Deborah Rotter Subscribe from the post of President of John F. Kennedy Center for Performing Arts in Washington at Washington at Washington
Kennedy was the center Intended to welcome a new chairman of the board This year, but shortly after the presidential election, he announced that he had failed to find a new one and that David M. Rubin Stein, who was elected chairman in 2010, would remain until September 2026.
Since 2014, the President of the Center, 68 -year -old Ms. Router, led the organization through the Corona virus pandemic diseases, overseeing its campus expansion, adding hip -hop and comedy to its offerings, and Italian conductor Gynendra Nusada He was attracted to becoming a national music director. Symphony orchestra. He helped keep the famous annual telecast, the Kennedy Center honored by Mr. Trump’s first term, when he broke for example and after some of his honors criticizing him. I refused to attend.
Ms. Router, whose contract is in August, agreed to stay at the end of the year to help the transfer. He said in an interview that the center was looking forward to working with Mr Trump and his administration, noting that half of the center’s board consists of his appointments. She said the first lady, Melania Trump, had already expressed interest in contacting the Center.
“Republican Democrats do not love the arts,” said Router.
Ms Router said she was leaving because she was ready for change, and it is time for a new generation of leaders to “lift a mantle and move the Kennedy Center forward.”
“I’m not going because I am fed up with the Kennedy Center,” he said. “I’m going because the time has come for me to think about using my abilities in another way, and get a new vision for the Kennedy Center.”
The new administration is already affecting the arts. Last week, the National Gallery of Art in Washington announced that it would eliminate its diversity, equality and joining programs. Mr. Trump’s Executive Order To call such actions “illegal and immoral”.
According to Ms. Router, the Kennedy Center does not have official diversity, equity and involvement program. But The center promotes its commitment “Diversity, equality, involvement, leakage and relationship.” And a Social trustDeveloped in 2021, the purpose of the Center describes the purpose of raising and supporting the voices of the backward and representatives of it.
Ms Router said the center would review the language that it uses to describe diversity efforts in light of the executive order.
The Center is still looking forward to seeing the new administration’s new arts policies. In his first term, Mr Trump proposed to abolish the national dedication to the arts because of bilateral backing in the Congress, but it survived, and even increased.
In his era, Ms. Rotor, an experienced arts manager, who had previously led the Chicago Symphony and Seattle Symphony, monitored the first extension of the Kennedy Center in his 54 -year history, which of studios and classrooms There is a complex known as Reich.
The offer at the center, which runs the Washington National Opera and the National Symphony Orchestra, increased in the time of Ms. Router. Silens like comedy and hip -hop are now side by side with classical music, ballet and theater. The center’s budget was $ 268 million last year, compared to $ 213 million in 2015.
Ms Rotor was holding during the epidemic diseases when the center canceled hundreds of incidents and lost millions of tickets. It monitored the launch of a major fundraising campaign in 2023, aimed at advancing, worth about $ 163 million, worth about $ 163 million, compared to about $ 113 million in 2014.
Mr Rubin Stein, who extended his term as the chairman of the board, said he was hopeful about the future of the center because of the strong leadership of Ms. Rotor.
“It will be difficult for us to find a person who has all his own skills,” said Mr. Rubin Stein, co -founder and co -chairman of the Carlyile Group, a private equity firm, a private equity firm, a co -founder and co -chairman. “Following it is a difficult process.”
Ford Foundation President Darren Walker, who has supported the Center’s programs, praised Ms. Rotor for expanding the Kennedy Center’s reach.
“The Kennedy Center, as it has become diversified, has become even more effective in fulfilling its mission, which is about virtue.”
Ms Router said she does not know what she will do next, adding that she did not imagine the guidance of another major cultural organization. He said his successor would need to find ways to create a place for the Kennedy Center that would collect Americans at the time of polarization.
“Arts should be the solidarity aspect of our society,” he said. “This is our mandate – to what extent can we really help our country find each other?”
