Alternative Arts of Long Island

Committed to showing the world Long Island's real artistic community. Check out Long Island's latest in original art and music through our gallery ! See what Long Island has to offer in entertainment and related industries in the market ! Or, check out what's new or read user-submitted reviews !
Where Did It All Begin?
Back in the summer of 1997, in a studio apartment above Three Village Automotive in East Setauket, a group of artists, writers, and musicians met to conceptualize an effective entity that would promote unique Long Island talent. We decided at that meeting that we would fan out and find more Long Island based artists, musicians, and writers, and to see what kind of interest we could stir up.
After about a week, it was pretty evident that we were on the right track. A number of artists were very interested in getting involved, and a local newspaper approached us about creating a magazine.
We had a number of meetings to cultivate content for our magazine and a lot of interesting and exciting ideas came out of those meetings, but unfortunately the timing was just not right.
Due to pending career decisions, academic pursuits, and a lack of experience, we decided to wait; but one thing that all of us came away with is this: the tools to create a promotional vehicle for the alternative arts of Long Island is out there.
Eight years later in 2004, during Thanksgiving weekend, two of the original collaborators from those meetings, Tord Johnson and Eric Hurnyak , got together with our long-time friend Dane Kurz to have a few drinks.
At some point in the night, we began discussing the ideas that we had at the studio apartment in East Setauket years ago. Based on that discussion, we decided that the timing and the chemistry was right to finally pursue what is now the Alternative Arts of Long Island.