Just published by the Australia Council, the Widening the Lens: Social inequality and arts participation report provides an up-to-date survey of the socio-economic factors that shape the Australian public’s engagement with arts and culture.

The upbeat headliner among the key finding is that 96% of survey respondents identified that they were engaging with the arts by reading, listening to music, attending arts and cultural events and venues, or by making art themselves.

But other key findings tell of an arts sector that still largely favours the economically, educationally and geographically privileged.

The report concluded that engagement with the arts was far greater among people with higher-than-average household incomes. Low-income respondents had lower rates of engagement of all kinds – attendance, creation and reading – and were more likely to select “because it is too expensive” as their main reason for not attending.

People currently in the labour force or retired are more likely to attend arts venues and events (68%) compared to those who are not in paid work (55%). They are also more likely to listen to music (paid workers 96%; retirees 91%), compared to those who are not in paid work (88%). Retirees are most active participants in ‘reading’ (80%), followed by...