In celebration of the weekend, a group of 30 students set out on a cultural excursion through… In celebration of the weekend, a group of 30 students set out on a cultural excursion through the city. The Friday night began with free dinner and dessert at Pitt’s local Italian restaurant, Joe Mama’s, and ended with complimentary seats at one of the New Hazlett Theater’s latest modern dance showings. The event, centered on an Alice in Wonderland-inspired dance called Feed Your Head Cafe, also included a round-trip bus ride for the students and a post-show talk with the artistic executive director of the dance.

This virtually costless trip is an example of what Pitt Arts, a student-friendly organization located on the top floor of the William Pitt Union, calls its “Arts Encounters,” or all-expenses-paid visits to Pittsburgh’s cultural hot spots.

Kristen Delevich, Pitt junior and neuroscience major, chose to come to Feed Your Head Cafe alone, but she believes these sort of art-related adventures are also meant to be enjoyed with others.

“It’s great for free dates. Just to get some culture instead of getting stuck in Oakland – it’s incredibly easy, too,” she said. “I hadn’t seen a dance through Pitt Arts yet, it was my last chance before the semester was over.”

During the 2007-08 school year, Pitt Arts offered 116 of these “Arts Encounters,” and the number increases every year. A student gets involved by signing up on the Pitt Arts e-mail list and then applying for a spot on the trips that suits? one’s personal tastes.

Annabelle Clippinger, the director at Pitt Arts, takes pride in the many opportunities her program grants to students.

“The first idea of Pitt Arts is to get people off campus and allow them to become acculturated in the arts, whether it be the ballet, the symphony or the opera,” she explained. “But the free arts encounter is the crown and jewel of the program.”

Though Clippinger notes The Pittsburgh Cultural Trust and the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra to be two of the most commonly used organizations, each offering more than 10 shows annually, she is sometimes surprised by the types of programs students will be most enthusiastic about.

“Undergrads love the opera more than anything,” she said. “We’ll have 40 tickets, and 100 people will want to go.”

Pitt freshman Kasia Mikoluk said she signed up for Pitt Arts within the first week of getting to school.

“You just sign up, come, and you don’t have to worry about a thing. They choose the top events in the city, not uninteresting choices,” said Mikoluk. “The best part is that they get you there – no waiting for buses.”

The “Arts Encounters” trips are only a piece of the pie hat Pitt Arts offers, though. “Cheap Seats” and “Free Visits” are two other programs that students take part in when they’re not hitting the books.

“Cheap Seats” means low-priced tickets for Pitt students, faculty and staff to performances at Pittsburgh’s cultural venues. A student is allowed up to four tickets per show, and these cheap seats are offered by a variety of Pittsburgh organizations, ranging from the Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre to the Guitar Society of Fine Arts.

According to Clippinger, Pitt Arts gave away more than 10,000 cheap seats this year, an appropriate number since Pitt Arts was also celebrating its 10th anniversary.

The “Free Visits” program also gives students the chance to attend cultural hot spots, but in a more “hands-off” fashion. Sponsored by both Pitt Arts and a variety of other school organizations, students are given free access to many of the city’s museums.

Using their school IDs, Pitt students can visit The Andy Warhol Museum, the Carnegie Museums of Art and Natural History, the Mattress Factory Art Museum, Phipps Conservatory and the Senator John Heinz History Center. Clippinger said that Pitt Arts receives a lot of funding from the office of the provost because the program gives prospective students more of a reason to go to Pitt and stay at Pitt.

“We help the retention rate because we keep students engaged,” she explained while referencing the highly skewed number of white females engaged in Pitt Arts to be an example of how far the program still has to go.

Clippinger hopes to up the number of males and increase the involvement of African Americans, “seeking to really try and push the boundaries of what multicultural means” for all students.

“We’ve been trying to mix things up a little,” she said. “We want to get everyone involved.”