A Short Guide to Audience Development in Finland

Consider this a very cautious introduction to the fast-developing audience development scene in Finland. I speak from my own observations and feelings only, as an integrated foreigner who has lived and worked in Finland for ten years. 

I feel that 'audience development' or 'audience engagement' is not exactly a spot-on translation for its Finnish counterpart - literally "audience work" in Finnish, yleisötyö. Or that they don't have the same points of focus. The European Commission's Creative Europe programme sees audience development's aims to be a) widening audiences, b) deepening relationships with audiences, and c) diversifying audiences. That's a pretty accepted definition, and leaves a lot of room for interpretation. 

In my experience, audience development in Finland is strongly interpreted as a contribution to the Finnish welfare state. The term 'cultural well-being' was coined in Finland, and the country's biggest-ever research project called ArtsEqual (2015-22, comprised of 90 researchers) sought to answer how art and culture can contribute to more equality and well-being in society. You could say Finns know a thing or two about the relation between culture and well-being. So how does this reflect in the audience development scene?

Audience development as a social service

While the term 'cultural well-being' is spreading fast among the Finnish cultural scene, especially since the corona pandemic, I think audience development in Finland has from the start strongly focused on education and outreach. Well, the education system in Finland is highly regarded, so it's logical for audience development to want to latch on to that. Outreach projects, then, are most often interpreted as a social service for minorities. That idea fits well within the Finnish value scale where equality and accessibility are holy stuff. I met with an audience development professional here some years ago who regarded outreach as the standard meaning of yleisötyö, and was surprised about the English translation 'audience development'. To him, it was all about teaching workshops to minorities, and he was operating almost separated from the rest of the organisation. More generally as well, I feel that the audience in these outreach projects is very much regarded as audience in its own right, without effectively needing to be charmed into the theatre walls afterwards. In other words, the outreach performance is already pretty 'emancipated' and acknowledged as a performance in its own right. I like to believe that in Finland, my former employer Zodiak - Center for New Dance played a pivotal role in this emancipation of the outreach project.

At the same time, I feel that in Finland, there is not so much a culture of working bottom-up with communities. A colleague of mine, a Finn who lived and worked in the UK for ten years, put it more bluntly: “Community spirit in Finland is a joke." I was glad she said it, so that I didn’t have to. I guess that's why the outreach projects easily start feeling as social services, rather than that the need springs from the community itself.

Gaining trust in communities

I promised myself I wouldn't delve into the cliché of the distant or socially awkward Finn - for that, I'll refer you to excellent self-mockery such as Finnish nightmares and Very Finnish Problems on social media. One thing that I'll mention here however, is what I learned about the Finnish mindset: Finns typically do not want to bother another person's peace of mind. Therefore the archetype Finn will not start conversations or even take up eye-contact with strangers, he will just leave him 'in his peace'. I have felt that this very respectful attitude towards 'the other' also results in a great deal of loneliness and need for belonging. 

Another thing is trust. Even though Finland is regarded a 'high-trust' society, I feel that people have more trust in formal structures and organisations rather than in their fellow Finn. Forming communities or with such ingrown attitudes is difficult - but I also feel that there is a great need and longing for it. 

Getting cross-departmental

In the beginning of this year, I attended a seminar of audience engagement professionals. The central outcome from that seminar: the Finnish audience development scene is looking to define itself and grow roots. Almost all of the participants felt the need for a mindshift within their organisation that audience development would be more present across departments and gets considered in artistic processes early on. Audience development as a mentality instead of a separate department.

Overall, I feel that audience development in Finland is maturing, and looking in different directions for expansion. There have always been elements of community engagement present, but now they are perhaps connecting better to the mission of the organisation. Arguably, also local communities start playing more of a role now. The ArtsEqual research project, the pandemic and the rise of the 'cultural well-being' term have likely played a role in these developments. Also the Helsingin malli-project has participated in this shift - more about that in a future post. But in practice, engaging with communities in Finland is not a given.

These are some contour sketches of the audience development scene in Finland, as I understand it. I warmly welcome your thoughts and experiences in the comments to make this picture more complete!