10/05: Santa Fe's creative community is brimming with talent, events, and artistic outlets to the point that visitors can find themselves lost in a sea of choices. The newly launched Santa Arts & Culture Portal combines a number of tools to help visitors with their next cultural exploration of Santa Fe.

The site contains a thorough calendar of music, theater, dance, and personal appearances plus an online box office for most events; a directory of galleries and artists that sorts through the hundreds of galleries, arts organizations, and individual artists in town; an interactive map of performing and visual art venues, restaurants, accommodations, historic neighborhoods, cultural sites and much more; an online concierge to help plan and book an entire itinerary in Santa Fe; and "Santa Fe Arts Online," an electronic magazine of interviews, profiles, and insightful articles about the city's rich arts and cultural community.

Recent census information released by Americans for the Arts shows that, in a list of 276 U.S. Metropolitan areas, Santa Fe was ranked first in the number of arts businesses per 1,000 residents, with a total of 6.29. It is this concentrated mix of creative outlets that has given Santa Fe its reputation as a superior place for arts of all kinds and led to the creation of the Arts & Culture portal. The portal is a joint effort between the City of Santa Fe and New Mexico Culture Net, a partnership designed to elevate the creative forces within Santa Fe and to better utilize and promote those resources. For more information contact Alex Traub, 505-474-8500, info@nmculturenet.org.