paper develops a new conceptual model that can be used to guide future research on audience expectations, motivations and experience of LST.

A comparative historic case study approach combines a structured review of relevant academic literature and industry sources. Theories of live cultural experience and authenticity are critically reviewed. The opportunities and threats of LST to performing arts companies are summarised. The approach considers cognitive, affective and behavioural factors in probing themes of audience awareness, perceptions, expectations and experience of LST. The paper uses these factors to develop an original conceptual model for LST.

The research finds that the practice of cinematic live transmission of performing arts challenges existing conceptual categories and marketing strategies. Fundamental events studies factors such as “attendance”, “authenticity” and “experience” are re-evaluated. The model suggests that despite improvements in digital technology traditional theatre and broadcasted theatre are two different experiences, not substitutes.

As a conceptual paper, the results are subject to being tested in the field. The findings reveal implications for the evolving future of hybrid and mixed event experiences. The potential for LST screenings to attract new audiences requires further study.

The implications of the research reflect the changing business models and supply side dynamics of theatre production and touring. The results suggest that live streaming is of limited effectiveness in addressing the capacity limits of Baumol and Bowen’s (1966) “cost disease” in live arts performance. LST allows major brands to penetrate regional markets thereby potentially squeezing out smaller touring companies and restricting innovation.

The findings reveal implications for the evolving future of hybrid and mixed event experiences.

The influence of digital technology on live arts experience is currently under-explored and under-theorised. This paper develops a new conceptual model that captures in greater detail than previously the various factors that may determine audience engagement with, and experience of, LST. The paper contributes to knowledge by expanding the discourse on the gaps between the competing aims of access and authenticity. The analysis expands the academic understanding of hybrid and virtual event experiences.

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the usefulness of the “audience exchange” approach for audience development and research, and to highlight the insights offered by peer-to-peer dialogue in understanding experiences of unfamiliar arts.

Using a case study with contemporary arts audiences, and setting this in the wider context of studies with other first-time attenders at a range of arts events, the paper explores the use of the “audience exchange” method, in which facilitated conversations after performance events allow newcomers to reflect upon and deepen their first-time encounters with live arts.

The study demonstrates the way in which conversations about arts events can enrich audience experience, and shows how participants use exploratory and emotional language to articulate their understanding of unfamiliar arts events. Peer-to-peer learning occurs through these conversations, in ways that could be further supported by arts organisations as a valuable tool for audience development. The audience exchange discussions also reveal the varieties of participation from “drifting” to full attention that are all part of audience engagement.

This is a small-scale, qualitative study, and the method has potential to be tested in future studies with a greater variety of participants (e.g. younger or more ethnically diverse groups).

Use of the audience exchange for enriching experiences of first-time attendance could be adopted by arts organisations as a regular part of their audience engagement. Greater understanding of how new audience members draw on prior cultural experiences in finding the language to articulate their first impressions of an unfamiliar arts event could be valuable for targeted marketing and increasing accessibility.

The originality of this study lies in its elaboration of the audience exchange method, and its focus on the language and peer-to-peer learning evident in the facilitated post-performance discussions.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the experiences of donors to a UK-based contemporary music organisation fundraising scheme through the theoretical lens of liminality.

In-depth interviews with 16 members of the Sound Investment scheme investigated the motivations and experiences of individual donors to the commissioning of new music. Thematic analysis suggested parallels with the framework of “liminality,” which shed new light on the ways in which membership changed donors' relationships with the organisation and audience.

Motivations for supporting contemporary music commissioning included personal interest, cultural responsibility and alignment to the values of the organisation. Tangible benefits, particularly access to rehearsals, brought donors into closer connection with the creative and managerial working of the organisation.

The sample did not include any lapsed donors, or people who had chosen not to participate. Future research could test the liminal framework in different artforms and through different tangible benefits.

Understanding donors as liminals could help arts organisations to develop membership schemes that more effectively sustain individual giving. Key elements of involvement and access are identified that could engage audiences more widely.

This case study foregrounds lived experience of arts donors where previous literature has primarily focussed on motivations for donating. It highlights the liminal elements of becoming an individual donor, namely, the integration and socialisation processes, the space-and time-bound interactions with the organisation and the alignment of values with the organisation. This framework offers a new way for arts organisations to understand and enhance individual giving in a time of austerity.

The purpose of this paper is to consider the social turn in contemporary capitalism and contemporary art through the lens of art-based social enterprises (ASEs) that aim to create positive social benefits for young people experiencing forms of marginalisation, and which trade creative products or services to help fulfil that mission. A growth in ASEs demonstrates a growing interest in how the arts can support social and economic development, and the ways new economic models can generate employment for individuals excluded from the labour market; extend opportunities for more people to participate in art markets; and challenge dominant market models of cultural production and consumption.

This paper considers a number of challenges and complexities faced by ASEs that embrace a co-dependence of three goals, which are often in tension and competition – artistic practice, social purpose and economic activity. It does so by analysing interviews from staff working with 12 ASE organisation’s across Australia.

While the external forces that shape ASEs – including government policy, markets, investors and philanthropy – are interested in the “self-sufficient” economic potential of ASEs, those working in ASEs tend to prioritise social values and ethical business over large financial returns and are often ambivalent about their roles as entrepreneurs. This ambivalence is symptomatic of a position that is simultaneously critical and affirmative, of the conditions of contemporary capitalism and neoliberalism.

This paper addresses a gap in social enterprise literature presenting empirical research focussing on the lived experience of those managing and leading ASEs in Australia.

The purpose this paper is to consider festivals as sites for inquiry and learning.

The research employed a pluralistic approach to the inquiry drawing on critical African-centred pedagogy, participatory action research, and performance as research inquiry. These arts-based research methods allowed insights to be gained in ways that were congruent to the arts and participants who enacted them. In total, 12 young people and six elders of diverse African heritage as well as two artists were participants in the research.

The research revealed that the festival as a research methodology was both dialogic and performative and a rich site for the exploration of identity negotiation. Through these arts-based approaches the aesthetic elements often missed by traditional social science methods were highlighted as key in exploring acculturation socialistaion experiences and deconstructing exclusionist discourses emanating from the dominant culture.

The research affirmed the power of multi-modal approaches to research and the importance of evocative discourses in identity exploration and development.

This research is the first known attempt to theorise an arts-based festival as a research approach in reference to enculturation and cultural memory.

Understanding disabled people as gray-collar workers who are under-paid, under-valued and under-employed is recognized as in urgent need of attention but remains unaddressed. Based on 30 semi-structured interviews with disabled people, observations and document analysis, the authors argue that the disabled gray-collar workers in the performing arts provide a context and socio-cultural perspective on how gray-collar workers can attain dignity through social inclusion. Building on a novel framework of four dimensions of social inclusion theory – access, participation, representation and empowerment – the authors identify social interactions portrayed in the performing arts in order to deconstruct the processes that normalize and reinforce exclusion and inequality. The authors demonstrate how social inclusion can be “enabled” which has implications for theory, policy and practice.

Participation in creative activities have been linked with increased personal agency. The purpose of this paper is to address critical considerations in the development of community-based creative workshops for people experiencing severe and persistent mental illness and explores participant experiences of these workshops.

The workshops aimed to build the skills and capacities of participants and provide alternative ways to communicate identity and recovery stories. They were designed to provide a range of creative opportunities for participants (visual arts, writing, dance and music) and were facilitated by practising artists. In total, 11 participants attended ten creative workshops over three months. On completion, a focus group was conducted to gather participant views, experiences and outcomes of the workshops.

The creative workshops supported the recovery of participants. The inclusion of peer mentors in the workshops was an important in facilitating connectedness.

This study advances the evidence that creative arts can support the psychological and social aspects of participants’ recovery journeys. Creative activities can promote positive self-identity and reduce self-stigma for people experiencing mental illness. It highlights the importance of using evidence in the design of creative workshops and supports the use of peer mentoring in group creative processes.

The actual uses to which public art is put have been virtually ignored, leaving multifarious dynamics related to its esthetic encounters unexplored. Both audience agency in placemaking and sensemaking and the agentic role of place as more than a mere platform or stage dressing for transformation are routinely neglected. Such transformative dynamics are analyzed and interpreted in this study of the Derry–Londonderry Temple, a transient mega-installation orchestrated by bricoleur artist David Best and co-created by sectarian communities in 2015.

A range of ethnographic methods and supplemental netnography were employed in the investigation.

Participants inscribed expressions of their lived experience of trauma on the Temple's infrastructure, on wood scrap remnants or on personal artifacts dedicated for interment. These inscriptions and artifacts became objects of contemplation for all participants to consider and appreciate during visitation, affording sectarian citizens opportunity for empathic response to the plight of opposite numbers. Thousands engaged with the installation over the course of a week, registering sorrow, humility and awe in their interactions, experiencing powerful catharsis and creating temporary cross-community comity. The installation and the grief work animating it were introjected by co-creators as a virtual legacy of the engagement.

The originality of the study lies in its theorizing of the successful delivery of social systems therapy in an esthetic modality to communities traditionally hostile to one another. This sustained encounter is defined as traumaturgy. The sacrificial ritual of participatory public art becomes the medium through which temporary cross-community cohesion is achieved.

The purpose of this paper is to first articulate and then illustrate a descriptive theoretical model of documentation (i.e. document creation) suitable for analysis of the experiential, first-person perspective.

Three models of documentation in the literature are presented and synthesized into a new model. This model is then used to understand the findings from a phenomenology-of-practice study of the work of seven visual artists as they each created a self-portrait, understood here as a form of documentation.

A number of themes are found to express the first-person experience of art-making in these examples, including communicating, memories, reference materials, taking breaks and stepping back. The themes are discussed with an eye toward articulating what is shared and unique in these experiences. Finally, the themes are mapped successfully to the theoretical model.

The study involved artists creating self-portraits, and further research will be required to determine if the thematic findings are unique to self-portraiture or apply as well to art-making, to documentation generally, etc. Still, the theoretical model developed here seems useful for analyzing documentation experiences.

As many activities and tasks in contemporary life can be conceptualized as documentation, this model provides a valuable analytical tool for better understanding those experiences. This can ground education and management decisions for those involved.

This paper makes conceptual and empirical contributions to document theory and the study of the information behavior of artists, particularly furthering discussions of information and document experience.