If, as arts administrators, we cover our eyes and believe that we just need to hold fast to all that we’ve known about our organizations, our communities, and our audiences until the fog lifts, we risk missing opportunities to engage audiences old and new even as our communities are changed in this period of pandemic and civic unrest.

Gaps in perception. Limitations of perspective. Failings of imagination. We can call them many things, but we all have them. And when it comes to building audiences for our arts organizations, they can really cause us trouble.