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The Metropolitan Museum of Art is known for searching the globe for noted works of art. Lately, its overseas trips have had a new goal: finding people to visit the museum itself.
A delegation sent to Japan recently returned with 1,000 Japanese tourists, who spent a long weekend in New York. They were rewarded with a gala evening at the Metropolitan Museum with Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
"We have got to get the people abroad to come back," says David McKinney, president of the Metropolitan Museum, which has a $6 million deficit. "They are the best spenders, and their proportion of our traffic is down from historic levels."
The Metropolitan Museum may be taking its search the farthest. But hit with cutbacks in city funding and a drop in tourism following Sept. 11, big and small cultural institutions across the city are marketing more aggressively than ever. Their mission: finding ways to increase their visibility and bring in more money.
The strategies range from telemarketing at the New York Philharmonic to Friday night dance parties at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Even small groups such as the Classic Stage Company, an off-Broadway theater, are developing catchy, novel corporate and individual fundraising programs.
"Arts organizations are spending a lot of time now trying to figure out new ways of marketing themselves," says Margaret...