Today we’d like to introduce you to Allan DiCastro.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Allan. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there. In 2004, Art + Practice started as a discussion between philanthropist and collector Eileen Harris Norton, artist Mark Bradford and myself. We wanted to establish an exhibition space in South LA where the community could experience free museum-curated contemporary art. We also wanted to support a local population in need. It took us a while to decide upon what population we’d support. Through research, we decided to address the needs of transition-aged foster youth living in South Los Angeles.
The overarching goals have always been about exposure and access.
Has it been a smooth road? One of the struggles is that we’ve had to switch gears and adapt a few times to the lessons learned along the way. For instance, we initially planned to host A+P’s foster youth programs in a small, fairly public storefront in Leimert Park, but as we became more educated as to the size of the foster care issue in Los Angeles County, A+P established the program in a larger, more private space. Similarly, we had also envisioned a smaller exhibition space, but when presented with the opportunity to purchase another building, we decided to expand the exhibition space into a new space, on W. 43rd Place and Degnan Boulevard, which opened in November 2016.
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