TALKING THROUGH YOUR ARTS – VIRTUAL AUDIENCES

The argument as to whether the evolution of the virtual audience has cannibalised the face-to-face audience has proven to be lean in fat. It is widely believed that audiences have expanded through hybrid participation. The more we become engaged online, the more we want to be part of the action. The truth is that the art on view, and for sale, does not mean much unless there is a public there to receive it.

We re-understand the body of an audience. We have translated our bodies through the bioscience of cloning, through digitised anatomy and through medical body-scan devices, so that the body has a virtual double. This oscillating and flickering world partners the machine, and then on through to the network. Think of the possibilities of these art bodies wanting to be as able as a spider, sitting astride thousands of webs that they have spun. For the audience to sense each soft ripple or bursting hail of electrons coming toward and flowing back to lure your patronage.

By using large networks as our instruments, creating and exploring multiple connected spaces in which different regions of space and time are spliced together, we alter the histories that manifest in media. Artists are creating a larger audience, leading to the strengthening of a business. Digital branding has become the norm for the arts, and crowd-funding campaigns, online galleries, virtual summits, live-streaming performances and image recognition technologies, are just some of the innovations used.

In 2010 Stuart and Robyn Buchanan put their collective professions together to form the award-winning digital agency The Nest. The company has since hatched many projects to assist creative businesses. Web developments as well as mobile and apps technologies for some of Sydney’s seminal art organisations have been designed including Sydney Festival, AGNSW, Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority and Sydney Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras.

The Scottish-born Stuart Buchanan has been working in the digital arts since the ‘90s and will be discussing the opportunities to build an online audience for artists and arts organisations by platforming audience engagement and audience experience. This is the first Sydney Arts Management Advisory Group panel session of the year and considering both the economic climate and the lack of support in the arts by both state and federal governments, it is a critical discourse.

Joining Buchanan will be Alex Cameron-Fraser, PR Manager of Australian Chamber Orchestra, Michael Parry, Director of Public Engagement to the Powerhouse Museum and Gabby Shaw, Digital Media Manager of MCA. (AS)

Virtual Audiences: Trends in Digital Engagement with the Arts, Feb 24, The Australia Council for the Arts, 372 Elizabeth St, Surry Hills, free (SAMAG members)-$12, samag.org

BY ANGELA STRETCH