Media ecology and the performing arts – Virtually

Abstract

Abstract This keynote address highlights the author’s application of a media ecological perspective to a new mode of accessibility involving the performing arts: the transmission (often live) into cinemas around the world, of productions from the worlds of opera, theatre, ballet and the musical stage. Referred to as Digital Broadcast Cinema (DBC), the analysis presented shows how elements of theatrical liveness mediated by the conventions of film and television have created a fourth way of experiencing the performing arts for virtual audiences. Much of the analysis focuses on the pioneering attempt, just over ten years ago of the New York Metropolitan Opera to make its Saturday offerings available globally – to what is now 70 countries. At a time when the arts are increasingly under siege and inaccessible to many, DBC represents a small but increasingly successful effort to redress this situation.