NYC Performing Arts Spaces (NYCPASpaces.org), the online database of rental space available for music, dance, and theatre, launches Version 2.0, including online booking and enhanced features for venues. With over 2,200 space listings, NYCPASpaces.org is a free website where artists can search for audition, rehearsal, and performance space by price, location, and availability, while venues can manage space calendars and payment online. The expansion of NYC Performing Arts Spaces is a technology initiative of national arts service organization Fractured Atlas.
NYC Performing Arts Spaces originally launched in 2001 to address the challenge of finding rehearsal and performance space. The first website to create a comprehensive database of available studios and theatres for rent in New York City, NYCPAS has also become a marketing tool for venues. While artists save time finding every available rental in one place, venues benefit from increased visibility by participating in a well-known resource that is used by thousands of artists every month. In 2011, NYCPASpaces.org has been used by over 100,000 visitors and is the #1 organic search result for rehearsal space on both Google and Bing.
"This new technology has the potential to help venues strengthen their promotion, management, and income, and to help thousands of artists address the challenge of access to space," says Lane Harwell, director of the advocacy group Dance/NYC. Fractured Atlas is working with its membership of over 18,000 artists and organizations to expand usage of the site.
The popularity of NYC Performing Arts Spaces has inspired organizations in other major arts markets to partner with Fractured Atlas to create localized databases. Sites with the same search capabilities are now available for the Bay Area, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia. Additional space finders will launch over the next year in Atlanta, Austin, Minnesota, Chicago, Sacramento, Salt Lake City, and Washington DC. The technology will also expand to include space for visual arts and film.
Development of NYC Performing Arts Spaces was made possible by Bloomberg Philanthropies, The Kresge Foundation, the Mertz Gilmore Foundation, New York City Council Speaker
Christine Quinn, New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, The New York City Theater Subdistrict Council, and New York State Council on the Arts.
FRACTURED ATLAS is the nation's largest nonprofit arts service organization. With a member base of over 18,000 independent artists and arts organizations, its core services include fiscal sponsorship, professional development, advocacy, health insurance education and navigation, and the nation's only arts liability insurance program. The Fractured Atlas Open Arts Network extends its programs and services to an audience of over 100,000 artists and arts groups nationwide. With a special emphasis in developing technology to serve the arts, new and continuing technology initiatives include Spaces (online performing arts space database), Archipelago (cultural asset mapping and data visualization software), Fractured U. (online professional development), and ATHENA (open-source software platform for the cultural sector). Fractured Atlas programs and services are made possible through the generous support of The
Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, andThe Kresge Foundation. Fractured Atlas is based in New York City.
www.fracturedatlas.org
