Following the success of the 4 year Track Change project, Way Art West has been asked to present its findings to the Arts Marketing Association national conference in Belfast. It has been a challenging time with cuts affecting venue partners and a great deal of suspicion towards all Muslim communities. However the lessons learnt can make a genuine track change in the way diversity can be viewed across the whole of performing arts.

A large audience await the arrival of the first Bollywood star at Colston Hall

What we demonstrated is that there is a viable new audience that can stand on its own terms and add a whole new perspective to venues. What is needed is for venues to re-imagine themselves and invest in diversifying their knowledge of communities and art-forms. It is the arts professional that needs to develop most not the audience!

During the conference we will be presenting our research and experience

• Identifying new media channels
• Perspectives on the arts in different communities
• Some of the surprising outcomes – both positive and less so
• What marketeers and programmers need to consider with new audiences
• The assumptions we need to challenge

Once the right work and the right channels to inform are identified, progress can be remarkably fast, although consolidation takes longer.

First Somali Audience in Liverpool Phil

This hard nosed look at diversity shows that, as well as being part of CSR, it can make good business sense long after diversity grants have gone! In the process new audiences will have transformative experiences.

Maxamed BK wows a crowd of 600 in Birmingham