The Artist-Run Initiatives map is the largest online overview of the global alternative artist-run field. This is your place to search, discover and connect with independent art spaces. The interactive map is continually updated with new artist-run initiatives, opportunities and events. Keep track of all the initiatives located in your city and get to know new spaces worldwide!
Space A is Kathmandu (Nepal) based non-governmental autonomous, non-political, non-profitable, and an Artist Initiative with the goal of establishing a stable platform for critical analysis, reflections, open discussions, information exchange, collaboration, and interactive communication. It aims at contributing to interdisciplinary contemporary art practices by setting up researches, discursive events, exhibitions, educational, and residency programs. Space A was formed in 2008 with the involvement of a Visual Artist, Interior Designer, Jewelry Designer, Musician, and writer to promote interdisciplinary art practice in Nepal. This unique diversity leads to lots of magnificent ideas. Kathmandu international artist-in-residence program (KIAR) is an initiative of Space A, a significant hub in the field of contemporary art both locally and internationally. The goal of the KIAR is to create an intellectual space where the residents will get the chance to penetrate the local cultural and socio-political contexts, as well as to combine their artistic practices (research, production, etc.) with meetings, lectures, and other discursive events with local and international artists, cultural experts, critics, and curators.
Tanka Prasad Sadak, Kathmandu 44600, Nepal
HyperCube is an artist-run project space that researches the innovative possibilities between alternative art spaces, and artists’ and scientists’ interactions with the in-situ/ex-situ. HyperCube is a non-profit experimental art space founded by artist, Özge Topçu and takes its purpose and identity from her practice. In her artwork, Ozge explores the relationship between the spatiality of space, science, and sociology. Hypercube is dedicated to curating and hosting projects that further understanding between the relationship of space, science, and sociology. As a non-profit organisation, HyperCube creates an open space for trans-disciplinary activity and aims to build institutional engagement with non-institutional actors such as local communities and students. HyperCube is open for project proposals from makers, thinkers, artists, and scientists. In additional to its regular call for curated projects, HyperCube welcomes and responds year round to open submissions. [email protected] Inspired by higher dimensional iterations of the cube, as well as the existing architectural structure of its location, the HyperCube space aims deconstruct the traditional notion of ‘the white cube’ and develop a hyper form of art space.
R. Almeida e Sousa, Lisbon, Portugal
supporting arts workers through written review, promotional assistance and, of course, commercial exchange with collectors. EMAIL: pkp3 (at) uw (dot) edu www.thestranger.com/locations/71802/pkultra-art-gallery known formerly as Form/Space Atelier 2006-2018.
2324 2nd AVE REAR ENTRANCE SEATTLE WA 98121
The dreamideamachine resideny is the new art space of the international online art magazine www.dreamideamachine.com which in parallel is organizing and promoting contemporary art exhibitions, performances, talks, seminars and publications. dreamideamachine is Media Partner of: LISTE Art Fair (Basel, on Regular basis from 2016), Platforms Project (Athens, on Regular basis from 2020- ), Art Paris (Paris from 2016- ), Yia 2016, Art Cologne 2017 (Cologne), Art Madrid 2020 and JUSTMAD 2020 (Madrid) and more…
Kolonou 55-59, Athina 104 36, Greece
b: ATELIER is located in the small regional town of Batlow near the southern Australian Alps. Batlow was severely impacted by the Black Summer Fires of 2020 & this ARI is one artist’s response to help her disaster affected town recover and renew itself in new and creative ways. Artist Robyn Veneer Sweeney is committed to encouraging locals and tourists to visit and support the output of the local arts community, through showing curated contemporary artworks and facilitating locals to engage with the arts through workshops both in-studio and through outreach. b: ATELIER running costs and improvements have been entirely funded by one artist with small donations of equipment by the local arts community. At this time, it is intended to stay an unincorporated NFP. The building has been made available rent free by the owner and patron, Potso. Some works are for sale but sales are not the core intention of the exhibitions. b: ATELIER charges small commissions for sales, the proceeds of which will go to cover running costs and improvements. In due course over 2021, it is hoped that b: ATELIER will be able to welcome outside artists for small residencies that will include access to working […]
14-16 Pioneer St, Batlow NSW 2730, Australia
The Union is a newly created Oslo-based organization (2020), an artist-run mediation platform consisting of Slovakian Martinka Bobrikova, Peruvian-Palestinian Rodrigo Ghattas-Pérez, and Spanish Oscar de Carmen. One of the core missions of The Union is to explore new socio-political realities through digital and physical activism and creative-citizen movements: the impact of Covid-19 – for artists, activists, thinkers, and creative minds – and its aftermath, being one of the most urgent ones. The Union´s laid-back projects target power structures in institutions, triggering loosen-up critical reflections through the use of unconventional, domestic, and experiential practices. We work to create other valorization structures for art, life, and culture, and to reshape the publics’ interaction; to actively participate in the collective design of new forms of care, participation, and empowerment through the arts. Whilst we cultivate countercultures and creative-civil community engagement.
Oslo gate 2, 0192 Oslo, Norway
EST art foundation’s purpose is to stimulate and explore new developments within concrete art. EST will initiate exhibitions, attract public attendance, invite international partnerships, house a library, a collection and host discussions to foster knowledge about concrete arts. Throughout, EST will operate according to Fair Practice principles.
Drie Octoberstraat 16A, 2313 ZP Leiden, Netherlands
FFTN is an independent space in St. Petersburg, Russia. FFTN is located in 4,5 meters of the former buffet in a building belonging to the local Artists’ Union. The project was launched in 2016 as a result of frustration from the local art-scene and became an attempt to overcome the prevailing “white cube” discourse. Today it is one of the key exhibition spots in the city as well as the meeting point and hub – a hybrid place, that would slip away from any rigid definitions and appropriations. FFTN widely collaborates with local independent art spaces as well as institutions (i.e. National Center for Contemporary Art). The projects were supported by The Foundation of Vladimir Smirnov and Konstantin Sorokin, Austrian Cultural Forum, Pro Helvetia Moscow.
St Petersburg, Russia
We are a creative and political collective that has grown out of the solidarity and sister*hood – and the difficulties – we have experienced in the industry. We want to destigmatise stripping and sex work as a whole, to start a dialogue about sex work in which people can learn about our work and lives, and, last but not least, to share the art of stripping. The sex industry presents many problems. Our collective want to provide a space where strippers’ voices can be heard and where we can share our love for sensual movement without being at the mercy of strip club rules and discrimination. We are advocates of the decriminalization of sex work globally. We condemn gender and racial discrimination in the sex industry. We want to challenge oppressive structures. We, the BSC, bring you original performance, pole skills, and sheer sexuality on a silver platter, with a political edge. Forget everything you thought you knew about strippers.
Gensinger Str. 78, 10315 Berlin, Germany
Award winning, not-for-profit arts publication reflecting on mental wellbeing. Produced and curated by Alice Bradshaw, Vanessa Haley & Lenny Szrama, founded in 2018.
9 Market Ave, Huddersfield HD1 2BU, UK
[Athens GR based pop-up curatorial team, former CDS projects] Unfuck Contemporary art Projects applied purism a guerrilla squad assembled & expanding to do just that. for us it’s personal, its [1love], there will be blood. rehumanize into the new collective
Zaimi 30 Athens Greece
Alfa is an artist-run contemporary art space. Since its establishment more than a decade ago, Alfa has identified and cultivated the careers of an international roster of visionary and emerging artists. Our mission is to support artists by providing a platform to showcase their work and dedicate to creativity and experimentation, as well as collaborate with venues on the national and international levels, presenting museum-quality group exhibitions. We represent an incomparable array of groundbreaking national and international artists working across all visual arts media. Our artists are included in major museum collections and exhibitions worldwide, including The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Israel, MAC Museo d’Arte Contemporanea, Lissone, Italy, Art Museum of Nord Trøndelag Norway, Museum of Contemporary Art of Crete, Greece, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, USA, Irish Museum of Modern Art, Ireland, Museum van Bommel van Dam, Venlo, Netherlands, New Museum, New York, USA, Perez Art Museum, Miami FL, USA, MOCA Museum of Contemporary Art,Miami, USA, Elgiz Museum of Contemporary Art,Turkey, Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes Chile, Santiago, Chile, Kyrgyz National Museum of Fine Arts, Kyrgyzstan, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo del Zulia, Venezuela, De Pont Museum Museum of Contemporary Art Tilburg, Netherlands, Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, USA, The Brooklyn Museum, New York, USA, Museo Nacional de Artes Visuales, […]
7934 West Dr suite 901 North Bay Village 33141 Florida
Founded in 2009, Arquetopia Foundation is an internationally established, award-winning non-profit arts and cultural foundation based in Mexico, Peru and Italy, with a social scope that emphasizes critical thinking through artistic practices. Our comprehensive, customized International Artist-in-Residence Programs are the largest and most reputable in Latin America, with an array of contents anchored in a solid structure of collaborations with prominent cultural institutions, renowned experts, and notable artists. We are invested in approaching art and art history with a critical perspective by understanding Mexico and Peru’s complexity in context and incorporating nuances in narratives and interpretation especially of the 3,000-year heritage of visual culture of these two countries. Our residency programs offer competitive professional opportunities for emerging and mid-career, national and international artists, designers, curators, art historians, art educators, writers, journalists, and cultural researchers age 20 and over. TESTIMONIALS FROM OUR PAST RESIDENT ARTISTS For profiles, feedback and testimonials from many of our outstanding past resident artists, art historians, and writers, don’t miss this page on our website: Arquetopia Foundation: Our Resident Artists OUR ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE PROGRAMS Our customized International Artist-in-Residence Programs offer competitive professional opportunities for emerging and mid-career, national and international artists, designers, curators, art historians, art […]
Avenida 15 Poniente 715, Centro Histórico. Puebla, Puebla 72000 MEXICO
Created in Barcelona, RICE is a Reversing Initiative to Counter the Exclusion of females and other discriminated groups in the art world. As an independent curatorial platform, our mission is to bring visibility and promote the sale of fresh and unique artworks by emerging and mid-career artists from around the world. Yes, we favor female-identifying artists and artists pertaining to other discriminated groups but we do not exclude male artists, especially those living in situations of marginalization or discrimination. Our goal is to reverse the current state of favoritism towards the traditionally privileged in mainstream contemporary art, by exercising positive discrimination while still leaving room for male artists and curators to be a part of this initiative. To that end, we launch quarterly open calls to discover artist to be featured in our art magazine and in the exhibitions we organize at established galleries across Europe.
Carrer del Baluard, 36, 08003 Barcelona, Spain
Bucharest International Dance Film Festival is the only cinema event in Romania dedicated to dance films. BIDFF – Bucharest International Dance Film Festival looks towards the future and tries to envision it. This year we use utopian | dystopian impulses as an instrument for reflection and dance films as a medium. By a surprising and meaningful coincidence, as we are all confronting the global pandemic, utopia | dystopia is the theme of the BIDFF in 2020. This fragile balance could generate creative or critical strategies to present or to contemplate the world and the future, as they are or as they will become. The BIDFF curatorial approach goes towards trying to decipher, shape, transform or revolutionize these concepts. Besides our regular international and national competition dedicated to short dance films, we also hold the new competitional category for musicals, introduced last year. We also highly encourage you to apply if you have a movement themed animation or if you have a short film revolving around the concept of utopia and dystopia. BIDFF awards excellence, novelty and courage in filmmaking, with a prize pool of 3000 euro.
1-3 Șoseaua Ștefan cel Mare 1-3, București 011736, Romania
STIFF is Croatia’s first International Film Festival dedicated entirely to student films. Established by the SKC Rijeka (Student Cultural Center) and organized in collaboration with Filmaktiv – the purpose of the festival is strengthening the student film and video industry by allowing an insight into the work of other fellow student filmmakers, encouraging the development of new ideas and establishing international collaborations in the field of media production. During six successful years, the festival screened over 350 most recent student fiction, documentary, animated and experimental films from all around the world. STIFF’s main goal is to present the best of the student film production from all around the world and help them get their audiences. It strives to educate audiences about the quality of work of emerging filmmakers. STIFF is supported by the Croatian Audiovisual Centre, City of Rijeka, Primorje-Gorski Kotar County, University of Rijeka, EPK Rijeka 2020, the “Kultura nova” Foundation and National Foundation for Civil Society Development.
Korzo 28 51000 Rijeka Croatia
Sweet Pass Sculpture Park is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit outdoor sculpture space started by Tamara Johnson and Trey Burns located on an acre lot in west Dallas, TX. Programming features contemporary projects from emerging and mid-career artists, local and international, working in an outdoor format. Sweet Pass Sculpture Park is dedicated to experimentation and community engagement, and provides an art space highlighting thought-provoking, interactive art in a public and free setting. Since opening in October 2018, Sweet Pass has presented multiple exhibitions and has worked with over 100 local and international artists, students from DFW area universities and various local organizations and institutions such as the Dallas Boys & Girls Club, the West Dallas Chamber of Commerce, the Nasher Sculpture Center and the Dallas Museum of Art. Sweet Pass Sculpture Park recently received a micro-grant from the Nasher Sculpture Center, a grant from the City of Dallas Office of Arts and Culture and a NEA Grant in conjunction with Wassaic Projects in New York.
402 Fabrication St. Dallas, TX 75212, USA
Lapsus is an independent project space and art-lab in Timișoara focused on the local scene, emerging artists, community projects and collaborative or educational approaches of creative endeavors. It is located on the first floor of the old paint factory on Peneș Curcanul street, nr. 3-5, in studio 27. Founded in October of 2017 by curator Alex Boca and artist Cătălin Bătrânu, Lapsus is a local hub for young artists and experimental projects working as a small-scale network for art practice. We organize screenings, exhibitions, performances as well as multimedia workshops or simple meetings. Lapsus is a hybrid between a project space and a makerspace, holding dear the open source culture and trying to improve artistic visions with technological advances while also studying their effects on human affect or the social environment.
Splaiul Peneș Curcanul 3-5, 1st floor, room 27, Timișoara, Romania
Yellow Brick is a non-profit artistic workspace that fosters relations among local and international artists, art collectives, curators, writers, thinkers and makers with the Athenian context as predominately accessed and introduced through the area of Nea Ionia. Initiated by artist Vasiliki Sifostratoudaki in 2016, Yellow Brick has so far hosted 32 artists from 25 countries. Yellow Brick wishes to participate in the cultural production of the city by focusing on the Athenian periphery and more specifically on Yellow Brick’s locale, a culturally diverse neighborhood established by immigrants from the coast of Asia Minor. Yellow Brick understands local identity as an assemblage of cultures, histories, languages, expressions and forms, and welcomes artists and cultural practitioners to activate and sustain a creative dialogue within Nea Ionia and greater Athens through their current interests, social concerns and artistic practices. All participants are called upon to act as hosts and poetic activators of forms and ideas through a three-week research trajectory (at minimum). Yellow Brick facilitates research and practice by providing residency in a studio and exhibition space that also contains a private sleeping area, private bathroom, shared kitchen, and a beautiful terrace. Yellow Brick’s small team develops the necessary conceptual tools, working modes, […]
7 Eptapirgiou, Nea Ionia, 142 31, Attiki, Greece
Edge to Edge is a ViCA initiative that puts into action our policy of continual push to collaborate with artists and institutions across borders. In the first Edge to Edge show throughout 2019 we showed American and Estonian art in the US in our gallery, then did the same in Estonia over the summer. Each country being one edge of western civilization. Then we turned to our southern neighbor, and used the border as a metaphor for Edge to Edge, and brought 12 Mexican artists to the U.S. for the first time. In another participating gallery (in Venice, CA) closed for during the outbreak, we’ll install 12 artists from Japan in a few days, then show the work virtually online. In 2021 (postponed from this coming May) 12 galleries in our building will be hosting an equal number of galleries or more from Berlin. What ideas do you have? How can we help? We have a great space and we’d love to see you here.
1206 S. Maple Ave. #722 Los Angeles, CA 90015, USA