Art galleries are working to recover from this epidemic| Roadsleeper.com

CHIPPEWA FALLS, Wis. (WEAU) -A performance scheduled for Veteran’s Day weekend at the Heyde Center in Chippewa Falls has been canceled due to a lack of ticket sales elsewhere.

As the arts community continues to recover from this pandemic, some people are worried about the future.

Staff at the Heyde Center for the Arts say things have changed since before the outbreak.

Debra Johnson, the center’s executive director, says: “We were selling tickets in advance. “We knew how big we were going to be, and when the game came, we didn’t have a lot of time to go. Now people just keep going. It makes it It’s hard to plan. It makes it even harder to figure out if you’re going to get enough people to cover costs like processing fees and things.”

Johnson said he thinks the fear that shows will be canceled is part of the reason for last-minute ticket sales.

Another change from 2020 is the sale.

“They’re going to get new experiences or different experiences, so we’ve had some better murder mysteries that we’ve been wondering about,” Johnson said.

Johnson said people 60 and older are not coming to shows like they used to.

“They’re scared,” Johnson said. “They are worried, they are scared. They, they feel — they still stay at home. That’s one of the biggest differences we’ve seen.”

Johnson says this uncertainty makes it difficult for places like the Heyde Center to plan its schedule and book tour programs.

“I’m still trying to put things in place for our 2023 program, so it’s been very difficult because they go, I can’t commit to you until I get enough of the tour, and that’s been a challenge for them.” Johnson said.

Although the center is focused on the arts, about 25% of businesses rent out spaces for events. However, people are waiting a long time to write.

“We want to be able to plan what our schedule is going to look like especially because we’re not planning just one thing,” said Kennedy Eslinger, assistant director of operations services with the Heyde Center. “We don’t just plan marriages. We’re not just a wedding-focused site. We plan art workshops. We plan weddings, plays, musicals, dramas, you know, different shows like that.”

Eslinger said this uncertainty could also make it more difficult to budget for the year as some of the money from the rent is used to reduce ticket prices.

It is important to those at the Heyde Center who work to make art accessible to all.

For 2023 the Heyde Center plans to run different types of entertainment to see what will bring people.

Johnson said one possible solution to finding tour groups would be some form of profit sharing.

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