Side Street Projects

Artists @ Work
Serving artists, youth, and community since 1992

Founded in 1992 by Karen Atkinson and Joe Luttrell, Side Street Projects is an artist-run organization that helps visual artists negotiate the baffling terrain of the contemporary art world. Our mission is to give artists of all ages the ability and the means to support their creative endeavors. Simply put: we help artists, and we do so with a wide array of unusual programs and practical services that help artists roll up their sleeves and do things themselves. These values of self-reliance, sustainability, and survival permeate all aspects of our programs and facilities.

We are a mid-sized nonprofit with a full-time staff of 3. Each year, more than 1,000 children age 5-11 participate in our renowned Woodworking Bus program, which teaches kids how to use tools and create unique objects out of wood. For the grown-ups, we provide a host of practical support services designed to meet the needs of working artists, directly serving over 400 adult artists each year.

Although we provide services to kids and artists all over LA County, we make a special effort to show our love for our adopted hometown of Pasadena... especially Northwest Pasadena, which is where we've been headquartered since November of 2001. In fact, in just the past 4 years alone, Side Street Projects has:

Taught over 1,160 Pasadena children at 15 PUSD elementary schools aboard our Woodworking Buses. 63% of these children participated at no cost thanks to support of the Pasadena Art Alliance, The Tournament of Roses Foundation, and the City of Pasadena Cultural Affairs Department. This represents over $60,000 in donated, long-term workshops at 10 PUSD schools in Northwest Pasadena.
Helped over 330 Pasadena-based artists with our Equipment Rental Co-Op and Career Survival Workshops for adult artists. 66% of the artists who won an individual artists’ grant from Pasadena Cultural Affairs Department in 2007 were alumni of our programs.

Donated in excess of $58,000 in equipment rentals, media support services, and technical expertise to Pasadena's cultural institutions and charitable organizations in support of local exhibitions and fundraising events.

We are currently in-residence at 730 North Fair Oaks Avenue in our new mobile headquarters: a pair of solar-powered vintage travel trailers originally built by J. Paul Getty (seriously). For complete details about this exciting public art experiment, please visit our trailer page.

» Staff & Administration

Otoño Luján
Executive Director
otono@sidestreet.org

Jon Lapointe
Creative Director
jon@sidestreet.org

Emily Hopkins
Education Director
emily@sidestreet.org

Ed Stevens Alternate Routes Teacher		Joey Stuckleman Head Teacher - Admin Guy

Kelly Austin Alternate Routes Teacher		Lauren Kroiz Office Manager

Bin Zhang Alternate Routes Teacher		Robert Parra Alternate Routes Teacher

Joseph Kohnke Alternate Routes Teacher		Caity Ballister VADA Intern

» Board of Directors for 07/08
Jose Caballer (Chair) Creative Director & CEO, The_Groop	Maite Zabala (Treasurer) Nonprofit Consultant, Past-Chair
D. Jean Hester Artist	Bari Zipperstein Artist
Denise Seider Artist, Arts Consultant	Lorraine Molina Director, Bank Gallery
Karen Atkinson Artist, Entrepreneur, CalArts Faculty	Sally Bickerton (Secretary) Dir. of Individual Giving, The Armory Center for the Arts
Dianne Magee Attorney (Retired), Distinguished Community Leader	Janine Perron Asso. Dir. of Development, The Hammer Museum
Jon Schnitzer AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals

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> Support Our Programs

We do a lot of good on a modest budget with only 3 full-time employees. How do we do it? We love this job, and we have help from people like you... that's how. Click the link below to support our programs with your tax deductible gift.

> Benefits of Membership

There's lots of art organizations in this town, but how many bend over backwards to help the most important members of a vibrant arts community... namely, the artists themselves? Side Street Projects does, that's who! Help support Side Street's programs and get some cool rewards, too.