What is our mission?
Allied Productions, Inc. is a not-for-profit arts umbrella organization founded in 1980. We are an entirely artist-run multi-purpose entity that fosters community building through the collective process. We present, produce, and sponsor all areas of the arts, including the activities of individuals, groups, and organizations. Allied is a vital resource for many projects and helps locate funds, materials and production space for underserved and marginalized communities.
In the past, Allied helped give a start to pioneering non-profits like ABC No Rio. In the past two decades, our main project has been the development and maintenance of Le Petit Versailles Community Garden (LPV). Founded in 1995 as part of NYC’s Greenthumb Community Gardens, Allied invested years of work to transform what was formerly an abandoned lot left in the wake of a demolished auto body chop shop into an extraordinary community garden and multipurpose arts space. LPV is a focal point for artists and community members enhancing the public spaces of our neighborhood, Manhattan’s Lower East Side. Since its founding, Le Petit Versailles has been home to countless art exhibitions, performances, readings, film screenings, and more.
Allied Productions facilitates community and communication between many different artists and organizations. Among our ongoing New York City organizational associates are The Film Makers Cooperative, Mix NYC, ABC No Rio, Rain Forest Relief, Gartenberg Media Enterprises, Inbred Hybrid Collective, and AIDS Data Treatment Network. Out-of-town affiliates include The Uptown Entertainment and Development Corporation (Philadelphia), Parasol Project (Tucson), and Frise Art Collective (Hamburg, Germany).
What do we do?
Public Services
Le Petit Versailles is a vibrant community garden, performance space, music venue and public forum for workshops, screenings and exhibitions.
Services to Artists
Allied works closely with The Department of Cultural Affairs and Materials For the Arts to facilitate donations of art supplies to groups and individual artists for public projects, performances and artworks. Allied facilitates work space for prop and set building, and provides training, experience, job referrals and career counseling for artists and art professionals.
Services to the Arts
Other services provided by Allied Productions include project planning, archival and appraisal expertise, and grant consultation to artist groups. In a landscape where cultural services to the underserved are ever decreasing, Allied provides a much needed resource for creative expression.
Archives
The Allied Productions Archival project presents, collects and conserves important media and other art works relevant to the LGBT community, including but not limited to the AIDS crisis. Allied Productions’ Archival Project began with preserving and exhibiting the works of co-founder Gordon Stokes Kurtti, who died in 1987 of AIDS-related illnesses. Allied continues to consult the ABC No Rio permanent collection – a collection of artworks from the world-renowned, seminal 1980s East Village art scene.
Who is our community?
Allied Productions is the real New York. We are based on the city’s Lower East Side. With the international vision that this community has long epitomized we reflect our neighborhood’s vibrant multi-cultural fabric, fomenting innovation through diversity, embracing change and growth while cherishing the traditions of the many cultures we represent.
Allied started at the peak of international urban blight. In the wake of White Flight many only saw the desolation caused by government neglect. We saw opportunity - we joined the highly constructive, creative multiculture that re-greened then empty rubble-filled lots. We mobilized professional artists as instructors and mentors to address the strained resources of the local public schools and settlement houses.
Our influence on contemporary arts and culture is informed by our presence in the vibrant scenes of alternative nightlife, radical fashion, and social critique that sustains the heart and soul of fine art and theater industry. We mentor and develop new talent by imbuing advanced and radical ideas of what art should and can be.
Issues concerning women and the LGBTQ communities have long been our focus, as are our concerns for the well-being and creative development of youth, particularly Queer youth of color.