Mix It Up Project Report: Building New Audiences - Multicultural Arts ...

Seven Strategies for Working in New Ways
Mix It Up Research Project 2006
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Centre For Leisure Management Research
The complexity of Mix It Up wasn’t simply working with cultural diversity, it was also complex in
terms of the number of artists from overseas, visas and tax issues and the logistics of it was
much more complicated…and it was done within a narrow time-frame. (Administrator)
This section gives an account of the interviews with stakeholders for Mix It Up. It is based on qualitative
interviews with musicians, curators, administrators, consular officers, marketers and volunteers. Some of these
people were, of course, also audience members. The purpose of the stakeholder interviews is two-fold. First, the
results of the interviews describe how Mix It Up was formulated, implemented and evaluated. There are
prescriptions of how multicultural projects should be designed and they are used as secondary source material.
However, little is known of how such projects evolve in practice. These strategies fill this gap. Second, the
responses and experiences of the stakeholders are recorded, especially in light of the assumptions and
perceptions which arts professionals hold about multicultural arts projects. The interviews were conducted in
order to see if there were any perception gaps between arts professionals and stakeholders and to examine the
implications of formulating, implementing and evaluating multicultural arts projects.
Mix It Up can be useful in stimulating discussion about how to develop multicultural arts programs, including
developing new audiences and developing new product, as well as the benefits people gain from participating in
the program. The seven strategies are:
- achieve organisational and cultural change by appointing a change champion
- build relationships between communities and Arts Centre key players
- create dialogues with communities through curators and programmers
- appoint cultural ambassadors as holders of the keys to the doors to multicultural communities
- empower marketing staff to act as facilitators with community marketers
- provide skills to artists to enable them to leverage new work from Arts Centre performances
- establish multicultural peer networks
The seven strategies were piloted in Mix It Up and are now discussed.
1. Achieve organisational cultural change by appointing change champions for Mix It Up