On October 29, Arts for LA gave some members of the Los Angeles County arts and culture community a glimpse at a current project in progress, a map identifying "cultural assets" throughout the region.  Arts for LA believes the map will serve as a critical advocacy tool to help visualize for policy makers and elected officials the abstract data on cultural infrastructure in Los Angeles County.

"Cultural assets" include a wide range of entities and places on the map.  Arts spaces, for example—museums, galleries, theaters, libraries, and concert halls—are a clear example of cultural assets that are generally visible to the community in which they sit, but other arts infrastructure, like arts organization office spaces and design firms, may not be quite as visible.  

Also included on the map are Los Angeles County school sites and existing rail transit lines.  These elements, when examined alongside the cultural asset data, can help reveal where mutually beneficial partnerships could be cultivated between schools and nearby cultural organizations, or to better understand how rail development influences and is influenced by existing and new cultural assets.  All of the information will be used to prompt dialogue, discussion, and a deeper understanding of the constantly-evolving landscape of arts and culture in the region.

"It's exciting.  It looks like it's finished because it's so pretty, but honestly it's still a prototype," said Danielle Brazell, executive director of Arts for LA.  "As we move into the next phase, we're looking for feedback, questions, and to crowdsource more data from our communities to ensure the map continues to be as complete as possible."

The Cultural Asset Map is a collaborative project involving the participation of several partners who contributed datasets as part of our initial upload.  Arts for LA thanks Alliance for California Traditional Arts, Khmer Arts Academy, LA Stage Alliance, Latino Arts Network, Los Angeles County Arts Commission, and Spacefinder for their participation in packaging and delivering data.

CAM is a project of Arts for LA and funded in part by the California Arts Council, a state agency; Arts for LA Organizational Members; and The California Community Foundation; The Ralph M. Parsons Foundation; The Boeing Company; and The Rosenthal Family Foundation.

If you lead an arts, culture, or arts education organization in Los Angeles County or operate a service organization working on behalf of these fields, Arts for LA invites you to contribute data to the Cultural Asset Map.

• Add your individual organization's information to the map by using this simple Google form. 
• Add your municipality's or service organization's dataset to the map collectively by emailing us at [email protected] for the data template.