MISSION
Available Potential Enterprises, Ltd (A.P.E.) is an artist-led, artist-centered non-profit organization supporting contemporary artists working in all disciplines by stewarding the spaces in which they create, perform and exhibit their work. A.P.E is dedicated to fostering relationships, encounters, and exchanges that nourish the capacity for imagination.
CORE VALUES
“Being responsible for creating the future, it is important that we keep alive our capacity to imagine what that might be lest we continue to recreate the present.”
- Gordon Thorne; A.P.E. Founder
- Gordon Thorne; A.P.E. Founder
SPACE STEWARDSHIP
A.P.E. is committed to keeping its spaces affordable and accessible to artists, fueled by the understanding that space, time, and protection from economic pressure are critical for the realization of creative work. A.P.E. currently stewards two spaces—the Gallery at 126 Main Street (since 2008) and the Workroom at 33 Hawley Street (since 2018)—in which we honor time and space for creative process, including fallow time.
A.P.E. regards space stewardship as a responsive and creative practice of tending to that with which we have been entrusted, with an understanding that spaces are made and shaped by the activities that happen within them. Our work is to ensure there are places for artists to do their work and programs through which multiple perspectives, interconnection, and imaginative activity can occur and thrive.
THE WORK OF ART/THE WORK OF ARTISTS
As an artist-founded, artist-led, and artist-centered organization, A.P.E. embraces the role of creative process as vital to the well-being of individuals and communities. We trust the work of artists in society, and value the ways artistic inquiry can help us ask questions, become responsive to the needs of the moment, catalyze political and social change, alter the terms of our perception, and venture into the often-avoided realms of the uncertain and unknown. A.P.E. centers creative process, artistic inquiry, development of new work, and art as catalyst for cultural conversation.
Each of the staff members at A.P.E. maintains an active creative practice, balancing administrative duties with ongoing artistic labor and collaborations. We engage in the running of A.P.E. with a creative process lens.
COMMUNITY and CULTURAL IMPACT
A.P.E. recognizes its role in shaping the culture and conversation of the local and regional community in relationship to the interconnected networks of artists, makers, organizations, and institutions that exist in the geographic region of the Connecticut River Valley. We trust the abundant wisdom, inquisitiveness, and perceptual capacity of our community, and seek out collaborations and alliances that enrich this artistic ecosystem and offer us opportunities to grow and learn in the company of each other.
Equally important to the artwork that appears on and within A.P.E’s walls is the fostering of these spaces as sites for people with a diversity of interests, practices, and cultural identities to encounter one another, be in dialogue, and find meaning in those encounters. Towards this, A.P.E. has developed the Workroom Cooperative, a program that expands the activation of the Workroom at 33 Hawley through offering “space/curation shares” to local artists / arts organizations.
PARTNERSHIPS
A.P.E. values its active partnerships with the Northampton Community Arts Trust, 33 Hawley, and our building partners at 33 Hawley: the Northampton Center for the Arts and Northampton Open Media. A.P.E. also shares a long history of partnership with the School for Contemporary Dance and Thought, Serious Play Theatre Ensemble, No Theater, Anchor House for Artists, Historic Northampton, and Cellblock Visions. Additionally, A.P.E. partners with local artists and arts organizations through our fiscal sponsorships program, supporting access to grants and funding through our 501(c)3 status.
EQUITY, DIVERSITY, JUSTICE
A.P.E is committed to ongoing action for racial and social justice within its staff, boards, space access, stewardship, and programming. We seek increased understanding of our positions, individually and organizationally, in relationship to the interlocking oppressive systems of white supremacy, patriarchy, capitalism, and ableism. We are committed to transparency in A.P.E’s operational structure, curatorial practices, and programming, and seek to be responsive and adaptive to the challenges of the present, and to artists' changing and evolving needs.
A.P.E. is committed to keeping its spaces affordable and accessible to artists, fueled by the understanding that space, time, and protection from economic pressure are critical for the realization of creative work. A.P.E. currently stewards two spaces—the Gallery at 126 Main Street (since 2008) and the Workroom at 33 Hawley Street (since 2018)—in which we honor time and space for creative process, including fallow time.
A.P.E. regards space stewardship as a responsive and creative practice of tending to that with which we have been entrusted, with an understanding that spaces are made and shaped by the activities that happen within them. Our work is to ensure there are places for artists to do their work and programs through which multiple perspectives, interconnection, and imaginative activity can occur and thrive.
THE WORK OF ART/THE WORK OF ARTISTS
As an artist-founded, artist-led, and artist-centered organization, A.P.E. embraces the role of creative process as vital to the well-being of individuals and communities. We trust the work of artists in society, and value the ways artistic inquiry can help us ask questions, become responsive to the needs of the moment, catalyze political and social change, alter the terms of our perception, and venture into the often-avoided realms of the uncertain and unknown. A.P.E. centers creative process, artistic inquiry, development of new work, and art as catalyst for cultural conversation.
Each of the staff members at A.P.E. maintains an active creative practice, balancing administrative duties with ongoing artistic labor and collaborations. We engage in the running of A.P.E. with a creative process lens.
COMMUNITY and CULTURAL IMPACT
A.P.E. recognizes its role in shaping the culture and conversation of the local and regional community in relationship to the interconnected networks of artists, makers, organizations, and institutions that exist in the geographic region of the Connecticut River Valley. We trust the abundant wisdom, inquisitiveness, and perceptual capacity of our community, and seek out collaborations and alliances that enrich this artistic ecosystem and offer us opportunities to grow and learn in the company of each other.
Equally important to the artwork that appears on and within A.P.E’s walls is the fostering of these spaces as sites for people with a diversity of interests, practices, and cultural identities to encounter one another, be in dialogue, and find meaning in those encounters. Towards this, A.P.E. has developed the Workroom Cooperative, a program that expands the activation of the Workroom at 33 Hawley through offering “space/curation shares” to local artists / arts organizations.
PARTNERSHIPS
A.P.E. values its active partnerships with the Northampton Community Arts Trust, 33 Hawley, and our building partners at 33 Hawley: the Northampton Center for the Arts and Northampton Open Media. A.P.E. also shares a long history of partnership with the School for Contemporary Dance and Thought, Serious Play Theatre Ensemble, No Theater, Anchor House for Artists, Historic Northampton, and Cellblock Visions. Additionally, A.P.E. partners with local artists and arts organizations through our fiscal sponsorships program, supporting access to grants and funding through our 501(c)3 status.
EQUITY, DIVERSITY, JUSTICE
A.P.E is committed to ongoing action for racial and social justice within its staff, boards, space access, stewardship, and programming. We seek increased understanding of our positions, individually and organizationally, in relationship to the interlocking oppressive systems of white supremacy, patriarchy, capitalism, and ableism. We are committed to transparency in A.P.E’s operational structure, curatorial practices, and programming, and seek to be responsive and adaptive to the challenges of the present, and to artists' changing and evolving needs.