Professional Overview
Co-Founder of The Diverse Future
Promoting the aspirations of those critical to America’s multi-cultural future.
James Brown, LT, Cherrie Nanninga(CFO CB Richard Ellis/Board Chair LMCC) at Evening Stars
As
Executive Director of the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council (LMCC) from 1997 to 2003 she balanced, and then quadrupled, the operating budget while vastly expanding the Council's offerings.
NY Times - The Stars Uptown to Dance Downtown
The events of September 11, 2001 severely affected LMCC: scarring the city, the attack also destroyed the World Trade Center-based group's offices, studio and exhibition spaces, numerous irreplaceable works of art, and three decades worth of archives tracing New York City's downtown cultural history. In the aftermath, Liz skillfully led the organization through its most challenging period — relocating twice to temporary offices, re-establishing the performing and visual arts programs in new venuesincluding the free outdoor performance festival she created Evening Stars, all the while expanding both the council's programming and its advocacy for the arts. Liz worked tirelessly throughout these years to ensure that arts and cultural resources would be included in the redevelopment process.
LT, Boston Mayor Menino
As a consultant from 1992 to 1994, Liz worked with Olympia & York, the World Financial Center, the Harkness Dance Foundation, and CBS Cable network along with international clients based in Bali, Australia, New Zealand and Mexico.
Judith Jamison, LT, Wynton Marsalis, Garth Fagan
From 1994 to 1997, she served as
President of First Night Boston, Inc., overseeing the growth of the event's diversity, and popularity. She served as Vice-President of
Brooklyn Academy of Music's Next Wave Festival from 1989 to 1992, playing a key role in the Academy's ever-strengthening commitment to new art forms and emerging artists.
LT, Bill T Jones
From 1979 to 1990, Liz was a pivotal
Executive Producer and Director of Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival in Becket, Massachusetts, where her background in the worlds of dance, Broadway, and television allowed her to further expand the Festival's brand of eclectic, popular programming.
Christopher Reeve, Ann Reinking, LT, Gary Ghrist
She worked closely with architects to design two new performance spaces: the experimental, and now regularly sold-out Studio Theatre, and an outdoor space with a magnificent mountain backdrop, the popular Inside-Out. She initiated and implemented the structure of an "artist's colony" that supported artists in the creation and development of new works and produced special events such as Roots of Creole,
NY Times - She Saw Wonderous Opportunities at Jacobs Pillow
Music and Dance of Africa, and Russian Village Project Performances. Liz initiated key improvements to the campus that not only increased earning potential, but furthered the development of the Pillow as a dynamic educational institution as well as an acclaimed performance venue.
Liz has received an Emmy Citation for her choreography of the Children's Television Workshop production, The Electric Company, is a recipient of Dance Magazine's Award for Outstanding Contributions to the dance world, an honorary doctorate from Springfield College, and a Founders Award from Trinity College for establishing its Dance Department, as well as numerous citations for her involvement in communities from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to the Borough of Staten Island. She is currently Chair of Five Myles, a fledgling cutting-edge art space situated in and dedicated to serving as an important part of its New York City community and on the Board of Flying Cloud Institute devoted to the children of Western MA with the single purpose of providing interdisciplinary experiences in art and science that stretch their minds and excite their curiosity.
