Audiences Central has contracted an independent interviewer who has visited several groups from our target communities with a standard set of questions developed by the Audiences Central team.

 Here is an executive summary of our findings so far:

• Accessing communities should not be seen as one size fits all. Issues of culture, religion and citizenship status, are all key factors in looking at how those communities participate in the arts and cultural life of the region.
  
  
• Some communities have a desire to expand the landscape of arts and culture within the region as both practitioners and audience, but feel quite isolated in knowing how to achieve it.
  
  
• Some arts practice within diverse communities is interconnected with religion and does not lend itself to public sharing.
  
  
• Venues, producers, and promoters within the region need to develop a more culturally competent approach to sourcing arts and cultural practices from diverse communities within the West Midlands region.
  
  
• A lack of insight and understanding of how to develop relevant and appropriate cultural brokerage when engaging diverse communities could mean audiences within the region may lose out.