Patricia Cruz began her term as Executive Director of Harlem Stage/Aaron Davis Hall, Inc. in 1998. Ms. Cruz is responsible for overseeing programming and administrative management as well as long range planning, fundraising, fiscal management and program development in accordance with the mission of the institution.
She directs a staff of 15 and is the chief liaison to the Board of Directors. Accomplishments include:
- Securing over $2 million in endowment funds
- Expanding programs and audiences; and
- Successfully completing a $26 million Campaign for Aaron Davis Hall to expand the current facility and secure the financial stabilization of the 25 year old institution.
The highlight of her tenure is securing and renovating a historically landmarked 100 year old gatehouse building of the Croton Aqueduct System, across the street from the current ADH facility. Following 2-year renovation the facility provides a state of the arts theatre and offices for Harlem Stage. The project, completed in 2006, also has served as a catalyst for economic and community development for the 4-block area surrounding the Gatehouse. All of the activities cited above were made possible through public and private partnerships and designed to expand services to artists and communities.
Cruz is a member of The CalArts Board of Overseers and she is a past Board Member of The Andy Warhol Foundation. She is also past president of The New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA), an organization that supports and nurtures the work of artists and arts organizations throughout the state and ArtTable, a national organization of women in the Arts.
Pat Cruz also enjoyed a simultaneous career as a performing artist in theatre working in both classical and avant garde productions and finally exclusively with her late husband, the artist Emilio Cruz. In 1982 they presented two of his works, Homeostasis: Once More the Scorpion and The Absence Held Fast to its Presence in France and Italy under the auspices of the Festival Mondial Du Theatre.
Patricia Cruz appears in the following:
Celebrating Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man
Thursday, February 16, 2023
The Greene Space
Habana Harlem Cultural Fusion: Past Present Future
Saturday, June 19, 2010
6:00 PM
Cultural Fusion: Past Present Future explores the merging and converging of cultural traditions in the Diaspora. In this instance, we look closely at the vital nexus between New Orleans and Havana and the work of great composers.
