Paul Baron
Strategy and Service Design
In 2004, Paul co-founded tokyoartbeat.com to spread awareness of Japanese art and culture. Paul also works as a product manager and is a co-founder at creative agency AQ.
We strive to make art and design a part of everyone's life. Our activities are bilingual, independent, neutral and non-profit.
A cultural guide for Tokyo residents, visitors and the rest of the world informed about Tokyo's art scene. Tokyo Art Beat tracks six hundred exhibitions happening across Tokyo's one thousand museums and galleries.
A bi-monthly, pocket-sized digest of Tokyo's most popular art exhibitions and events, distributed at seven hundred cafes, galleries, stores and other locations throughout the Tokyo area.
iPhone and Android apps to find art exhibitions nearby or anywhere in Tokyo, bookmark them and go.
An iOS app that provides exclusive admission discounts to exhibitions at the thirty best museums in the Tokyo area.
Strategy and Service Design
In 2004, Paul co-founded tokyoartbeat.com to spread awareness of Japanese art and culture. Paul also works as a product manager and is a co-founder at creative agency AQ.
General Operations Manager
Afer working in companies and art centers, Sayo now manages the staff at Gadago NPO, as well as the website and Art Map.
Brand Manager
Communications
Frustrated by the lack of readily available bilingual information on art and design events happening in Tokyo, Paul Baron, Olivier Thereaux and Kosuke Fujitaka devise the first true exhaustive source of cultural event information in Japan.
Twenty three months later, a team of ten volunteers launch TokyoArtBeat.com. Shortly after launch, the team grows to thirty Japanese and expat Tokyoites. Working mostly after hours, they pull information from hundreds of sources, edits, translates and publishes it to the website.
The website welcomes the addition of MyTAB, which allows users to bookmark events they want to see or recommend events they have visited. A line of graphic t-shirts featuring designs donated by well-known creative personalities is launched in order to raise funds.
The organization gains NPO status with the Tokyo Metropolitan government, and move into their first office near the Tokyo Imperial Palace with two staff members as the editorial team. Later that year, thanks to growing revenue from advertising sales, a full time operations manager also joins the team. The second collection of TAB T-shirts is released, along with an online job board for the creative industry.
The site makes available an API for its venue and event data, and relaunches TABlog as a web magazine for the Tokyo art scene. The 3rd collection of TAB Shirts goes on sale, while the online shop is expanded to include books, poster, and other goods. Gadago strikes a partnership with the Flanders Center in Osaka to launch Kansai Art Beat, which covers the art and design scene in Osaka, Kyoto, and Kobe.
The NPO launches the Tokyo Art Map, a bi-monthly publication showcasing 50 events in popular art venues. The team also kicks off TAB Talks, a live event series featuring talks by leaders in art and design. Kansai Art Beat is closed down, while an independent team including NPO co-founder Kosuke Fujitaka launches New York Art Beat. The NPO relocates to a new office, and goes through a reorganization and an online donation campaign to counter the effects of the global economic crisis.
2009 is a slow year as the team focuses on stabilizing operations and regaining ground by hiring a full-time sales staff and building a robust four-month internship program for the editorial work. The 4th collection of TAB Shirts is released, and the online job board closes doors.
The official Tokyo Art Beat iPhone and Android apps are launched to great success. The team moves to a bigger office in Omotesando. The audience for the official Twitter accounts @TokyoArtBeat_EN and @TokyoArtBeat_JP explodes.
The TAB app is ranked the most popular app of the Lifestyle category in the Japanese App Store for 2010. The team launches MuPon, an app which offers discounts to popular art museums in Tokyo and organizes a series of events at partner venues to explore new engagement models between TAB, its audience, and museums. The office closes for a week following the disaster of March 11th, but the team quickly mobilizes with a MuPon donation campaign and speaking engagements about the power of art.
The 2012 edition of MuPon is launched with thirty partner museums, and the team travels to Barcelona to present MuPon at MuseumNext 2012.
We re-design the Tokyo Art Map format, taking inspirations from big posters. In collaboration with the Nishieda Foundation, we set up an office in Kyoto to re-launch Kansai Art Beat. We launch our first "Summer MuPon" campaign, expanding the geographical reach of MuPon to museums across the country.
Six hundred guests joined us to celebrate the 10th anniversary of Tokyo Art Beat.
Our team grows to three full time staff.
We ramp up on web and mobile app development, and start working on a re-design of the TAB app. We also ran a research project about the distribution of art event information in Tokyo and its influence on the viewing experience.
Gadago NPO
West Azabu 2F, 2-21-22 Nishi-Azabu, Minato-ku Tokyo 106-0031
Tel: +81 3-6427-6035