New Chapter For Singapore Arts

WHAT WILL HAPPEN to the arts post- Covid-19? Will audiences become so used to watching shows online that they'll be less inclined to step back into the theatre? Will they be reluctant to pay for tickets, thinking they might see the shows streamed for free someday? Or will they simply be unwilling to sit next to strangers for a live performance, as long as there's no proven and affordable vaccine?

Singapore's most international arts company, TheatreWorks, isn't sitting idly while waiting for the answers. It's taking the opportunity during the pandemic to stage its own rebirth instead. Dr Ong Keng Sen, who's been reappointed as its artistic director, is renaming the company as T:>Works and expanding its focus into the digital sphere and the realm of thought leadership.

He expects the Singapore arts scene to lose "20 percent of the audience who will choose to stay home after this pandemic." His prediction comes in the wake of various audience surveys, including a Shugoll Research study in the US that shows only 25 per cent of theatregoers will return to the theatres soon after the lockdown.