The 2nd Adeste + Summer School begins with an episode about the ADESTE + “Blueprint”. Around 90 people from different European countries will exchange knowledge in learning sessions on audience development and organizational change.
Our first episode “Get Ready” is about “Why do we need change?” In the past decade we are more and more confronted with the demands to include audience more actively in the work of our cultural organizations and institutions. Thus ADESTE + partners have developed strategies that try to go beyond usual approaches to the audience and engage the whole organization in this achievement. In this first episode participants will be introduced to the ADESTE + approach to audience development and organizational change, the so called Adeste + “Blueprint”. We will learn about what is AD and why it requires first of all to look into our organizations, its values and assumptions to understand what’s the place that audiences have in it, and if you really want it to change. Our Adeste+ partners will be in charge to this first session.
The ADESTE+ Summer School and Conference, originally due to take place in Rijeka, Croatia, has adjusted to new circumstances with the Covid-19 crisis and will take place online, dealing with a range of questions and issues old and new.
The central concept remains the same – looking at what cultural institutions need to do or change in order to become more audience focused. The concept of audience development is transversal, extending from the framing of cultural policy to issues of cultural rights, access and participation. Increasing cultural participation is a crucial challenge for an inclusive and open European society, and growing audiences depends on the ability of a cultural organisation to place the audience at the centre of its practice. However, this theme has taken on greater significance and new urgency as the crisis forces us to address the role of cultural organisations in this changed world.