The Mistake Room (TMR) is an independent non-profit space and global-reaching platform for art, culture, and ideas. We transform how art and other forms of creative expression are made; broaden who gets to make and experience them; and re-imagine where and how we encounter them.

We believe that mistakes disrupt the way things are and that the discomforts they cause show us new ways of existing in the world. That is why our work challenges what we have come to expect from encounters with and in spaces like ours. What drives us is a deep commitment to making the arts more equitable, so that meaningful and dignified participation is possible for others like us and the ones that will come after.


Founded in 2014, TMR works with artists, thinkers, and makers from around the globe to commission new works and projects; develop and present research-driven exhibitions; facilitate the creation of ideas through discursive initiatives; and organize moments and events that enrich what we know about art and culture.

Our program happens in a renovated industrial warehouse space at the southernmost edge of Downtown LA as well as in other venues around the city and the world. This allows us to connect Los Angeles to peoples, places, and histories well beyond its confines.

To advance our work we devise innovative support structures that respond to the inequities that too often determine who gets to make culture and for who. In challenging and expanding the function of the non-profit model we hope to boldly redefine what an independent art space can be.

Named after a performance that proposed mistakes as generative moments, we believe mistakes are ruptures of the status quo and that the discomforts we feel when we make them are but new ways of being and knowing. That is why we embrace what others deem unconventional and champion those who inspire us to think about art and culture in radical ways.

Team

César García-Alvarez
Executive & Artistic Director

Jorge (Yuka) Vallejo
Admin & Operations Coordinator

Nicolas Orozco-Valdivia
Curator at Large

PUBLIC RELATIONS:
Evolutionary Media Group

Board of Directors

Dr. V. Joy Simmons, Chair
Tina Perry-Whitney, Vice Chair
Aryn Drake-Lee, Secretary
César García-Alvarez, Executive & Artistic Director
Kaeli Deane
Jennifer Gross
Roberto Hemuda
Oscar Murillo
Analia Saban
Eduardo Sarabia
Jose Noe Suro

Mistake Room original concept co-creators: Derek DelGaudio & Glenn Kaino.

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