Fairfield Arts & Convention Center director gives annual report

FAIRFIELD — Fairfield Arts & Convention Center Executive Director Lindsay Bauer gave her annual report to the Fairfield City Council during its meeting Monday night, touching on the financial problems the center has faced and how generous donors have helped it overcome those.

Bauer began her remarks by mentioning a new program she’s especially proud of, and that is “Cinema Fairfield.” Through this program, the center is able to run blockbuster films at the same time they are being shown in bigger theaters across the country. In previous years, the center had been limited to showing local or second-run films.

“One of the things we’re most excited for is that it provides low-cost entertainment right here in Fairfield,” Bauer said about the program. “As much as we try to provide free and low-cost opportunities for [live entertainment], we’re limited in what we can do. We launched the summer series that provides free concerts all summer, which is wonderful, but the film programming allows us to provide $6 tickets, so it’s a lot easier for families to come out and folks to enjoy this gorgeous building we have.”

One of the goals of “Cinema Fairfield” is to show more locally produced content, such as movies from local filmmakers. For instance, the center showed the locally produced film “Smiling Death” on Oct. 22. In addition to more local and first-run films, another new thing for the arts center in 2022 has been showing FIFA World Cup matches in the center’s atrium.

In Bauer’s report, she noted that the arts center was looking forward to its 2021-2022 artist series, since it had to cancel the previous year’s series because of the pandemic. However, the center faced one hiccup after another last year, and almost half the acts it booked had to cancel their shows.

“With audiences slower to return to the theater than analysts predicted, we were again faced with heavy revenue losses due to ticket sales gaps,” Bauer stated in her report.

Bauer said ticket sales for the 2021-22 series were down 52 percent compared to pre-pandemic years, and that the success of the arts center is “largely due to our generous and committed supporters.” Bauer included a graph showing that about half of the center’s revenue comes from individual giving and corporate sponsorships, and a further quarter comes from grants.

Call Andy Hallman at 641-575-0135 or email him at andy.hallman@southeastiowaunion.com