Pandemic Preparedness in the Live Performing Arts: Lessons to Learn from COVID-19

New grant from British Academy programme, Pandemic Preparedness: Lessons to Learn from COVID-19 across the G7

9 May 2023

New grant to examine the lessons learned from how governmental, charity, and informal support for organisations and workers in the performing arts across the G7 impacted the workforce, the type of outputs produced, and the resilience of the industry.

An international research team have been awarded a new grant from the British Academy to look at Pandemic Preparedness: Lessons to Learn from COVID-19 across the G7. Senior Research Associate from the School for Policy Studies, Dr Karen Gray, will co-lead this project alongside Professor Pascale Aebischer at the University of Exeter.

One of the sectors most affected by lockdowns and social distancing measures introduced during the pandemic within the G7 has been the creative and cultural industry (CCI). UNESCO’s report on ‘Cultural and Creative Industries in the Face of Covid-19’ (June 2021) noted CCI revenue falls of 30% in the UK, 27% in North America and 23% in Germany. Meanwhile, a Statistics Canada report showed a drop of 63.9% in the operating revenue of for-profit performing arts companies in 2020.

Barred from in-person performance indoors, organisations struggled to survive. In the UK, already precarious creative and cultural workers (CCWs) struggled to access support. Some dropped out of the workforce; others adapted rapidly to continue to work differently, whether by delivering local arts for health and wellbeing activities or by pivoting towards digital performance. Most organisations and CCWs (especially freelancers) became dependent on financial support from the state and charitable organisations.

The objective of the project is to provide evidence-based policy recommendations that will enable industry professionals and support structures to move from the reactive mode they adopted during the lockdown years to a proactive mode that anticipates future shocks and renders the industry more resilient. Key to achieving this is identifying what worked best, where, and why, and sifting the available literature to base comparisons on high-quality research and comparable data to identify gaps and areas for further research.

Dr Karen Gray said:

“I am very grateful to the British Academy for funding this research. This project gives me an opportunity to build on research I conducted during the pandemic into the impacts of COVID on the cultural sector in the UK with new comparative research that will identify impacts and implications of COVID for the performing arts sector here and internationally.

"We will be working closely with people with lived experience of working in the sector and with policymakers to shape the research and I’m excited about our focus on identifying practical insights that will help support and develop the sector and its workforce in the future.”

Further information

Research team: Professor Pascale Aebischer, University of Exeter; Dr Karen Gray, University of Bristol; Dr Kelsey Jacobson, Queen's University, Canada; Professor Barbara Fuchs, University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA); Dr Heidi Lucja Liedke Goethe-University, Frankfurt.