A new report from the UK's Policy Studies Institute says that data on audience attendance is inadequate for decisionmaking.<P><B>Arts bodies called to account over funding</B> <BR> <BR>BY DALYA ALBERGE, ARTS CORRESPONDENT of The Times<BR> <BR> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>AUDIENCE figures for ballet and theatre are declining at a time when arts funding is at a record level. <BR>Some £5.5 billion of public money was invested in the sector in 1998-99, at a time when audiences for ballet fell by 14 per cent from the mid-1990s. Audiences for the theatre fell by eight per cent. <P>Contemporary dance, which is attended by only 4 per cent of the population, saw a meagre 1 per cent rise. Even cinema failed to rise by more than 6 per cent between 1986 to 1996, according to the most recent data available. <P>The findings are revealed in the first comprehensive report on arts funding, published yesterday by the Policy Studies Institute, an independent research organisation.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P><A HREF="http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,2-2001253793,00.html" TARGET=_blank><B>more...</B></A><P> <P><BR><B>The cost of culture</B> <P>Creativity may need freedom, but the taxpayer wants a report <P>A Times leader <P> <BR> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>For all that aesthetes like to argue otherwise, culture is closely linked to a country’s economy. For every lone artist who toils in penury in the apocryphal garret, another group will follow the funds needed to bring a project to fruition. <BR>In Britain, more than £5 billion is annually spent on subsidies from the state to the cultural sector. Taxpayers pay for pleasures that enrich and educate — and they do not expect state-controlled art for their cash.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P><BR><A HREF="http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,56-2001253901,00.html" TARGET=_blank><B>more...</B></A><P><BR>

<B>Arts audiences dwindle despite 'extra' cash</B> <P>Culture department spending has been cut by 20%, says report <P>Maev Kennedy, arts and heritage correspondent of The Guardian <P><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>The report showed that the percentage of adults attending arts events was either static or falling across plays, opera, ballet, contemporary dance, jazz, classical music and art galleries. Contemporary dance was alone in slightly increasing and then holding its audience, from a tiny base of 3.4% claiming to attend performances regularly in 1993-94, to 4.3% in 1998-99.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> <BR> <A HREF="http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,526921,00.html" TARGET=_blank>http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,526921,00.html</A> <P>Thus UK contemporary dance audiences have gone up by about 25%. I wonder if a lot of that is due to Adventures in Motion Pictures.

For those who like visual representation of info, a I do, here are the stats in graph form.<P><BR><A HREF="http://www.guardian.co.uk/artslatest/page/0,10607,527172,00.html" TARGET=_blank><B>UK audience trend graphs</B></A><BR>