$11.3 Million . . . Digest That

Back in 1921, when newlyweds Lila Acheson Wallace and DeWitt Wallace borrowed $5,000 to launch a magazine from home, they hadn’t an inkling of what they were starting. But Reader’s Digest would grow to become the most widely read magazine in the world, published in 47 editions and 18 languages, with a circulation of approximately 100 million a month.

The Wallace’s little primer of condensed articles did in fact go on to become the flagship periodical of a major global publishing and direct mail marketing concern. Even today, it graces the end tables in doctors’ offices everywhere, standing as it does for a certain wholesome stripe of mainstream Americana.

Yet if the Wallaces couldn’t have anticipated the empire they were seeding, they did come to know success in their time. Their fortune allowed Lila Wallace--who decorated the corporate headquarters and often chose the back cover art for the magazine--to indulge her penchant for philanthropy and the arts.

She began the Reader’s Digest Art Collection and gave to many important visual and performing arts organizations, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Metropolitan Opera, New York City Ballet and the Martha Graham Dance Company. And in 1956, she launched what is now known as the Lila Wallace-Reader’s Digest Fund, giving money to philanthropies of her personal choosing. For example, she set up a fund to pay for the flowers in the lobby of the Metropolitan Museum, as well as a wing of the museum for 20th century art. When Wallace died in 1984, her fund was already an influential presence in arts funding circles, and quickly became an institution itself. It was restructured in 1987, progressively expanding its funding to encompass a broad range of arts programming.

According to a 1995-96 report from the Foundation Center, based in New York and San Francisco, Lila Wallace-Reader’s Digest Fund is the third largest funder of arts culture and humanities in the U.S., behind the Annenberg Foundation and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. But since those both focus more on culture and the humanities, the Reader’s Digest fund has become recognized as the largest private-sector funder of the arts in America.

In California alone, between 1990 and 1995, the fund granted a total of $13.5 million to the state’s arts and cultural institutions. In 1995, it granted $11.3 million for arts across the country, out of a total annual allocation of $20.6 million, which also includes grants for urban parks and adult literacy programs.

Don’t let the name fool you. For if Reader’s Digest conjures images of gentle snowscapes and rosy-cheeked children at play, the kind of artworks the fund actually backs couldn’t be more different.

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Its mission statement says it’s out to “enhance the cultural life of communities.” But in practical terms, the Reader’s Digest fund’s focus is on bringing new--meaning younger as well as more culturally and ethnically diverse--audiences to the arts.

Often, that means it ends up funding some comparatively progressive work and programs--not, in other words, what most people would have thought of as Lila Wallace’s kind of art.

The Reader’s Digest fund doesn’t sponsor specific works, but it does pay for programs that produce plays by such openly gay writers as Chay Yew or Eduardo Machado, or performances of dances by such controversial choreographers as Bill T. Jones. Often, works that are seen thanks to Reader’s Digest funding cater directly to the identity politics of the targeted constituents.

Still, the people who now run the New York-based foundation insist that what they do is in keeping with their founder’s intentions.

“Mrs. Wallace had a deep love and passion for the arts, to make the arts more accessible,” says program director Holly Sidford. “There was also a support for American art forms, particularly ones that had been under-supported by the philanthropic sector. I don’t think Lila’s turning in her grave because we’re pursuing her fundamental goals.”

Lila Wallace, however, surely couldn’t have foreseen how bad things would have gotten for the arts by now. For while the 1970s and 1980s saw a nationwide boom in the number of orchestras, theaters, opera and dance companies and museums, fueled in large part by the expansion of public funding, the 1990s so far have been a decade about downsizing.

Nor is the recent decimation of public funding the only problem facing the arts today. According to research conducted by the National Endowment for the Arts in 1982 and 1992, baby boomers are either less interested in the arts, or no longer have time for them. There are more rich people in the United States today, but they are less likely to be philanthropic, particularly in the cultural arena.

Increasingly, the kinds of people (white, educated, middle-class) who have traditionally supported the arts have been moving out of the major urban areas. And those who remain--and indeed the arts audience in general--are growing old and gray.

The foundation gives grants to encourage presenters and producers to rethink what they’re offering and the ways in which they do business. And it’s there to offer guidance to those organizations that have never had to worry about such matters before.

“Building audiences is a complex thing, and the development of new work is one strategy for broadening audiences,” Sidford says. “It is a delicate matter for any organization to hold onto the audience it has while it tries to diversify. I don’t think one size fits all. Arts organizations need to be helped through that experiment.”

Help, however, does have its parameters. And while Reader’s Digest fund may, for example, give a grant in support of building Latino audiences (as it has at the Mark Taper Forum), it isn’t party to decisions about which particular plays are produced with its funds.

“We don’t make artistic decision for the groups that we fund,” Sidford says. “We’re not trying to homogenize institutions. It’s their decision as to what they put up. We don’t intrude at that level and say, ‘Yes, you can do this play’ and, ‘No, you can’t do that.’ ”

While the particular qualifications vary from field to field, the fund’s procedure for judging who should get this money is twofold. “We’re looking first and foremost for artistic quality and second for [an organizational] track record,” Sidford says. “We hardly ever do start-up.

“We’re looking for organizations that have been doing work for a minimum of three years. We try to pick organizations that have a solid respected profile in the past.

“We look for organizations that have a record of building audiences,” she continues. “And the other thing we need is a sense that the organization is in decent financial shape.”

Most of the proposals the Reader’s Digest fund backs have been solicited, and few that come in over the transom end up being serious contenders. Above all, perhaps, the fund is looking for like-minded administrators who share its goals.

“We look for commitment from the leadership of the organization to this work,” Sidford says. “And we have to know an organization pretty well before we fund them.”

In the arts, the Reader’s Digest fund supports primarily visual arts, theater, dance and music. There are also other related programs--such as the writers’ grants, the one program that gives money to individuals--linked indirectly to its work in these main arts areas. The major program areas are:

MUSEUMS: Reader’s Digest fund has put $27 million toward helping art museums use their permanent collections to attract new audiences. At the Indianapolis Fine Arts Museum, for example, the money is earmarked for programs designed to woo more African American patrons.

Given that a significant number of these potential patrons were churchgoers, the museum decided to consult with local pastors about what they thought might interest their parishioners. The result is a program highlighting religion in art by teaming docents with ministers to lead congregations on custom-designed tours through the museum.

“It’s been phenomenally successful,” Sidford says. “In some cases, all it takes is a very simple change of being willing to share the platform with another type of expert.”

THEATER: Reader’s Digest fund’s efforts in theater have had perhaps the most dramatic effect, so to speak, of all its programs. The organization has spent $25 million on programs at 42 resident theaters across the country, and these programs have greatly altered the kinds of plays that have been cropping up on major stages from California to Connecticut.

After conducting a survey among theater administrators and others across the country, the fund found that there was concern both about the aging of audiences, as well as a lack of diversity among theatergoers. “We heard from regional theaters that they were concerned about broadening their audiences,” Sidford says. “From community theaters, we heard that they needed help with things like marketing and box office--things that would make them more efficient. So we took that as our cue.”

Nearly all of the Resident Theater and Theaters for New Audiences Initiative grants target particular racial, ethnic, age or geographical groups. Berkeley Repertory Theatre, for example, has received funding to reach out to Asian Americans; African American and Southern writers are wanted at Alabama Shakespeare, and Baltimore’s Center Stage is out to attract younger theatergoers.

While the theaters themselves chose their respective target populations, Reader’s Digest fund has not been without its helpful hints. The Taper, for example, originally applied for a grant geared toward African American, Latino and Asian American theatergoers, but was twice rejected. Only when the Taper narrowed its aim to Latinos did the fund give the grant.

“The theaters identified the target audiences,” Sidford says. “But from our experience, taking on three constituencies was too ambitious. You have to be focused in order to succeed.”

At Hartford Stage, where the company has been trying to broaden its African American audience, there’s been an effort to introduce new patrons to increasingly adventurous theater. “There has been a sequence of plays written by African American artists or cast [with them],” Sidford says. “It started with conservative August Wilson and, most recently, it’s been edgier and more confrontational.”

The gradual approach seems to work. “They have a successful experience in broadening the audience,” she continues. “It has actually brought the audience along. The people stayed in the conversation.”

These days, the Reader’s Digest fund is in the process of gathering more specific data on the success of its theater programs. All 42 theaters are, for example, doing community surveys, and outside professional program evaluators have been hired to gauge the overall progress.

“There are very few funders that have invested heavily in evaluation,” Sidford says. “We hope to help upgrade the skills of arts organizations to understand the impact of their work.”

DANCE: Since Reader’s Digest fund started focusing on dance in 1990, it has allocated $22 million to dance companies and presenters in support of touring, residencies, workshops and other activities. Between 1990 and 1994, 33 companies received grants, which allowed them to expand their base of touring, thereby reaching dance patrons who wouldn’t otherwise have had the chance to see these groups perform live.

Similarly, smaller companies have had limited tours funded through the American Dance Touring Initiative, which is backed by Reader’s Digest fund and administered by the service organization Dance/USA.

The American Dance Festival in Durham, N.C., for example, received funds to expand its home season, as well as to develop national audiences through the Black Tradition in American Modern Dance on Tour. Other recipients have included Pilobolus, Alvin Ailey, the Colorado Dance Festival, the Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, and New York’s Dance Theater Workshop’s National Performance Network, which supports dance residencies in 27 cities across the country.

MUSIC: Reader’s Digest fund has spent $19 million since 1991 on music programs. Grants have gone to such places as the Atlantic Center for the Arts in New Smyrna Beach, Fla., for a residency program at six locations; Chamber Music America, for a residency program designed to pair professional ensembles with community organizations; and the Painted Bride Art Center in Philadelphia, for a four-day festival held concurrently at 16 sites across the country. One of the Reader’s Digest fund’s major commissioning programs is Opera for a New America, which backs the development of opera and musical theater works aimed at new audiences. This year, for example, the Orange County Philharmonic is receiving support for the West Coast premiere of “The Cave,” a new full-length video opera by composer Steve Reich and video artist Beryl Korot.

The lion’s share of the foundation’s music funding, however, goes toward jazz. “We are one of the only national funders that funds jazz,” Sidford says. “Because of that, we have a high profile [in that field].”

The largest program is the National Jazz Network, which supports touring and outreach activities throughout America. Other grant recipients have included New World Records, which received backing for jazz releases; the Smithsonian Institution, which has been given money for the America’s Jazz Heritage program; and National Public Radio, for its Jazz Initiative.

Music in general--and to a lesser extent, dance--are, however, areas in which the Reader’s Digest fund is reconsidering some of its strategies. “We’ve funded a fair amount of touring, but we may do less of that,” Sidford says.

“Touring is brief encounters and there’s not a lot of evidence that touring builds audiences. Where we’ve had the greatest impact is where artists and residents have been able to work together over an extended period of time.”

The fund has also come up with several new ways to support residencies through its Arts Partners program, which gives money to presenters. “We’ve developed a software package for [presenters] to collect data about audiences--before, during and after the residency,” Sidford says.

“It’s a package they can keep and use, including audience surveys,” she continues. “We are concerned to raise the capacity of the arts [presenters] to use evaluation in their own field.”

The lessons the Lila Wallace-Reader’s Digest Fund has learned so far may prove critical to the health of arts institutions in the years to come, as they continue to adapt to survive. Still, these aren’t changes that organizations will be able to make overnight.

“As far as building audiences for the arts, we’ve learned that its a complex business and it takes time to do it well,” Sidford says. “When we started eight or nine years ago, a lot of people thought it was a marketing problem. That’s not our finding.”

The key factor in bringing about change appears to be commitment. “It takes leadership from the board,” Sidford says. “It can’t just be lip service, particularly with the people who are intended to benefit.”

Beyond that, there must be dialogue. “It takes some reconsideration of programming and a fresh way of asking, ‘What are the barriers?’ ” Sidford says. “It could be venue, time, the content of the work--but you don’t find that out until you talk to the audience.

“Audiences are linked to health and vitality of arts in the future,” she continues. “Our strategies may shift a little bit, but fundamentally we’re focused on getting a broad cross-section of the American people in the arts. We’re going to stay the course.”