In recent years, cultural participation in art institutions has come to take centre stage in debates on audience development. This is especially the case in countries that register low in the cultural participation rates – countries like Malta and Portugal. These two southern European countries share certain common peculiarities that may contribute towards this low rate of participation in formal arts, yet score highly in participation in folk arts. A study that makes sense of these cultural conditions, in a comparative approach of the two countries, remain absent in the social sciences. This paper is concerned with understanding these commonalities influencing cultural participation, buttressed by theoretical frame on cultural consumption and taste. It is the aim here to present a contextual framework, through a comparative approach of both countries, for an epistemological understanding of cultural engagement in both art forms. This paper brings together the study on cultural consumption of folk arts and arts in institutions under a single conceptual framework.

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