María Fernanda Ortiz

As one of New York City’s oldest nonprofit alternative art centers, The Kitchen is dedicated to offering emerging and established artists opportunities to create and present new work within, and across, the disciplines of dance, music, theater, visual art, and literature. Recognizing its longstanding legacy for innovation, The Kitchen remains devoted to fostering a community of artists and audiences, offering artists the opportunity to make—and for audiences to engage with—work that pushes the boundaries of artistic disciplines and strengthens meaningful dialogues between the arts and larger culture. Founded as an artist collective in 1971 by Woody and Steina Vasulka and incorporated as a nonprofit two years later, The Kitchen was among the first American institutions to embrace the emerging fields of video and performance, while presenting visionary new work in established disciplines such as dance, music, literature, and film. This unique combination generated an environment immediately conducive to groundbreaking explorations, helping launch the careers of many artists who have defined the American avant-garde, including Laurie Anderson, Charles Atlas, Lucinda Childs, Bill T. Jones, Robert Longo, Robert Mapplethorpe, Cindy Sherman, Kiki Smith, and Elizabeth Streb, among many others. Today, The Kitchen is an internationally-acclaimed institution supporting artists from every area of culture in the effort to create an art for our time.