In the Arts: Surveys Find Decline in Museum Attendance

Attendance at art museums is in decline, according to separate national surveys of participation in cultural activities, The Washington Post reports.

Data released Monday by the National Endowment for the Arts show 23 percent of adults visited an art museum or visual-arts festival last year, down from 26 percent from 1992 to 2001. The agency also reported double-digit drops in attendance in almost every performing-arts field since 1982, when it began conducting the annual survey.

A separate poll of nearly 4,000 eighth-graders found that 16 percent had gone to an art museum or gallery with their classes in 2008, compared to 22 percent in 1997.

In other arts news, the Orange County Museum of Art has come under fire from other Southern California institutions for quietly selling 18 of its 20 California Impressionist works to a private collector in March, the Los Angeles Times reports.

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