Engaging Art explores the many ways that Americans participate in the arts today—from museum attendance to music downloading. Commissioned by The Wallace Foundation and independently carried out by the Curb Center at Vanderbilt University, this volume is an attempt to address the question of how to better understand the changing landscape of cultural participation. By bringing the perspectives of multiple scholars and experts to the table, the volume offers a new framework for understanding the momentous changes to impact America's cultural life over the past fifty years.

This volume offers suggestive glimpses into the character and consequence of a new engagement with old-fashioned participation in the arts. The authors in this volume hint at a bright future for art and citizen art making. They argue that if we center a new commitment to arts participation in everyday art making, creativity, and quality of life, we will not only restore the lifelong pleasure of homemade art, but will likely seed a new generation of enthusiasts who will support America's signature nonprofit cultural institutions well into the future.