FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Some of our events are ticketed but most are not. Admission is typically paid at the door.

Be sure to check our Events page for details on your specific event. For events that do require a ticket, the link to purchase will be located there.

Our events are All Ages unless stated otherwise. We feel it’s very important for younger people to take part in art & culture events.

We encourage picture taking for promotional purposes only, no sale of photos is allowed. All photoshoots MUST be approved by our team in advance.

Be sure to tag the Alternative Gallery in your photos!

We encourage you to reach out to talk about your event!

Please submit details for your event here:

Event Submission

We typically do not serve food during events so we recommend eating before your visit.

We have several small restaurants and businesses in our neighborhood to check out. We also encourage you to explore 7th Street, where many of our favorite restaurants are located, as well as Downtown Allentown.

There are several great hotels in the area but we recommend the Americus Hotel, a 100-year old historic hotel which is on the National Register of Historic Places!

Americus Hotel

Our building is located in a residential neighborhood so we’re very mindful of our neighbors. We try to have all amplified music done by 10 PM on weeknights and 11 PM on weekends.

We ask that anyone hosting or attending an event with us help to ensure we’re a good neighbor to our community!

There is a coat rack at the front check-in, which is free to use.

Parking for our events is mostly limited to street parking. We encourage all attendees to carpool or take a rideshare whenever possible.

There are several parking garages in the Hamilton District, which is about a 10-15 minute walk from our building or a short trip via a rideshare service such as Uber or Lyft.

All monetary donations are used to help support the ongoing efforts of the Alternative Gallery. This includes our operational expenses, equipment costs & funding to keep many of our events Free to the public.

We’re always on the lookout for old electronics, art supplies & media of all types!

Check out our Donations page with in-depth info.

All donations must be dropped off at the Alternative Gallery. We can only pick items up under special circumstances.

Please schedule a drop off with the gallery to ensure we’re around to take your item(s). Please email us with the word DONATION in the subject line.

Contact@TheAlternativeGallery.com

Please contact us to set-up an appointment to view our studios.

Contact@TheAlternativeGallery.com

The studios in our building are designed for visual art only. Due to the nature of the open studios they’re not suitable for live music or sound recording of any type.

The best uses for our studios would be painters, photographers, illustrators, writers, film editors, sculptors, fashion designers, & animators.

Loud sounds such as power tools can be very distracting to other artists so we try to avoid having that in our studios.

We recognize that having an artist studio can be more of a luxury than a necessity, due to the cost. We work to make our studios affordable for independent artists.

Having a studio in our building allows you to be part of a thriving artist community and have on-site access to a fine art print shop, art supply store, art shipping services & more, as well access to information and a team of experienced artists to help you navigate a career in art.

We have a wide range of events and projects here at the Alternative Gallery and we’re always looking to bring on new people to collaborate!

Some of our projects require general volunteers, like ArtsFest, other projects require specialized skills, like running sound at a show.

Stop by the gallery or contact us to have a discussion about how we might be able to work together!

The Alternative Gallery is a small grassroots organization that is run 100% through the efforts of volunteers. We’re a federally recognized 501c3 non-profit organization and we offer accredited & non-accredited internships as well as volunteer opportunities.

Being that the work of the Alternative Gallery is so diverse, we seek a wide-range of skills: marketing, grant writing, teaching, gardening, event planning, even media preservation.

Please check our listings of specific projects we’re seeking help on:

Volunteer Opportunities

Our general classes are for children aged 6-12.

There are a wide-range of projects in our classes, including; paper making, illustration, mixed media, cultural studies, upcycling, slime-making & more!

Unless specifically noted, all of our children’s art & education classes are free for everyone.

Donations are always welcome but it’s not a condition to take part in our classes. We believe in making these classes as accessible as possible.

Our children’s art classes are typically held every Saturday Noon-1:30 PM at the Alternative Gallery.

There are also special classes, workshops & even after school programs from time to time.

Our classes are a drop-in basis, so children can attend class as often or infrequently as their schedule allows.

Please check our Class Schedule for updated information.

We supply everything for students from art supplies, materials & even a smock!

All they need to bring is their imagination!

The classes at the Alternative Gallery are taught by a group of teaching artists, headed by our Director of Education, Monica Salazar.

Monica Salazar, also known as The Blue Bee Art Studio, is a Lehigh Valley Visual Mixed Media Artist based in South Allentown. Born in Quito, Ecuador, she moved to the USA 15 years ago. Salazar works in a variety of different styles, mediums and series. The size of her work varies, in the last two years she has been creating a variety of murals for various organizations that provide education for young people.

ArtsFest is typically held in September at Cedar Beach Park in Allentown. The pandemic has made it much more difficult to host large events of this scale, but every year we work to bring you an ArtsFest event!

Check the ArtsFest page for announcements and updates.

Anyone is welcome to submit to be considered for a vendor at ArtsFest.

Please submit here.

Anyone is welcome to submit to be considered for a performance at ArtsFest.

Please submit here.

ArtsFest relies on community donations & sponsorships in order to be able to host the festival each year.

It’s very important for us to keep the festival admission free so everyone can take part in it.

Please consider being a donor or sponsor of ArtsFest.

ArtsFest is completely admission free! All events within ArtsFest are free!

We do this so everyone can attend the festival. It also means there’s more money going around to support all those amazing vendors!

All parking is free at the festival grounds!

But the event typically sees a large attendance in the thousands which quickly takes up all immediate parking in the on-site lots.

A recommended parking alternative would to be utilize one of the parking garages on Hamilton Street, and either walk or hop the bus down the street to Cedar Beach Park.

You never know what you’re going to stumble upon at ArtsFest, from live painting, breakdancing, sideshow acts, interactive areas, tech demos, and not to mention all sorts of different musical styles!

ArtsFest is a perfect event to take your whole family to!

There’s a large children’s art area that works as an extension of the existing playground. While some of the performances many not be of interest to the kids, there’s always something happening to catch their attention!