Machine Project
Since 2003, Machine Project has built a national reputation for nurturing innovative, experimental modes of arts engagement by framing challenging arts and educational opportunities as fun, approachable, and occasionally bizarre community events. And together all of our interrelated activities create active participants in culture where everyone sees themselves as producers and every place as a site for cultural exchange. Our most important achievements to date include:
* Hosted over 1,000 free events on everything from lectures on the sex life of sea slugs, butter-making aerobics, poetry readings, and mind-reading workshops.
* Changed how museums relate to their publics. In the past 4 years we have partnered with major cultural institutions (LACMA, Hammer Museum, Walker Art Center) to develop and execute a replicable model for how artists and small organizations can work with larger institutions to break down participation barriers.
* Supported the creation of new work by hundreds of artists. This includes direct financial support, often presenting their first solo show or first museum show and providing professional video documentation of their work.
Visit this organization’s website to volunteer
Learn about this organization’s budget, leadership and mission
1 Submitted Idea
- 2013 Grants Challenge
Everything Everywhere: LA 2050
OUR IDEA: Los Angeles is exploding with diverse creative talent and sites for cultural production and we believe that anything is possible here. Furthermore we believe that the most interesting ideas emerge from outside our traditional educational and cultural institutions. Our project Everything, Everywhere helps to explore the city’s full creative potential by providing artists and art organizers with the logistical and organizational support to create temporary or semi-permanent arts spaces in ten communities across greater Los Angeles. By helping artists and communities redefine and experiment with sites of cultural production we can question how we want culture to look and function in our city. Our goal for 2050 is to develop visionary models of local cultural production in a diverse set of communities. Together let’s create the cultural spaces and grassroots organizers of tomorrow.
Everything, Everywhere is based on three basic principles:
• Every Angelino has the power to create and re-imagine culture in our city
• Artists can act as a catalyst for interaction within a community
• Any location has the potential to be transformed into a site of creative use and civic discourse
HOW WE WILL DO IT:
1. Selective application process
To implement Everything, Everywhere first Machine Project will publicize an open call for applications. We will accept applications from artists, collectives, community leaders, and small organizations throughout Los Angeles. Successful applicants will propose visionary activity that reflects their community. We expect a wide range of proposals from one-day outdoor tours, to temporarily transforming unused public spaces for cultural use, to converting private space into public forums, to establishing a more permanent artist-run center.
2. Intensive project training and development
Our process will draw from both our informal grassroots education and institutional collaboration models. We will select a cohort of ten applicants, with special care to capture a wide range of neighborhoods. This cohort will enter a three-month training program to learn how to conceptualize, create, and manage their projects. The program will be comprised of lectures, site visits, classes, and workshops. We will assemble a dedicated team to work directly with each cohort member to identify potential locations/venues, build support within their home neighborhoods, produce and document their programming. Machine Project will remain involved in each project through frequent check-ins and consultation.
HOW IT WILL IMPACT ARTS AND CULTURAL VITALITY:
Everything, Everywhere will provide visionary ways for the public to experience art throughout Los Angeles County. Because each project will evolve out of a different community we have the potential to discover hundreds of innovative ways to produce and experience culture.
Everything, Everywhere will empower the next generation of artists to create, thrive, and grow in every neighborhood of Los Angeles. By creating connected arts programming across greater Los Angeles we will develop an infrastructure of sustainable art creation and a network of local artists and audiences. By 2050, we envision hundreds of community-led projects and spaces, each bringing a uniquely local, but highly visible program to their neighborhoods. The artists and audiences will inspire as well as be inspired by their home.
Everything, Everywhere will sidestep cultural production and participation barriers (high cost, transportation, intimidating arts intuitions) by bringing alternative, participation-driven arts spaces to every neighborhood through the innovation of their own local artists. We believe that cultural vitality depends on creating opportunity, support and space for artists to experiment. Furthermore, we believe that artists should be actively involved in re-imagining how these spaces are built and how culture is experienced.