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Annual Report (January 2009)
Alliance for the Arts
Info@allianceforarts.org
330 West 42nd Street, #1701
New York, NY 10036
Tel: (212) 947-6340
Fax: (212) 947-6416
The Alliance for the Arts serves the entire cultural community through research and advocacy and serves the public through cultural guides and calendars. We publish information on the arts and cultural events in New York City as well as studies highlighting the importance of the arts to the economy and education.
The Alliance is a resource for:
• Children, parents and teachers using our arts education guides
• The general public and visitors to New York
• New York's cultural community
• Government and civic leaders who read our studies
• Artists, curators and historians served by the Estate Project for Artists with AIDS.
In 2008, the Alliance for the Arts' activities included the following program service accomplishments and highlights:
Advocacy
A key aspect of the Alliance's mission is to maintain public funding and strengthen public/private partnerships in support of culture in New York and to provide information on issues facing the field today. Our advocacy continues with ongoing efforts to keep the City Council, the Mayor's office, members of Congress and other policymakers informed of the issues affecting the cultural community. We update our respected community cultural profiles to provide detailed information about cultural organizations and activities in each Councilmember's district and create a citywide profile of cultural activity in an effort to inform the city's political leaders in the budget process.
The Alliance publishes its popular monthly newsletter sent by e-mail to over 5,000 arts professionals, funders and policymakers. Now in its sixth year, the newsletter reports on topics such as public funding for the arts, special initiatives in the field and other news, collecting and providing links to articles about the arts in the media. This has proved to be highly effective for communicating with the field and raising our profile as an advocate for the arts.
In 2008, Randall Bourscheidt, President of the Alliance, also began posting advocacy statements on various blogs, including The New York Times and the Huffington Post.
Research
The Alliance serves as the center of research on the arts in New York City and State--conducting original research and collaborating with local and national partners to inform cultural policy. In 2008, the Alliance completed reports on income trends to arts groups and on the economic impact of capital construction at cultural institutions--the final parts of The Arts as an Industry (2007), the first comprehensive study of the economic impact of the arts industry statewide. These will be released early in 2009.
The Alliance also built a new system for analyzing data on the cultural field, called the Arts Research Center, which will allow us to produce regular and timely reports on the challenges and opportunities of the field. The Alliance has begun to use the system to conduct ad hoc surveys on the needs of field in the face of the current crisis. The research center will launch publicly in 2009.
Promoting Access and Cultural Tourism
The Alliance publishes the most complete cultural guides to New York. We are the sole organization with the experience and the resources to produce these publications and Web sites, offering a unique service to the public, the cultural community and the city.
In 2008, the Alliance rebuilt its flagship online guides to culture, NYC-ARTS.org and NYCkidsARTS.org. These sites are the most complete, customizable, easy-to-use and dynamic source of information on New York's cultural institutions. NYCkidsARTS.org offers special tools for parents and teachers, such as lesson plans.
The Alliance is using the Internet to help organizations sustain their earned income through this time of economic uncertainty and to reach audiences who face barriers to accessing the arts. In 2008, it launched the Give the Gift of Culture campaign through NYC ARTS and created a Japanese-language guide to arts groups throughout the state on NYStateARTS.org.
The Alliance also published issues 35 and 36 of NYCkidsARTS, the Alliance's highly-regarded twice-yearly guide to arts education programs. Intended for teachers and parents, this publication is distributed free to the public schools and in public libraries.
New York Cultural Database
Using $1.5 million in City capital funds, the Department of Cultural Affairs contracted, on the Alliance's behalf, with the multimedia-design firm Funny Garbage to design and build the first phase of the NYC ARTS (formerly known as the Citywide Cultural Database). This Web-based information system, which launched in beta in November, includes the NYC ARTS Web sites and a comprehensive analytic system for research--transforming our core audience-building and access programs and strengthening the foundation of advocacy. With support from the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Empire State Development Corporation and the New York State Council on the Arts, the Alliance will extend this system to the state.
Convening the Field
The Alliance continues to fulfill its role as a hub of New York's cultural community. In 2008 the Alliance revived its great speaker series, the Arts Forum, with an inaugural lecture by Mary Schmidt Campbell at The New York Times.
The Estate Project for Artists with AIDS
Founded in 1991, the Estate Project is a response to the unprecedented impact of AIDS on American artists. Its primary missions are to provide practical estate planning advice to all artists, especially those living with HIV/AIDS, to document and offset the immense loss wrought by AIDS in all artistic disciplines, and to preserve the cultural legacy of the AIDS crisis so that future generations can enjoy, study and engage artworks as aesthetic achievements and historical documents. The focus of the project in 2008 was on creating online archives for works by writers, filmmakers and architects with AIDS for the benefit of the public.
Board of Trustees
Chairman
J. P. Versace, Jr., Vice President, Bernstein Global Wealth Management §
Chairman Emeriti
Paul Beirne, Principal, Bernstein Global Wealth Management
Ashton Hawkins, Counsel, Gersten, Savage & Kaplowitz §
President
Randall Bourscheidt, Chief Executive Officer, Alliance for the Arts §
Vice Chairmen
Robert Clauser, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, Media &
Entertainment Holdings §
Anita Contini, Senior Vice President, Director, Corporate and Public Affairs, CIT
Group §
Karen K. Gifford, Investment Consultant §
Laurie Beckelman, Partner, Beckelman+Capalino §
Raoul Bhavnani, Partner, Financial Dynamics
John F. Breglio, Of Counsel, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison
Theodore Chapin, Executive Director, Rodgers & Hammerstein Organization
Charles Cowles, President, Charles Cowles Gallery
James H. Duffy, Attorney; Author
Stephanie French, Senior Vice President, United States Trust Company
Paul Gunther, President, Institute of Classical Architecture and Classical
America §
Patricia C. Jones, Interim Managing Director, Maysles Institute
Eric S. Lee, Managing Partner, Bennett Midland LLC §
Robert Marx, Vice President, Fan Fox & Leslie R. Samuels Foundation §
Richard Mittenthal, President, TCC Group; Consultant §
Martha Newton, Senior Director, Pfizer Global Manufacturing, Pfizer
Marc Porter, President, Christie's Americas
Susan Ralston, Senior Consulting Editor, Knopf Publishing Group
Jerry Scally, M.D./Ph.D., Director, Core Computer Group
Andrew Solomon, Writer
Larry Warsh, Founder, Museums Magazine
Paul Washington, Senior Vice President, General Counsel & Corporate Secretary,
Time Warner §
Tim Zagat, Publisher, Zagat Survey
Joanne Stern, Life Trustee
§ Member of Executive Committee
The Alliance for the Arts is tax exempt under section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. Donations are tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law.
Info@allianceforarts.org
330 West 42nd Street, #1701
New York, NY 10036
Tel: (212) 947-6340
Fax: (212) 947-6416
The Alliance for the Arts serves the entire cultural community through research and advocacy and serves the public through cultural guides and calendars. We publish information on the arts and cultural events in New York City as well as studies highlighting the importance of the arts to the economy and education.
The Alliance is a resource for:
• Children, parents and teachers using our arts education guides
• The general public and visitors to New York
• New York's cultural community
• Government and civic leaders who read our studies
• Artists, curators and historians served by the Estate Project for Artists with AIDS.
In 2008, the Alliance for the Arts' activities included the following program service accomplishments and highlights:
Advocacy
A key aspect of the Alliance's mission is to maintain public funding and strengthen public/private partnerships in support of culture in New York and to provide information on issues facing the field today. Our advocacy continues with ongoing efforts to keep the City Council, the Mayor's office, members of Congress and other policymakers informed of the issues affecting the cultural community. We update our respected community cultural profiles to provide detailed information about cultural organizations and activities in each Councilmember's district and create a citywide profile of cultural activity in an effort to inform the city's political leaders in the budget process.
The Alliance publishes its popular monthly newsletter sent by e-mail to over 5,000 arts professionals, funders and policymakers. Now in its sixth year, the newsletter reports on topics such as public funding for the arts, special initiatives in the field and other news, collecting and providing links to articles about the arts in the media. This has proved to be highly effective for communicating with the field and raising our profile as an advocate for the arts.
In 2008, Randall Bourscheidt, President of the Alliance, also began posting advocacy statements on various blogs, including The New York Times and the Huffington Post.
Research
The Alliance serves as the center of research on the arts in New York City and State--conducting original research and collaborating with local and national partners to inform cultural policy. In 2008, the Alliance completed reports on income trends to arts groups and on the economic impact of capital construction at cultural institutions--the final parts of The Arts as an Industry (2007), the first comprehensive study of the economic impact of the arts industry statewide. These will be released early in 2009.
The Alliance also built a new system for analyzing data on the cultural field, called the Arts Research Center, which will allow us to produce regular and timely reports on the challenges and opportunities of the field. The Alliance has begun to use the system to conduct ad hoc surveys on the needs of field in the face of the current crisis. The research center will launch publicly in 2009.
Promoting Access and Cultural Tourism
The Alliance publishes the most complete cultural guides to New York. We are the sole organization with the experience and the resources to produce these publications and Web sites, offering a unique service to the public, the cultural community and the city.
In 2008, the Alliance rebuilt its flagship online guides to culture, NYC-ARTS.org and NYCkidsARTS.org. These sites are the most complete, customizable, easy-to-use and dynamic source of information on New York's cultural institutions. NYCkidsARTS.org offers special tools for parents and teachers, such as lesson plans.
The Alliance is using the Internet to help organizations sustain their earned income through this time of economic uncertainty and to reach audiences who face barriers to accessing the arts. In 2008, it launched the Give the Gift of Culture campaign through NYC ARTS and created a Japanese-language guide to arts groups throughout the state on NYStateARTS.org.
The Alliance also published issues 35 and 36 of NYCkidsARTS, the Alliance's highly-regarded twice-yearly guide to arts education programs. Intended for teachers and parents, this publication is distributed free to the public schools and in public libraries.
New York Cultural Database
Using $1.5 million in City capital funds, the Department of Cultural Affairs contracted, on the Alliance's behalf, with the multimedia-design firm Funny Garbage to design and build the first phase of the NYC ARTS (formerly known as the Citywide Cultural Database). This Web-based information system, which launched in beta in November, includes the NYC ARTS Web sites and a comprehensive analytic system for research--transforming our core audience-building and access programs and strengthening the foundation of advocacy. With support from the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Empire State Development Corporation and the New York State Council on the Arts, the Alliance will extend this system to the state.
Convening the Field
The Alliance continues to fulfill its role as a hub of New York's cultural community. In 2008 the Alliance revived its great speaker series, the Arts Forum, with an inaugural lecture by Mary Schmidt Campbell at The New York Times.
The Estate Project for Artists with AIDS
Founded in 1991, the Estate Project is a response to the unprecedented impact of AIDS on American artists. Its primary missions are to provide practical estate planning advice to all artists, especially those living with HIV/AIDS, to document and offset the immense loss wrought by AIDS in all artistic disciplines, and to preserve the cultural legacy of the AIDS crisis so that future generations can enjoy, study and engage artworks as aesthetic achievements and historical documents. The focus of the project in 2008 was on creating online archives for works by writers, filmmakers and architects with AIDS for the benefit of the public.
Board of Trustees
Chairman
J. P. Versace, Jr., Vice President, Bernstein Global Wealth Management §
Chairman Emeriti
Paul Beirne, Principal, Bernstein Global Wealth Management
Ashton Hawkins, Counsel, Gersten, Savage & Kaplowitz §
President
Randall Bourscheidt, Chief Executive Officer, Alliance for the Arts §
Vice Chairmen
Robert Clauser, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, Media &
Entertainment Holdings §
Anita Contini, Senior Vice President, Director, Corporate and Public Affairs, CIT
Group §
Karen K. Gifford, Investment Consultant §
Laurie Beckelman, Partner, Beckelman+Capalino §
Raoul Bhavnani, Partner, Financial Dynamics
John F. Breglio, Of Counsel, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison
Theodore Chapin, Executive Director, Rodgers & Hammerstein Organization
Charles Cowles, President, Charles Cowles Gallery
James H. Duffy, Attorney; Author
Stephanie French, Senior Vice President, United States Trust Company
Paul Gunther, President, Institute of Classical Architecture and Classical
America §
Patricia C. Jones, Interim Managing Director, Maysles Institute
Eric S. Lee, Managing Partner, Bennett Midland LLC §
Robert Marx, Vice President, Fan Fox & Leslie R. Samuels Foundation §
Richard Mittenthal, President, TCC Group; Consultant §
Martha Newton, Senior Director, Pfizer Global Manufacturing, Pfizer
Marc Porter, President, Christie's Americas
Susan Ralston, Senior Consulting Editor, Knopf Publishing Group
Jerry Scally, M.D./Ph.D., Director, Core Computer Group
Andrew Solomon, Writer
Larry Warsh, Founder, Museums Magazine
Paul Washington, Senior Vice President, General Counsel & Corporate Secretary,
Time Warner §
Tim Zagat, Publisher, Zagat Survey
Joanne Stern, Life Trustee
§ Member of Executive Committee
The Alliance for the Arts is tax exempt under section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. Donations are tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law.
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