Sustaining Today’s Artists will address how artist-centered organizations can sustain today’s artists and respond to artists’ needs, while also building sustainable organizations and communities. The small size of our conferences allows for time to meet new peers, participate in sessions and dialogues, build your skills, and explore New Orleans – the music, the food, the artist studios, the environment, the neighborhoods, the history, and the people. All are welcome!

	Conference Hosts Our primary host for the conference is Louisiana ArtWorks, a 93,000-square-foot visual arts facility in New Orleans' Arts & Warehouse District. Additional hosts include A Studio in the Woods, Hot Iron Press, and New Orleans Creative Glass Institute.
Eric Dallimore's Untitled #6209	Conference Events With so much to see and do in New Orleans, the conference will include off-site events that explore the rich diversity of New Orleans arts and culture – from an eco tour of the changing landscape since Hurricane Katrina, to neighborhoods known for traditional New Orleans music and food, to artist collectives and off-the-beaten-path studios, to public art around the city, to schools and theaters transformed by artists.
	Why New Orleans By year’s end, the Alliance will have invested nearly $1 Million in support of New Orleans artists, arts organizations, and the local community, through funding partnerships with The Ford Foundation, The James Irvine Foundation, and our Annual Conference. Today, New Orleans is undergoing a creative renaissance. The city boasts world-class museums, artist studios and galleries line the Arts & Warehouse District, theatre and music groups abound. All around the city, historic neighborhoods are being remade and transformed by artists. New Orleans is a city reborn, and while there is much work still left to be done in restoring the lives and neighborhoods damaged from Hurricane Katrina, the city offers us an analogy for reinvention and reflection in challenging times.
Check back for conference details in June 2009… We look forward to seeing you in New Orleans! The Alliance's 19th Annual Conference, Sustaining Today's Artists, is supported in part by grants from The Ford Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts.

Conference

I just wanted to thank you for making a newcomer to your conference feel so welcome. I also wanted to congratulate you on such an organized, content- and experience-filled conference … with sessions and conversations that left me truly inspired and energized!
–2008 Conference attendee