Audience Development Resources
This page provides links to audience development and access guides and resources.
Links to access equipment and services are located here.
1. General
2. Museums and Galleries (scroll down)
3. Performing Arts (scroll down)
1. Audience Development and Access (General - may be applied across artforms)
Access All Areas: Guidelines for Marketing the Arts to People with Disabilities
This guide is intended to be practical, covering actions which are within reach of arts organisations, especially marketing officers and their departments.
Action for Access: A Practical Resource for Arts Organisations (UK)
Describes levels of engagement with access, ranging from no-cost strategies through to larger scale and long-term improvements. It is particularly good example of a practical resource.
Arts Access UK
Access information for arts and cultural venues.
Arts and Australian Disability Enterprises
Government supported arts and craft employment services
Arts Council England
Enter ‘disability’ as a search term to find relevant projects and reports.
Arts Council of Wales
Enter ‘disability’ as a search term to find policies, publications, press reports and an arts database.
Artsline
Artsline is the UK's leading disability access website, providing searchable information on over 1,000 arts venues across London.
Companion Card
A card system developed in Victoria, with other States following. Allows carers of people with disabilities to attend arts and cultural events free of charge.
Design for Accessibility: A Cultural Administrator’s Handbook (USA)
Disability Access: A Good Practice Guide for the Arts (UK)
Comprehensive guide to increasing participation in the arts by disabled people as artists, audience members, participants and employees. Includes checklists and an action plan template.
Disability Access Symbols: Graphic Artists Guild (USA)
The Graphic Artists Guild site provides information and image downloads.
Disability (Access to Premises – Buildings) Standards
These Standards for the first time set the minimum access requirements for people with a disability to publicly accessible buildings.
Disability Fact Pack
This outlines a variety of issues for arts organisations regarding people with disabilities, including access, attitude, employment and discrimination. It also provides an overview of the Disability Discrimination Act.
Disability Rights: Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission
A useful overview of the Disability Discrimination Act 1992.
Dog Rose Trust
An organisation for people with a visual or other sensory impairment. Publishers of the book Another Eyesight: Multi-Sensory Design in Context.
HREOC Advisory Notes on Access to Premises
The Human Rights and Equal Opportunities Commission produces a range of guidelines and notes on access.
Implementing an Holistic Approach to E-Learning Accessibility
This paper by Brian Kelly reviews the limitations of the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) approach to Web accessibility, especially when applied to e-learning accessibility. The Tate Gallery’s iMap service, which provides an educational resource for the visually impaired about the paintings of Picasso and Matisse, was used as an example of an application of the holistic approach for e-learning accessibility.
Improving Access to Heritage Buildings
A publication by the Australian Heritage Council.
Inside Out: Exploring the Relationship between Disability and Architecture
Disabled and deaf artists responding creatively to places and spaces.
Kennedy Center Leadership Exchange in Arts and Disability: Resources
Includes information on how to obtain copies of the Center’s ‘tip sheets’ on different aspects of access in the performing arts, plus other resources.
Making the Journey: Arts and Disability in Australia
National Arts and Disability Strategy
Produced by the Cultural Ministers Council this Strategy sets out a vision for improving access and participation in the artistic and cultural activities for people with disabilities. The Strategy provides a framework within which jurisdictions can assess and improve existing activities. It also identifies new priority projects that could be progressed as national initiatives or by individual jurisdictions.
NEA Office for AccessAbility (USA)
Resources on accessibility from the National Endowment for the Arts’ Office for AccessAbility.
New Audiences Archive: Taking Part in the Arts (UK)
Arts Council England’s New Audiences archive features details of over 50 audience development projects in the UK, and a range of resources. Click on ‘New Audiences Archive’, then enter ‘disability’ as a search term.
Way with Words: Guidelines for the Portrayal of People with Disabilities
A Queensland Government publication.
Web Access Guidelines: Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission
2. Museums and Galleries
Accessibility of Museum, Library and Archive Websites: The MLA Audit
Report by Helen Petrie, Neil King and Fraser Hamilton, City University. Museums, Libraries and Archives Council, London, 2006.
Art Beyond Sight: Handbook for Educators and Museums
This handbook explores the process of creating accessible programming for people with visual impairments.
Association of Science-Technology Centers Inc
Provides very useful resources for improving access to facilities and services, developing policy and action plan documents, and consulting with disability communities.
MAGIC
MAGIC is fourteen museums and galleries in London who provide events and facilities for deaf and hard of hearing visitors.
Many Voices Making Choices: Museum Audiences with Disabilities
By Peta Landman, Kiersten Fishburn, Lynda Kelly, Susan Tonkin. Australian Museum/National Museum of Australia, Sydney & Canberra, 2005.
Museums and Galleries Disability Association (MAGDA)
MAGDA’s Disability Portfolio is a collection of 12 guides on how best to meet the needs of people with a disability as users and staff in museums, archives and libraries. It gives invaluable advice, information and guidance to help overcome barriers and follow good practice.
Smithsonian Guidelines for Accessible Exhibition Design
Guidelines for museums and galleries.
Talking Images
Improving access to museums, galleries and heritage sites for people with a visual impairment.
The Accessible Museum: Model Programs of Accessibility for Disabled and Older People This book was published jointly by the American Association of Museums (AAM) and the Institute of Museum Services in 1993. This and other publications on accessibility are available from the AAM’s website.
3. Performing Arts
Beyond the Ramp: Accessibility as an Organizational Asset (USA)
A report commissioned by the Association of Performing Arts Presenters - see also: additional access and the arts resources from the Association of Performing Arts Presenters.
Community Access Ticket Service - CATS (USA)
A San Francisco based project that aims to increase access to culture by providing tickets to disadvantaged people.
EASE
Australia’s only accessible ticketing service, based in Victoria.
Kennedy Center Leadership Exchange in Arts and Disability: Resources (USA)
Includes information on how to obtain copies of the Center’s ‘tip sheets’ on different aspects of access in the performing arts, plus other resources.
Mindframe Stage and Screen Guidelines
This website provides practical advice and information for people involved in the development of Australian film, television and theatre. It is designed to help inform truthful and authentic portrayals of mental illness and suicide.
Theatre Development Fund: TDF Accessibility Programs (USA)
Project based in New York which aims to increase access to theatre.
