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Gayle Isa '93 Fights to Save Asian Arts Initiative in Philadelphia

Gayle Isa '93 Fights to Save
Asian Arts Initiative in Philadelphia

by Alisa Giardinelli
3/09/2009

Gayle Isa '93/>

Gayle Isa '93

 

Gayle Isa '93, executive director of the  Asian Arts Initiative (AIA) in Philadelphia, is fighting for the community-based arts center's survival. As described in the Philadelphia Inquirer, Isa has been working to secure a new, permanent home for the AIA since it was forced to vacate its headquarters just west of Chinatown two years ago to make way for the expansion of the Pennsylvania Convention Center. more

Finding and securing a new location, while also keeping the organization's many programs going, has been a constant struggle - now made all the more urgent by the upcoming September deadline to raise the remaining funds needed to guarantee the purchase of a new space. The promise of 2 1/2 stories that include an art gallery, a 72-seat theater, and a media lab is tantalizingly close.

"You can see the pride in the kids when they walk in a space like this," Isa says. "It inspires them to aspire."