By Pamela Tatge
Director
Center for the Arts
Wesleyan University
Whether you’ve never booked an artist before or you are an experienced presenter, it’s important to think about why arts presentation is important and why it matters. For me, there is no greater thrill than watching an audience bear witness to the work of an artist , and seeing the audience transported and the artist’s mission fulfilled. From researching an artist, getting to know them and their work, selecting the best time and place for the presentation, and promoting the event; to creating the ancillary activities and materials to contextualize their work and deepen the impact, it is all an artistic and highly creative pursuit.
There are some curatorial questions to ask yourself even before you begin to think about which artist you will select. First of all, what’s the intent of your presentation? Is it to build community and to generate a specific size audience of a certain kind? Is it to showcase emerging artists in your community and give them a platform for their work (in which case the size of the audience may be less important, and the priority becomes to create the best performing opportunity for the artists). For example, the Green Street Arts Center in Middletown, Connecticut was recently looking for a Sicilian folk ensemble because as a new arts center in a historically Italian-American community, it wanted to bring back people who had originally lived in the neighborhood, but had since moved out. Green Street’s goal was to find a group of the highest artistic caliber that it could afford, whose program and marketing materials would attract the largest audience possible.
Alternatively, maybe you need to net a certain amount of money from ticket sales to support a venue or a non-profit. In this case you have to look carefully at the size of your venue as it relates to the artist fee and presentation expenses, consider audience recognition/appeal and determine if the event could be underwritten to maximize your profit potential.
Whatever your reasons, it’s most important to be clear about why you want to present artistic work even before you begin your research, and to come up with some guiding curatorial principles that will help to focus your efforts.
Researching Artists
It is always best for a presenter to view the work of an artist before presenting it, ideally by witnessing a live performance. Short of that, make sure that you review a press kit and DVD, video or audio CD. Consider contacting venues where the artist has been presented and getting a reference on the artist. Some questions to ask:
- What was the audience’s response?
- What was the artist like to work with?
- Did they deliver on what they promised?
If you are looking to have the artist teach a workshop as well as perform, find out if they appeared to be good teachers. It’s important to remember that many performance groups do just that: perform. They do not necessarily have experience or training in teaching or sharing what they do.
Knowing Your Venue
Before you even begin to discuss a booking with an artist, it’s important to really know the venue where you hope to present them, whether it’s a room in a library or a concert hall. What is the size of the playing area and the audience area? What’s the capacity of the space? Does it have theatrical lighting and a sound system or will that have to be brought in? Where are electrical outlets? What are the acoustics like? Do you have insurance coverage?
Information From the Artist
When exploring the possibility of a performance opportunity with an artist, it’s important to ask the following questions: what program would they be presenting? Do you have a choice? What are their technical needs? How long will they need to load-in or set up their performance? How much rehearsal time do they need in the space? What’s the length of the performance and is there an intermission (or perhaps you know you want a 50 minute program because you are inaugurating a free noontime series and you know that your audience will need the event to stay within an hour)?
Negotiating the Artist Fee
There are two main ways of approaching this. You may have a fixed budget and so you make an offer as the starting point, or you ask the artist what their fee might be for a particular engagement and begin there. In the first case, for example, we have a summer noontime series and we pay everyone an inclusive fee of $250 (inclusive means that the fee includes transportation, per diem, lodging, and any expenses). Consequently, we tend to look to performers/speakers who are in our immediate region who will not have extensive travel/accommodation needs. We make the offer and the artist can choose to take it or not take it. When an artist quotes you a fee for a particular engagement, you can often make a counter-offer if you feel that you can’t afford what they quoted. They may or may not be able to negotiate but they are rarely surprised that you try.
Once you have agreed on a fee, it’s important that you are perfectly clear about what the fee includes. Expenses to take into account are travel, lodging, per diem, ground transportation, technical expenses. It is customary for the presenter to provide the technical needs for the artist. It’s important that you understand and cost out the technical needs (lighting, sound, back-line: instrumentation that you need to provide) before you come to an agreement. I had an instance where I successfully booked a very large Afro-Cuban ensemble only to find out that the technical equipment and back-line they required increased the cost by 30%.
Letter of Agreement or Contract
It is important for you to have a letter of agreement or contract with the artist that outlines the date, time, venue, fee, other expenses and who will be responsible for them, technical needs, cancellation policy, insurance, etc. How these should be drafted is a subject worthy of a separate article, but you can obtain a sample copy by contacting another presenter in your community or online through MatchBook.org .
The Day of the Performance
Communicate well in advance about day of the performance details and clearly outline your expectations. Give the artist an opportunity to express their expectations. What time are they planning to arrive at the venue? Do they have directions? If they are unloading instruments/equipment, where and how will they unload/park? If they need to do a sound check, how much time will they need, or how much time does your technician say they need? Will they be expecting to eat before or after the performance and are you providing food, or are you expecting them to take care of this? Do you expect the artist to do a question/answer session after the performance? If so, has this been communicated? Will they need a facilitator?
So much about successful presenting is related to advance planning and good communication with the artist. It’s also about finding a mentor: someone in your community who is a successful presenter who might take the time to sit down with you and walk you through their process. Finally, it’s about investing in artists whose work truly moves you and listening to what the artist is telling you. More often than not, a happy artist means an engaged and happy audience.
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