General Accessibility Statement

Accessibility

The ArtsEverywhere Festival is committed to supporting your access needs to the greatest extent of our capacity. When we refer to “access,” we mean much more than just physical accessibility to the venues and spaces where we gather. We strive to offer access to the festival in terms of:

• physical comfort and accommodation for specific needs (e.g. type of chair, prominent exits, spaces to recharge);
• access to events with low to no economic barriers (free events; subsidized ticket prices; and “pay what you can’);
• degrees of comfort in attending the venues we choose (e.g. safe spaces, ethical organizations, diverse demographic representations); and
• intellectual and affective accessibility in a variety of forms, from academic-style lectures to musical performances to circle conversations, and so on.

All of our venues offer barrier-free physical access, including entrances, events spaces, and washrooms. Festival volunteers and Access Ambassadors will be readily available to collaborate and assist in ensuring your access needs are met. Some of the venues offer gender-specific and all gender washrooms and most of them offer single-user barrier-free washrooms. We encourage and can materially support our audiences to keep our event spaces scent-free. Guide dogs and emotional support animals are welcome. Details about wayfinding at each venue can be found in our Access Guide.

We will have ASL interpretation and live transcription at the Guelph Lecture. ASL interpretation is available for all other events upon request (up to 3 weeks prior to the start of the festival) even if only one person requests it.

We want to support you to enable your full participation. We include a fillable form in the Accessibility section of our website so you can inform us of your access requirements and support needs that might not be listed above. These might include:

• chemical, light, sound, touch, temperature, or other sensitivities or allergies;
• food allergies or sensitivities;
• requests for ASL interpretation at some or all events;
• requests for a dedicated festival helper to enable your full participation;
• reimbursement for public transit;
• requests for subsidized or reduced-price tickets; and
• anything else we can do to provide a comfortable environment for you.

If you will be attending with an attendant, care giver, support worker, or family member as support and would like us to be in touch with that person, please share the person’s name, pronouns, and contact information. We offer complimentary tickets to paid-ticket events for attendants, support workers, care givers, helpers, or family members as support.

Please provide us with information you feel comfortable sharing or feel free to contact our Logistics Coordinator Sonia Preisler by email at logistics@artseverywhere.ca. Your personal information will be kept confidential.

The ArtsEverywhere Festival is committed to developing its accessibility capacities. We are grateful to those who offer us feedback, suggestions, and critique so that we can continue to make the world a better and more accessible place for all.