In the two years since South West Arts Marketing has been working with individual artists and arts organisations in Bristol, the city has seen an explosion of marketing and audience development activity.
Large-scale festivals such as Dance Live! Bristol have grabbed the headlines in a programme that has included cultural tourism initiatives, audience research and training opportunities that have provided support to practitioners whilst also raising the profile of Bristol’s arts community and attracting additional investment of over £500,000 for the promotion of the arts in the city.
A reciprocal initiative with Birmingham Arts Marketing led to cross-sector support for a cultural tourism campaign encouraging visits to Bristol’s range of high quality visual arts venues and gave an unparalleled opportunity to learn more about the market for this artform.
Links with both tourism and the commercial sector have also ensured that Dance Live! Bristol reaches into every part of the community as well as significantly raising Bristol’s profile on the national arts scene.
And SWAM have contributed directly to the development and sustainability of the creative industries in Bristol, supporting small and middle-scale enterprise and lone traders as well as the subsidised arts sector.
In 2001, SWAM provided 192 formal training sessions in the city, ranging from one-to-one support for individual artists or arts organisations to seminars on specific topics reaching groups of up to 50 people. The results of the programme have been improved communication skills, professional development for practitioners, a reduction in expenditure on external consultancies and more effective business planning for many of the smaller organisations.
2002-2008 © Audiences South West