New York City Center
Program: Access to Arts
Area of Work: Arts
Grant Purpose: Fall for Dance
Overview
New York City Center (City Center) was founded in 1943 by Mayor Fiorello La Guardia with the mission to make the best in the performing arts accessible to all. The theater welcomes 300,000 annually to experience the Encores! musical theater series and Fall for Dance Festival, as well as productions and performances from national and international companies, including Manhattan Theatre Club and Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater.
Grant
Purpose: To support the annual Fall for Dance Festival.
Fall for Dance Festival was created in 2004 to challenge the barriers to access that come with world-class performing arts, making all tickets affordable. Fall for Dance brings together dance artists and companies from around the world – both household names and emerging – to present a diversity of styles, aesthetics, and cultures. In addition to featuring New York City-based dance artists and companies, the Festival has hosted international artists from South Africa, France, Israel, Cuba and South Korea. City Center has also commissioned artists to create new works for the Festival. In conjunction with the Festival, City Center hosts a special professional development program, the FFD Lab. The FFD Lab is a day of intensive training for dance educators, classroom teachers, and teaching artists working for arts and cultural institutions.
Impact
Fall for Dance has become a hallmark of the NYC dance circuit and continues to exemplify City Center’s efforts to democratize the performing arts. A survey of audience members from 2021’s Festival, which sold almost 21,000 tickets, revealed that:
- 27% of survey respondents identified as BIPOC;
- 39% of survey respondents have household incomes under $75,000 a year;
- 45% of survey respondents attended Fall for Dance for the first time this year;
- 49% of survey respondents came from outside Manhattan;
- over 50% of survey respondents were under the age of 50.
Collectively, these insights show that Fall for Dance continues to be one of City Center’s most accessible programs, with the ability to engage a variety of new audiences from a diverse set of backgrounds.
