Tom Finkelpearl

See photos from the NYU Tisch School of the Arts Gala, which made its grand return at the Ziegfeld Ballroom.

The NYC Department of Cultural Affairs has announced $51.3 million in grants to support public cultural programming at 985 organizations across New York City as part of its fiscal year 2020 annual funding cycle. The funds support groups working in a vast range of disciplines, serving audiences of all ages and backgrounds. Together, the hundreds of cultural organizations receiving this support form the backbone of New York City's vibrant cultural life. The total includes funding set aside for underserved communities and major new investments in nonprofits that directly support individual artists working throughout the city. The agency continues to prioritize funding equity for culture in every corner of NYC and support for goals outlined in the CreateNYC cultural plan.

The NYC Department of Cultural Affairs (DCLA), members of the City Council, and Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams have announced that The Noel Pointer Foundation (NPF) has received $6.5 million in City capital funding to restore the historic firehouse located at 299 Degraw Street in Cobble Hill. NPF will be the non-profit cultural operator of the site pending completion of the renovation project. Formerly home to Fire Department Engine Company 204, the two-story, 18th century firehouse building was decommissioned in 2003. NPF plans to transform the long-vacant facility into a new center for music education and enrichment for New York City youth.

ArtBridge, an NYC-based public art organization, recently installed their second large-scale exhibition on the sidewalk shed along 15th Street outside of Google's Chelsea offices. The project is part of City Canvas, a pilot initiative of NYC's Department of Cultural Affairs that enables non-profit arts organizations to use protective construction structures as platforms for public art exhibitions. ArtBridge is one of two organizations chosen to implement the City Canvas pilot program.

The NYC Department of Cultural Affairs (DCLA) and NYC Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC) today celebrated the start of construction on a new cultural center at the 32-story mixed-use tower, located at 300 Ashland Place in Fort Greene, Brooklyn. The L10 Arts and Cultural Center will be home to several noteworthy cultural institutions including the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), Brooklyn Public Library, the Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts (MoCADA) and 651 ARTS.

The Mayor's Office of Media and Entertainment today announces the first-ever study of its kind, 'ALL NEW YORK'S A STAGE: NYC Small Theater Industry Cultural and Economic Impact Study.' This groundbreaking report calls attention to the vibrance of the small theater community, and offers an in-depth portrait of the size, makeup, location, overall cultural importance and economic impact of the sector; as well as the challenges the industry is facing.

The de Blasio Administration today announced the launch of the IDNYC renewal campaign, new and returning benefit partners, and the IDNYC Middle School Card. With the fifth anniversary of the IDNYC program approaching and the first set of cards set to expire beginning in January 2020, the program has also introduced a new card design and a comprehensive, citywide advertising and targeted outreach campaign to promote renewals. IDNYC is the largest and most successful municipal ID program in the country with over 1.3 million cardholders.

a??a??a??a??a??a??a??Spaceworks, the nonprofit organization that builds and operates below-market creative workspace across New York City, is partnering with Abrons Arts Center, a home for contemporary interdisciplinary arts in Manhattan's Lower East Side neighborhood, to bring 10 studios online for dance, music, and theater rehearsals starting at $10/hour.  

The City University of New York (CUNY), the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs (DCLA), and The Rockefeller Foundation have announced the launch of the fourth year of the CUNY Cultural Corps, which places students in paid internship positions with New York City non-profit cultural institutions. The program exposes students to opportunities and future careers in the arts while expanding the cultural community's engagement with CUNY's diverse pool of talent. As of the current fiscal year, funding for the Cultural Corps has been made a permanent line item in DCLA's budget, providing long-term support for the program. The Rockefeller Foundation has also established an endowment-based fellowship to support several internships each year in perpetuity. 

Queens Theatre will focus on disability inclusion in the performing arts with two major programs in September: offering an intensive professional training program for disabled actors, and hosting a National Disability in Theatre Convening.

The NYC Department of Cultural Affairs (DCLA) has announced the CreateNYC Language Access Fund to support cultural organizations' efforts to increase access to cultural programming for audiences whose primary language is not English. Building on recommendations in the CreateNYC cultural plan, the new fund will support the creation and presentation of work for non-English-speaking audiences, bilingual cultural programming intended primarily for non-English speakers, and multilingual community engagement in the arts. The initiative aims to remove barriers to participation in arts and culture for the millions of New Yorkers who are non-English speakers, multilingual learners (MLLs), English language learners (ELLs), and sign language users.

The service organization Dance/NYC is pleased to announce today's release of its latest research report, Advancing Immigrants. Dance. Arts., a qualitative analysis prepared in collaboration with the organization's Immigrants. Dance. Arts. (IDA) Task Force. 

The NYC Department of Cultural Affairs (DCLA) and SMU DataArts have released a pilot demographic report on the workforce of cultural nonprofits that receive City funding. This report builds on the landmark 2016 study of the workforce at City-funded, non-profit cultural organizations, which found major disparities between the makeup of the cultural workforce and the city's population and helped shape a number of new programs and policies aimed at promoting a more diverse and inclusive cultural sector. By collecting self-reported data, this new study captures data on disability and sexual orientation, which were not captured in 2016. Once it is rolled out to all of DCLA's constituent organizations next year, it will provide a baseline to track progress over time on a broad range of categories, representing a powerful new tool in the City's efforts to foster a cultural sector that reflects the diversity of the city it serves.

The NYC Department of Cultural Affairs (DCLA) today announced the launch of Community Organizing 101: Engagement Tactics for Cultural Organizations, a pilot course that will train staff from cultural organizations around the city in strategies for sustained community building. During public engagement conducted for CreateNYC, residents and cultural workers called for the City to support cultural groups in efforts to establish stronger connections with their neighbors and engage new audiences. Representatives from 30 DCLA-funded organizations from all five boroughs will participate in this free pilot course, providing them an opportunity to establish new peer networks and learn how to integrate the tools of community organizing into their work in the cultural sector.

Today, the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs (DCLA) and women.nyc (NYCEDC) announced that artist team Amanda Williams and Olalekan Jeyifous has been selected to design a new monument honoring Shirley Chisholm, the first black woman elected to serve in Congress. The design proposed by the artists, called Our Destiny, Our Democracy, was selected through the City's Percent for Art program, and will now be refined as it proceeds through additional community input and public review. The monument is the first to be commissioned as part of the She Built NYC program, which seeks to expand representation of women in the City's public art collection. The Shirley Chisolm monument will be installed in Prospect Park by the end of 2020.

The New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) inducted three arts luminaries into its Hall of Fame during its annual benefit on April 11 at Capitale.

The service organization Dance/NYC and its program partners Gibney and Spaceworks are pleased to announce the recipients of the Disability. Dance. Artistry. Residency Program, made possible by the generous support of the Craig H. Neilsen Foundation and the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs CreateNYC Disability Forward Fund. The purpose of the residency program is to expand opportunities for dancers with spinal cord injury (SCI) and other disabilities, and to advance accessibility and inclusion within the larger dance, residency, and presenting communities.

Dance/NYC, New York City's leading organization dedicated to promoting the knowledge, appreciation, practice, and performance of dance in the metropolitan area, today announced content for its tenth annual Symposium happening Friday, February 22 and Saturday, February 23, 2019, at Hunter College. This is the only gathering of its kind for dance leaders, makers, and supporters in the metropolitan New York City area. Hundreds will gather for panel discussions, case studies, interactive workshops, individual legal and management consultations, a networking lunch, and more. (Visit Dance.NYC for complete program.)

Today, MCC Theater Artistic Directors Robert LuPone, Bernard Telsey, William Cantler, and Executive Director Blake West officially opened MCC's first permanent home, The Robert W. Wilson MCC Theater Space. For the first time in the Theater's 32-year history, MCC will bring the company's mainstage productions, new play development, and public engagement and education programming under one roof.