Art + Tech + Youth = The Future (Hasn't it Always?)

"Long before tonight's opening of that most epic of Seattle Opera productions — the "Ring" cycle — a college student out to demystify the Wagner saga for other young people already has filmed an online reality series: "Confessions of a First-Time Operagoer."

A few blocks down the street, under a large multicolored tent, dozens of school kids leap and tumble at circus camp — for many, their first exposure to another local arts organization, Teatro ZinZanni.

And at the Olympic Sculpture Park downtown, a recent event designed to attract young people included a dance party with DJs, interactive displays of video art and nighttime tours led by guerrilla artists.

As core arts audiences grow older and attendance declines among young people, big arts organizations across the country are reaching out to potential new audiences in innovative ways. Seattle has become a center for this kind of outreach.

The attempts to create a broader base of attendees are taking many forms and using many tools, from reality TV-style webcasts to social-networking sites, dance nights and scavenger hunts.

Of course, arts organizations have conducted educational and outreach activities for years. Many offer discounted tickets for younger attendees, and a program called Teen Tix allows teenagers to get $5 rush tickets at many Seattle-area arts venues.

But now, "there's a real shift in the way that people connect to arts activities," said Dwight Gee, executive vice president of ArtsFund, which raises money for the arts in Western Washington.

A National Endowment for the Arts survey conducted last year showed that arts audiences in general are older than they were 26 years ago and that the rate of attendance among 18- to 44-year-olds has declined.

Some arts organizations maintain their audiences aren't graying, saying participation remains more of a time-of-life issue — that people trying to build careers and raise kids are less likely to attend arts events.

In any case, to Kelly Tweeddale, Seattle Opera's executive director, a more interesting issue is how behavior has changed among different age groups.

People don't just decide one day to go to the opera, she said. It takes exploration and exposure. And increasingly, younger people want that exposure through Web videos or audio downloads, and to know via social-networking tools what their friends think, before they'll go to a live performance.

"That's very different from our core audience who go to a Web site and look for basics — the who and where — and who use traditional media," Tweeddale said. "It's a huge behavior shift."

Without building a highly engaged community, this idea of building audiences — it just doesn't happen,""