“Culture is made to share”
Summary of 13 research interviews on the impacts and challenges of cultural venues in New Brunswick
Based on in-depth discussions with senior staff members of 13 cultural venues in New Brunswick, this report examines venues’ engagement in their communities and the challenges that they face. It was clear from the interviews that the province’s cultural venues are trying to be spaces of reflection, conversation, and lasting impact on people’s lives. It was also clear that finances are a significant challenge, especially in the context of limited operating funding.
This summary offers a few examples of the key findings from the interviews. The full report provides many more details.
New Brunswick cultural venues are working hard to develop and sustain community-rooted, mutually beneficial practices. In particular, venues are trying to deepen the relationships between artists and audience members (or workshop participants, in the case of hands-on activities), which can improve everyone’s wellbeing.
Venues are strongly influenced by their locations, and they tend to have robust local connections. Still, all are striving to better understand their communities and deepen their connections.
Many examples of community engagement activities were discussed in the interviews, including:
Teaching students about Indigenous practices such as drumming, blessings, and Powwow activities (Fort Folly First Nation).
Providing engagement opportunities between visual artists in residence and community members (Struts Gallery, Sackville).
Ensuring that touring and local artists have meaningful engagements in the community, including in seniors’ homes and schools (Imperial Theatre, Saint John).
Using curatorial choices to further social goals such as human rights and equality (Gallery on Queen, Fredericton).
Working with many community organizations to further a variety of social and artistic goals (Galerie d'art Louise-et-Reuben-Cohen, Moncton).
With much focus on Truth and Reconciliation, there have been increasing levels of connection between Indigenous and non-Indigenous organizations. For example, many non-Indigenous venues indicated that they are trying to ensure that Indigenous artists are well represented in their programming. As such, these non-Indigenous venues are engaging many Indigenous artists to show works and lead arts learning sessions. Beyond ensuring appropriate Indigenous representation, non-Indigenous organizations are in various places in their journeys to connect with Indigenous Peoples and organizations.
Venues have a central role in supporting the province’s artists. Many interviewees spoke of how they promote local and New Brunswick-wide artists and provide them with paid opportunities.
Despite the strengths and efforts noted above, the province’s arts, culture, and heritage venues are facing incredible challenges in the current post-pandemic environment. Financial health, the most-discussed interview topic, is a constant, troubling challenge for most venues. Some stated that culture in New Brunswick is severely under-funded. Operating funding is an urgent need, as many rely on project funding to make ends meet, which hinders long-term stability.
Human resources are a serious concern for nearly all interviewees. Specific challenges include understaffing, the risk of burnout, the financial inability to improve the benefits offered to their staff members, and labour shortages in certain areas. In particular, specialized expertise can be hard to find, especially in rural areas.
Attendance and marketing challenges were pointed out by a number of venues. Some noted that it can be difficult to encourage people to spend money on art and to make arts activities outside the home a regular part of their busy lives. Regarding hands-on activities, some venues indicated that there appears to be a lack of awareness of the usefulness that arts-related learning has for a range of career choices and, more generally, in an increasingly visual and literate world.
Interview details
Kelly Hill (President of Hill Strategies Research) conducted the 13 interviews in French (4) or English (9). The interviews lasted between 45 and 60 minutes and used a semi-structured interview protocol. The interviews were conducted during two visits to the province: 1) a June visit to rural areas, including the Acadian Peninsula, Sackville and area, and St. Andrews; and 2) a November visit to Moncton, Saint John, and Fredericton.
Kelly Hill thanks the interviewees for their time and insights. In chronological order, the interviewees were:
Annie Chiasson, Co-owner, Librairie Pélagie, Shippagan
Lucie Roy, Head of Events, Centre culturel Caraquet, Caraquet
Paul Henderson, Director, Struts Gallery, Sackville
Nicole Porter, Cultural Coordinator, Fort Folly First Nation
Sierra Reibling, Executive Assistant to the Managing Director, Kingsbrae International Residence for the Arts & Amphitheatre, St. Andrews
Caroline Walker, Artistic Director and Gerald McEachern, Executive Director, Sunbury Shores Arts and Nature Centre, St. Andrews
René Légère, Executive Director and Éric Cormier, Deputy Director, Centre culturel Aberdeen, Moncton
Andrew Keirstead, Executive Director, Saint John Arts Centre, Saint John
Angela Campbell, Executive Director, Imperial Theatre, Saint John
Abigail Smith, Co-owner, Haven Music Hall, Saint John
Chloe Keith-Barnaby, Project Coordinator, Mawi'Art: Wabanaki Artist Collective, Fredericton (Later, we were joined in the discussion by Natasha Martin-Mitchell, Project Manager, and Shawn Dalton, Executive Director.)
Nadia Khoury, Director and owner, Gallery on Queen, Fredericton
Nisk Imbeault, Director/Curator, Galerie d'art Louise-et-Reuben-Cohen, Moncton (Zoom interview)
Broader project on impacts and post-pandemic challenges
This report is part of a larger project that is investigating the impacts and post-pandemic challenges of the arts, culture, and heritage in New Brunswick. Activities and reports in the project include:
A statistical profile of the 2,700 professional artists in New Brunswick in 2021.
An analysis of other data on the arts and culture in the province.
A fuller report on the entire project, which is planned for September of 2024.
The research project is intended to produce results that will inform the province’s arts, culture, and heritage sector for the next decade. The project’s partners will use these resources to further their information sharing, policy, and advocacy activities for the betterment of the sector as a whole.
The project partners are ArtsLink NB, Association acadienne des artistes professionel.le.s du Nouveau-Brunswick (AAAPNB), and the Owens Art Gallery at Mount Allison University. We want to thank the project’s supporters: the Canada Council for the Arts and the Government of New Brunswick.
