APPLICATION GUIDELINES
The application deadline has passed. To ask to see if you qualify to apply late, please contact isabel at draves dot org.
Creative Tech Week features the best work being done in Creative Technology today. For more general information about the event week and to avoid confusion, check out what went on at our past festivals and read our FAQ.
CTW is May 9-19, 2019 in multiple venues all around New York City. Our CWT2019 Conference will be held in conjunction with our founding partner, the New York Institute of Technology, at the NYIT Auditorium on Broadway on May 10-11, 2019.
When is Creative Tech Week 2019?
Why join us?
We’ve gathered a professional and artistic community of the top creative technologists in the world and surrounded them with the people who need to know about them and their work. We invite you to join us on our stages and in our audiences to discover new things and meet your next partners and colleagues.
Creative Technology is the use of emerging technologies as a medium in creative endeavors. Whether you’re using new technologies to market ideas, to make fascinating projects and products, to shape immersive experiences, or to make media, art, music, fashion, performance, or film, we welcome you. Think in terms of artificial intelligence, digital art, virtual reality, user experiences, 3D-printed architecture, LED fabric, algorithmic visuals, or music made with custom electronics. Wherever a new technology is influencing what our creative endeavors are made from – that’s creative tech.
At our festival, we also cover the use of emerging technology as it applies to creative pursuits, and artistic explorations of new technologies. How AI is being used in media and consumer experiences. How the blockchain will enable artists to track or market their work. Art that explores privacy and surveillance, EEG data that drives visuals or music, are all fair game. Our events include whatever you decide: Consider hackathons, fashion shows, performances, talks, panels, conferences, open houses, gallery and museum shows, workshops, labs, hands-demos, parties, and product launches. Bring it on!
What is it?
Our Place or Yours? (Where Should I Hold My Event?)
Our hubs will have room for panels, talks, performances, workshops, booths, and some showcasing of works. We reserve the right to charge larger companies to participate. You may either use these spaces, if accepted, or hold a wonderful event in your own or third party space. We have limited ability to show original visual art at our headquarters.
CTW is a crowdsourced festival. You produce and market your event, talk, show or workshop at your own expense. Our stages come with standard laptop projection and audio for spoken presentations. Stage requirements beyond that are the responsibility of the participating entity (you!) to organize and finance. Events at satellite locations (your own locations) are 100% your responsibility.
Production Expectations
Can CTW Fund My Art or Project?
Nope. If you’re an artist who wishes to mount an installation or have your project or product launch on display during Creative Tech Week, your show or installation location should already be confirmed or in process of being confirmed when you submit your event to us. Your work should be funded or in process of being funded. With some exceptions, we cannot provide space to show your work, nor do we provide funding.
Yes! You are welcome to submit to give a solo talk on our stage and also show your work at a gallery, or be on a panel and also hold an open house at your agency, or teach a workshop and perform on stage. In fact, we hope you do. Just use the event form to submit as many events as you like.
Can I hold 2 events?
What about Finances?
Creative Tech Week follows the principle of “Every Barrel on Its Own Bottom”. We do not pay experts to participate. With hundreds of events, all our organizers are responsible for funding their own sessions, installations, performances and marketing. You will work out financial details with your venue yourself before committing to your venue.
You are. You are in charge of submitting materials to us at the right times and before our deadlines to make sure you are included in our calendar of events and program. You are in charge of taking the materials we provide to market your event. You are in charge of getting audience to your event. You are in charge of making sure you have your space reserved, whether it is ours or yours. You are in charge of making sure your talk is prepared, your panelists show up, your costume is clean, your batteries hold a charge, your AV techs understand your program needs, everything. You are in charge of making sure you leave the venue the way you found it, with no damage and no trash. Creative Tech Week is a crowdsourced festival.
Who is in charge of My Event?
What Will Be Done to Market My Event?
Attendance at your event is your own responsibility. We will publicize your event, and hopefully give you a boost, but you’ll need to promote it to your fans. As a confirmed partner in Creative Tech Week, your event will be featured on our event week calendar and attendees will be able to buy tickets to your event through our website (you’ll keep your own ticket revenues). We consider it part of our role to make sure people show up to your event, but it never stops being your responsibility to make sure people show up to whatever you organize.
As soon as you are a confirmed partner, we will begin marketing your event through our social media channels and blog. We plan to interview partners for our blog, and you are free to submit articles and videos or send us tweets and Facebook posts. We’ll have PR for partner organizations, for the event week itself.
As soon as you are a confirmed partner, we will begin marketing your event through our social media channels and blog. We plan to interview partners for our blog, and you are free to submit articles and videos or send us tweets and Facebook posts. We’ll have PR for partner organizations, for the event week itself.
What Can I Do To Promote Creative Tech Week?
Glad you asked. We’ll send you marketing materials! The thing that makes Creative Tech Week work from a marketing standpoint is the fact that each of our partners has their own member list and social media campaigns, and we ask each of our partners to promote the whole as they promote their own part. When people come to our site to learn about one partner’s event, they will see every partner’s event listed there.
You may use whatever ticket service you want – Eventbrite, Brown Paper Tickets, your choice. You are in charge of listing your own event, selling your own tickets, collecting and keeping your own income. Just give us the URL for your ticket sales and we’ll put it on your event listing in our calendar
What is the Protocol when Organizers Sell Tickets for their Own Events?
How Does Scheduling Work?
Keep in mind that there will be competition over CTW audiences for certain time slots during the week, and other time slots will have our audiences looking for something to do. Your flexibility in providing multiple possible time slots and allowing us to help schedule your event at the right time is appreciated. We reserve the right to change the schedule at our Headquarters.
With hundreds of events all over the city, organizers will have to arrange for this themselves to be videotaped and photographed if they want to be sure their event will make it onto our social media channels. Be sure to budget for photography and video capture and editing when you plan your event expenses.
Will you video my event?
Can I edit my event submission once it is accepted? What if one of my panelists cancels, or my location changes?
Once your event has been accepted as part of Creative Technology Week, we consider you committed and we’re super excited! You will be permitted to edit your program description and other profile details until our drop-dead final edit deadline, April 15. After April 15, there is a $15 change fee per calendar edit.