The Philadelphia Live Arts Festival and Philly Fringe is an internationally recognized presenter of performing arts.

We support the work of a broad array of performing artists from Philadelphia and around the world by producing two concurrent sixteen-day festivals each September in venues throughout Philadelphia. The 14th annual Philadelphia Live Arts Festival and Philly Fringe will take place from September 3 -18, 2010.

A collection of the world’s best contemporary performing artists energize Philadelphia audiences each year during the Philadelphia Live Arts Festival. Selected by Nick Stuccio, the Festival’s Producing Director, about half of these artists are based in Philadelphia, while others come in from across the globe. In 2010, 15 Live Arts Festival shows will be presented.

The mission of the Philadelphia Live Arts Festival is to commission, develop, and present a wide range of the latest cutting-edge, high-quality performance.

Through this, we seek to:

• Present audiences with high-quality work that entertains, challenges, and stimulates.
• Support Philadelphia-based, regional, national, and international artists who create this work.
• Showcase Philadelphia-based artists alongside their international peers.
• Provide workshops for diverse audiences and aspiring local artists to encourage the growth and continued health of the local and regional performing arts community.
• Create a festival that engages fully in the global dialogue about contemporary performance and that solidifies Philadelphia as a performing arts destination.

Philly Fringe is an unfiltered festival, where new and established artists present their work free of a selection process. For some it’s a once-a-year, or once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to create a show; for professional companies, it can be an opportunity to try something new and join in the fray. It's come one, come all! In 2009, 185 Philly Fringe shows were self-produced by artists from throughout the region.
How many artists will participate in 2010 will be known in May!

The mission of the Philly Fringe is to provide an opportunity and a platform for Philadelphia-based artists to produce their work.

Through this we seek to:

• Create a cityscape filled with theater, dance, music, and everything in between for audiences to enjoy.
• Encourage artists to give expression to and develop their talents and artistic visions in total artistic freedom without any curatorial barriers in bringing that work to an audience.
• Help artists become successful independent producers.
• Ensure the growth and continued health of the local and regional performing arts community.

The Live Arts Brewery (LAB) is a laboratory for research and development. The LAB operates year-round to support artistic research, experimentation, and exploration of contemporary theater, dance, and cross-genre live performance work. The LAB provides artists with a state-of-the-art studio facility at the Live Arts Studio in Northern Liberties.

The mission of the LAB is to expand and enhance the Festival's mission to support the development of new work by selected local artists, while also providing the organization with a year-round presence in the cultural landscape of Philadelphia.

Through this we seek to:

• Maintain a LAB Fellowship program dedicated to directly supporting dance and theater artists in the process of researching and developing new work in a supportive and highly resourced environment.
• Provide additional ongoing programming, including workshop showings, lectures and demonstrations, master classes, and community gatherings.
• Create a dialogue among artists and the public to enrich the performing arts community.