Uncertain future for Puget Sound's hard-hit arts and culture organizations

In pre-pandemic times, non-profit arts and culture organizations in the Puget Sound region punched above their weight. They generated more than $2.4 billion a year and created tens of thousands of jobs.

Now, one year into the pandemic, many of those organizations have closed for good. Those that are still hanging on are doing so by a thread.

This interview has been edited for clarity.

Margo Vansynghel reports on arts and culture for Crosscut. She recently surveyed more than a hundred arts organizations to learn about their economic challenges and their hopes for the future.

She told KUOW’s Kim Malcolm that everyone has felt the impact.

Margo Vansynghel: Across the board, everyone is struggling in some kind of way. What I found is that many are running low on cash. You see that smaller organizations are more likely to have just a couple of months left, basically.

Overall, I would say everyone is struggling to stay afloat. Operating budgets are running low. People are hoping that more cash will come in from the federal government and from other organizations.

These arts and culture organizations are listed among the last that can reopen. They have to hang on for even longer, right?

Yes. Many of these organizations are in a little bit of a hibernation mode. They are doing events online. But in terms of live events, the live events sector is saying we were the first to close and we will be the last to reopen. For many, that means not before the fall.

You point out that quite a few arts organizations were barely getting by before the pandemic. What kinds of vulnerabilities did the pandemic expose?

Basically, that the margins were really thin, that people were already struggling to stay afloat, and that there was just no buffer. There was no way to absorb this shock, or barely any. I think for a lot of people what the pandemic exposed was that things were already incredibly precarious.

Can you tell us about one particular organization, and what they've been facing over the last year?

I talked to Velocity Dance Center. They relied in part on ticket revenue from shows, and they rent out their studio space. Of course, when the pandemic hit it slashed that. They were already operating on thin margins. They had a cash balance of just three months before the pandemic. That's not much.

When the pandemic hit, they were just not able to really weather this storm. They were not able to pay rent, and they had to leave their home on Capitol Hill. They are waiting to see what they can do when the pandemic is over, but for right now are really hoping that more funds will come in from the federal government as well as donations until they can get their feet under them. For now, it's tough.

We know that creatives are inherently innovative. What have people tried to do to keep their audiences engaged over the last year?

There's lots of talk about pivots. Almost all organizations have done something online: virtual fundraisers, virtual theater shows. There's been also really creative things besides the virtuals. There have been outdoor performances that I've seen that were really wonderful. One by Whim W'Him had the dancers moving in a line so that people wouldn't congregate and had to walk so that the audience was further away from each other.

There's been dance films, filmed operas. There's been a lot of creative solutions. That's been really wonderful to see and to report on, but I also want to add that that was never a moneymaker for any of the arts organizations.

Not enough to keep the lights on?

The pivots have been great and helped, but for many, it was not enough to keep all the staff employed and keep producing as much art as they were before.

We know that more vaccinations are coming online, and it looks like the lives that we've led under the pandemic are going to start to shift. How are the arts and culture organizations feeling about this coming year?

I think people are actually a little more positive than I expected, overall. People are expecting to rehire people. Revenue will pick back up, but that comes with a huge asterisk. It can't get worse than 2020.

Overall, I would say people are in a wait-and-see mode. Even with the vaccines, people are not so sure that the audience will feel comfortable. Rather than it being just about the vaccines, it's about how are people feeling about showing up in a theater and sitting really close to someone, particularly for older audiences. The question is still if we open up will people show up?

The pandemic has made us rethink how we used to do things. What are you hearing from the arts and culture world about what they might do better when they come back?

I've been hearing that the "normal" that some people say they want to go back to was not great to begin with. People want to rethink how the sector has operated for a long time. That's with a lot of people working very long hours for not a lot of pay, and the general idea that because you love this job and you work in the arts, you should be okay with that is par for the course, that you're not getting paid much.

Another expectation is that small organizations and organizations that are for or by BIPOC are underfunded, and that is also par for the course. People are saying no, we don't want to go back to this. It was not great. The grind was hard. What I'm hearing is that people want more sustained government support for arts organizations. They say that the pandemic, or the reaction to the pandemic, the funds that were made available, have shown that that works.

Someone proposed universal basic income for artists. We're also seeing someone proposing stabilized rental prices for arts groups, more equitable grant processes, and also more of a focus on diversity and equity, and inclusion. A more inclusive industry. That's what people want to return to.

Listen to the interview by clicking the play button above.