Gold For Culture: 19.8m Visited London 2012 Festival

Gold For Culture: 19.8m Visited London 2012 Festival

More than 19.8 million visitors saw an event at the London 2012 Festival, figures show.

Arts, theatre, music and exhibitions were part of the £63 million cultural festival which ran from June 21 to September 9 to celebrate the Olympics and Paralympics.

Some 16.5 million visitors went to free events such as the BBC Radio 1 Hackney Weekend and the BT River of Music, according to interim figures from London 2012.

In total there were 621 productions and projects in the festival made up of 13,006 performances and events at 1,270 venues across the UK.

More than 200 works were commissioned and there were 160 world and UK premieres. There are now 176 permanent artworks that have been left as a result.

The festival was the climax of the £55 million Cultural Olympiad, the wide-ranging four-year artistic build-up to the Games.

The International Olympic Committee has congratulated London 2012 for keeping a strong cultural focus to the Games.

Tony Hall, the Cultural Olympiad board chairman, said: "The scale and reach of the London 2012 Festival was unprecedented and arts intuitions across the UK were able to win new audiences."

Ruth Mackenzie, the London 2012 Festival and Cultural Olympiad director, said: "We asked partners and artists from round the world to create once-in-a-lifetime new work to match up to the once-in-a-lifetime ambition and scale of the London 2012 Games.

"They rose magnificently to the challenge. They showed that the UK creative and cultural sector are world leaders.

"World class artists amazed us with the risks they took and the quality of the work they created."

Organisers hoped the festival would entice a new audience to the arts with work by star names such as Alfred Hitchcock, Tracey Emin and Damon Albarn on show.

Over half a million people signed up to London 2012 to receive information on cultural events linked to the Games.

It is estimated that more than 10 million people "have been personally inspired to take part in more cultural activities in the future," according to London 2012.

People aged from 16 to 24, approximately 38%, were the most aware of the festival.

Up to 30% of everyone who went to the festival was aged 35 or under and 11% of attendees were from minority ethnic groups. There was also 12.5% of visitors who were disabled or said they had a disabled person in their family.

A final report on the festival and the Cultural Olympiad is set to be published by the University of Liverpool's Institute of Cultural Capital in spring 2013.

Arts Council England, Legacy Trust UK and the Olympic Lottery Distributor were the main funders of the Cultural Olympiad and the London 2012 Festival.

Backers of the festival also included BMW, Eurostar, Freshfields, King's College London, Panasonic, Samsung, Arts Council of Northern Ireland, Arts Council of Wales, BBC, British Council, Creative Scotland, Culture department, Festivals Edinburgh, Mayor Of London, Northern Ireland Tourist Board, Visit Britain and Visit Scotland.

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