Arte for art’s sake as cultural channel rejuvenates

Pascale Paoli-Lebailly | 29-08-2012

French-German cultural channel Arte has started to increase its audiences after over a decade of decline.

In 2011 the FTA channel fell to a 1.5 % audience share from its 3–4% rating five years ago. Yet things are certainly are getting better and since early 2012 with figures growing to 1.7 % over Q1 and to 1.9% last July. Websites audiences have also upped 30 % while catch-up registered a 50 % growth. Recovery is mostly due to new schedules introduced in January.

According to Arte G.EI.E President Véronique Cayla who presented the forthcoming 2012-2013 season of programmes, Arte is now more rooted into reality, less “erudite” and more European.

The channel will move on to rejuvenate its image and its content with more social dramas, movies, live shows and docs.

In addition to series such as Danish production Borgen, whose season 2 will kick off in November, Arte has also bet on hybrid formats to invent a new form of interactive television. New projects include euro cross-media format The Spiral and animated internet drama Hotel from Lardux Films.