Mission
Arts for LA builds a thriving and equitable arts, culture, and entertainment ecosystem in Los Angeles County through advocacy, direct services, connecting communities, and building power.
OUR VISION: an abundant and just Los Angeles County where:
Arts, culture, and entertainment are valued.
Resources are equitably shared.
Creative workers and artists thrive.
All people benefit from the arts.
Arts and culture are deeply woven into the fabric of life.
VALUES
Arts for LA believes that arts, culture, and creativity are essential to personal and collective well-being and to the evolution of a just society. Los Angeles County’s artistic and cultural diversity is central to its identity, prosperity, and influence. Sustaining this ecosystem requires social conditions and financial investment commensurate with its contributions and with LA’s branding as the world’s creative capital. This only happens through strong advocacy, effective policy development, and a civically engaged creative sector. Los Angeles County thrives only when its arts, culture, and entertainment ecosystem prospers. People thrive when there is boundless participation in the arts.
We Prioritize People. Artists and creative workers are at the heart of LA’s arts, culture, and entertainment ecosystem, and we put people and their well-being first in our decision making, programming, and advocacy.
As we acknowledge historic and current systemic inequities, we respect the equality of each person’s voice and lived experience.
We Build Power. We believe in building power with LA’s arts and cultural communities through actions that develop and sustain emerging and legacy leaders, forge coalitions and collaborations, provide needed services, and create inclusive spaces for the community to connect, convene, share, and mobilize.
Communities are stronger when united, and we value our role as the region’s only cross-discipline, cross-sector voice for the arts.
We Advance Cultural Equity. We are guided by policies and practices that eliminate barriers to full participation in LA’s culture, arts, and public life – and particularly for those who are most impacted by systemic discrimination and inequities.
We work to ensure artists, cultural bearers, and creative workers are valued and have the power to shape the development of arts policy, the equitable distribution of resources, and the stewardship of accessible and sustainable arts spaces.
WHO WE ARE
Arts for LA is the civic home for Los Angeles County's creative ecosystem. Our role is to organize with people, influence policy, build leadership, and transform the conditions where creativity can flourish.
We believe arts, culture, and entertainment are not luxuries - they are public infrastructure that shape economic vitality, community belonging, civic participation, education, health, and democracy.
When creative workers thrive, Los Angeles thrives.
OUR STORY
Arts for LA, a non-profit 501(c)3 organization, was incorporated in 2006 by a group of arts leaders who had met informally for years to discuss and address the region’s most pressing arts issues. Since that time, Arts for LA has expanded its reach and deepened its roots in neighborhoods and school districts across Los Angeles County.
During its second decade of existence, Arts for LA began providing opportunities in leadership development. This initiative sparked growing networks of civically-engaged advocates, built deep relationships with elected officials, and worked in partnership across sectors to make Los Angeles a vibrant, prosperous, creative, and healthy society.
Recognizing a sector in need of help, Arts for LA launched its Creative Jobs Collective (CJC) in 2021 to address a need for a just recovery plan for the arts and cultural sector. It is imperative that we invest in the creative workers who make LA the creative capital of the world. Our CJC Employer Toolkit (released in 2026) is a first-of-its kind resource in LA County that provides recommendations for hiring and employment practices in the creative economy. This cross-sectoral initiative is working to build 10,000 living wage creative jobs in LA County by 2030.
No matter what the challenge, the arts and culture sector has maintained its footing in the region with creativity, adaptability, and unity. Arts for LA seeks to uphold all of those aspects for the next chapter of arts advocacy with its new (2026) Mission, Vision and Values that focus its efforts on Building Power Where Creativity Lives.
Learn more in our 20th anniversary reflection.
Our Movement
Arts for LA is Los Angeles County’s leading arts advocacy and power-building organization, bringing together artists, creative workers, cultural organizations, policymakers, funders and communities to participate, lead, and thrive in building an equitable creative ecosystem.
Arts for LA Equity Statement
Arts for LA recognizes that our society is challenged to overcome a complex web of inequities – racism, sexism, homophobia, classism, ageism, and ableism among them. All of these forms of discrimination are powerful drivers of unequal individual and group outcomes.
Recognizing that achieving cultural equity is one of today’s most pressing issues, and that advancing equity through a cultural lens will have a significant positive impact on challenging discrimination-based injustices, Arts for LA affirms working for cultural equity in the LA County Arts Sector as one of our organizational priorities.
