In short, just a normal week when it comes to You Are Here, the experimental arts festival that's fast becoming one of Canberra's underground institutions.

Now in its fifth year, You Are Here is a free event that occupies theatres, galleries and disused shopfronts throughout the CBD.

It has also been a launching pad for hundreds of local artists who might otherwise toil away, unseen and unheard, in the rabbit-warren of the capital arts scene.

And, ever since the festival was given seed funding in the years leading up to the Canberra Centenary in 2013, this is the part its producers take the most seriously.

The group have refined and carefully curated the festival's program over the years, and watched in awe as applications from artists have flooded in over the past two years.

This year, say Vanessa Wright and Nick Delatovic, the program will be half the size – over five days instead of 10 – and much more streamlined, which has meant better engagement with the many artists involved with the festival each year.

Although this year's budget is smaller than before, the production team decided to scale down the event well before it saw the figures, although it received a welcome funding boost of $25,000 from EventsACT to help with marketing and evaluation.

"It happened after last year's festival and it was a decision that we felt like we weren't contributing enough and weren't involved enough in artist support. We were spread too thin," Ms Wright said.

Mr Delatovic said it had been important this year to have more time with the artists, and to curate the program more carefully.

"There were artists last year who more or less were just rocking up on the day and presenting their thing … and this time, every single artist, we've been able to have tons of contact with them over the summer, work the concept over, do little preview showings, have little test audiences with test versions of the shows, just giving people what they need."

The program this year will include some previous successes, such as Neon Nightriders – the glowing ride around the lake at sunset – and the big Saturday night sleepover in the foyer of the Canberra Museum and Gallery in Civic Square.

The sleepover's theme will be An Ill-Advised Night Out – a typical Canberra experience for many, but all in the one venue, and without drugs or alcohol.

There will also be a festival-long stream of site-specific theatre shows under the banner Dangerous Territory.

"What we've done is approached a bunch of Canberra theatre-makers that we thought were exciting and emerging, and we challenged them to pick a weird space, specifically a non-theatre, non-blackbox space, in the CBD, and build a theatre show around it," Mr Delatovic said.

The spaces include a coffee shop, a shipping container, Landspeed Records in Garema Place and the office of an NGO, among others.

The two form part of a team of four producers this year, and have been with the festival since its inception.

"I've learnt a lot about what artist support really is, and that's our big decision to refine the number of events this year – it was knowing that it was the only way that we could increase the level of support for the artists," Mr Delatovic said.

"We had so many different artists from so many different art forms doing so many different things out of their comfort zones, so that every single artist has a different thing that they need from us. So being an arts producer is just about going what invisible jobs need to be done for this to happen, to set conditions for success for the artist."

Ms Wright said the festival was primarily about making space for artists – around 150 of them this year – to experiment with their work in Canberra, and enabling audiences to be part of it.

You Are Here is on from March 18 to 22, and will be launching its program at the Street Theatre on Thursday February 26 at 6pm. The event is free and all are welcome.