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Audience Engagement in the Performing Arts pp 165–198Cite as

Palgrave Macmillan

Co-creating Art, Meaning, and Value

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Part of the book series: New Directions in Cultural Policy Research ((NDCPR))

Abstract

Co-creative activities have now become an integral part of artistic experiences, as audience engage and are engaged in cognitive, emotional, and imaginal practices to appropriate and make sense of cultural products and experiences. This chapter investigates why and how audience expectations and behaviours are changing, and explores emerging theories, concepts and practices of co-creation, including active spectatorship, co-production, participation, play, interpretation, and facilitation. The chapter reviews the drivers behind co-creation and argues that artists and arts organisations have a strategic, artistic and social responsibility to develop their audiences’ co-creative skills. It investigates how co-creation can be used to generate and extract meaning in a collaborative way, and illustrates how this collaboration can have a positive impact on audience engagement.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Gadamer’s interpretation of Heidegger’s notion of the hermeneutic circle is that all interpretation is inherently prejudicial in the sense that it is always based on people’s existing knowledge, concerns and interests (Malpas 2016).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School Performance Cultural Industries, University of Leeds, Leeds, West Yorkshire, UK

    Ben Walmsley

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  1. Ben Walmsley
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Walmsley, B. (2019). Co-creating Art, Meaning, and Value. In: Audience Engagement in the Performing Arts. New Directions in Cultural Policy Research. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-26653-0_7

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