Welcome

After being relocated twice already, the Asian Arts Initiative has
finally moved out of the path of the Pennsylvania Convention Center
expansion. Please note our new mailing address:

      Asian Arts Initiative
      1219 Vine Street
      Philadelphia, PA 19107
      Phone: (215) 557-0455

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The Asian Arts Initiative hosts
in collaboration with the Philadelphia Chinatown Development Corporation, the Swarthmore College Lang Learning Center for Civic and Social Responsibility, WHYY Learning Lab

Chinatown Youth Radio Philadelphia

Come CELEBRATE Chinatown Youth Radio Philadelphia's first ever CD release party!

Friday, August 15, 2008
5 pm – 7 pm

Gallery Space at
Asian Arts Initiative
1219 Vine Street
RSVP to chon@asianartsinitiative.org
Or call 215.557.0455

Chinatown Youth Radio Philadelphia (ChYRP) is an intensive, 3-week summer experience for high school students to create a blog and podcast featuring radio stories of Philadelphia Chinatown.  During the course of this summer pilot program, youth learned the skills involved in creating a radio story, engaging community members, and the new media technology involved in radio podcasting.

Listen to our work!
Learn with us!
Celebrate!

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The Asian Arts Initiative invites artists of all disciplines and backgrounds to apply to participate in our 2008 Artists Exchange focusing on the theme of Community Development and Displacement.

The Artists Exchange begins with a weekend-long Learning Retreat (November 7-8th) where artists will share some of their existing work and sources of inspiration with each other; and participate in workshops to explore and gain topical knowledge as the basis for creating individual new works around the theme of Community Development and Displacement. As part of the Asian Arts Initiative’s relocation to our new home in Chinatown, we are interested in exploring our pivotal role as an intersection between the arts community and our local neighborhood.
 
Some of the questions that will be explored include: What keeps communities rooted? Who stands to benefit from economic development and who is exploited? How will gentrification and economic development affect reconstruction of areas where Asian Americans and other communities of color live? How are patterns of gentrification similar or different to economic policies enforced outside of the U.S. through globalization? How can Asian American communities build together with other communities of color to address the experiences of gentrification and forced relocation?

Participants will have a month following the Learning Retreat to conduct research on their own and to create new work that will be showcased in a series of public performances December 5-6th.

We are seeking up to 15 artists of color, with emphasis on the Asian American community, representing diverse disciplines—including but not limited to dance, music, spoken word, and theater. Preference will be given to artists with a commitment to the Philadelphia area, though all artists are invited to apply. We will provide $150 honorariums to working artists that are selected to participate. Partial travel stipends will be available for artists living outside the Philadelphia-area. Artistic groups and collectives are invited to apply though stipends and performance time will be limited.

Please click here for full application.

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The ASIAN ARTS INITIATIVE issues a CALL FOR ARTISTS:

TRANSPLANTS EXHIBITION

October 2008 – January 2009

TRANSPLANTS is a dual site multi-artist exhibition organized by the Asian Arts Initiative and curated by Sean Stoops. The exhibition will be based at the Asian Arts Initiative's new home at 1219 Vine Street in Philadelphia, with a video art installation at the International House Video Lounge, a space programmed by InLiquid Art & Design Network. The exhibition is scheduled to be open from October 2008 through January 2009.
 

Exploring experiences of migration and displacement, those both chosen and imposed, Transplants will examine life-changing journeys made by artists and communities 'transplanted' from one place—whether physical or conceptual—to another, revealing the critical and creative roles that culture, immigration, exile, and home play in our ideas of ourselves and our world. Transplants will show the complexities and particularities of communities’ and individuals’ stories and representations of movement through space and time.

The theme of Transplants is particularly close to home for the Asian Arts Initiative, who in June 2007, due to the expansion of the Pennsylvania Convention Center, alongside several other arts and cultural organizations was forced to move from our former home in the now-demolished Gilbert Building. In a struggle to survive and grow despite the displacement, the Initiative moved to a temporary space and then was forced to move yet again from the unheated space during the winter. Now we are looking forward to our final move into our newly renovated home at 1219 Vine Street in Philadelphia’s Chinatown neighborhood.

TRANSPLANTS will be the inaugural exhibition at the Asian Arts Initiative's new gallery.

The Asian Arts Initiative invites submissions of visual and media art work for the ‘Transplants’ exhibition. We are accepting proposals for existing or new work, including site specific installations created for the exhibition.

Please click here for full application. Please contact Amy Danford, Visual Arts Coordinator, at gallery@asianartsinitiative.org if you need an extension on the deadline.

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The Asian Arts Initiative hosts
in collaboration with the City of Philadelphia Big Picture
Mural Arts Program
a year-long mural-making workshop for youth

October 6th- December 12th, 2008
3 days a week/ 3:30-6:30pm

Asian Arts Initiative Salon Space
1219 Vine Street, Philadelphia, PA 19107

This workshop is free and open to all interested youth ages 10-18.

Register Now! Contact Chon at 215.557.0455 or chon@asianartsinitiative.org

www.asianartsinitiative.org :: www.myspace.com/asianartsinitiative

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The Asian Arts Initiative Oral History Project is underway!

The Asian Arts Initiative’s Oral History Project celebrates the Initiative’s 15-year-long dedication to promoting social justice and change through the arts. We’re busy gathering testimonies of 15 interviewees to illuminate their experiences as artists, community activists, staff members, and program participants within the orbit of the Asian Arts Initiative. This exciting “look back” is a way to preserve our organizational and local history--sharing visions of social justice and strategies for making change through the arts, while simultaneously highlighting a diverse spectrum of voices from the Philadelphia community.

Many thanks to our committed staff, volunteers, and community members who are participating in this live history of the Asian Arts Initiative; and to the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission for project funding.

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Congratulations to the cast and crew of Flashpoints/ Unbreakable Objects and the Re:location Video Collage Project in the culminating performance on Saturday May 31, 2008.


Photo of Flashpoints cast by Jen Cleary

Flashpoints Cast: Regie Cabico Lovella Calica, Misia Denea, Jo Louie, J. Mason, Charles Ramirez, Manny Son, Omar Telan, Hannah Utain-Evans, and Tyrell White.

Re:locations Crew: Anula Shetty, Dina Dashiell, Robert Hill, Hakeem Jefferson, Elizabeth Powers, Danny Seng, Amarjeet Singh, Larry Staton, and Arif Zahir.

The "Re:location" workshop with Anula Shetty was made possible in part with a grant from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, Philadelphia Arts in Education Partnership. Regie Cabico's residency in Philadelphia and the "Flashpoints" workshop were made possible in part with grants from the Artists & Communities program of the MidAtlantic Arts Foundation; and the Philadelphia Theatre Initiative, a program of the Philadelphia Center for Arts and Heritage, funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts and administered by the University of the Arts.

Welcome to the Asian Arts initiative's new home at 1219 Vine Street. We've (finally) arrived! Center building with green window trim.