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July 23, 2008 - 8:39PM
Scottsdale arts center director to step down
Michael Grady, Tribune
The director for the Scottsdale Center for the Performing Arts has announced that she will step down after this summer.
Kathy Hotchner, who also serves as vice president of the Scottsdale Cultural Council, will leave both positions Sept. 1, concluding more than 20 years at the helm of the nonprofit arts center.
"It has been a privilege to have guided the Scottsdale Center for the Performing Arts for the past two decades, and I'm so proud of what we've accomplished during that time," Hotchner said.
Her tenure saw the arts center grow from a performance venue with a $1.5 million budget to an $8 million-a-year organization with a roster of nationally prominent performers and programming that reaches more than 300,000 annually.
"Our role has been to bring touring artists to Scottsdale and give people a chance to experience world music and jazz and things they might not otherwise experience into the community," she said. "I think we've done that."
A published playwright-turned-performing arts director, Hotchner, 65, left a similar post in Colorado to take over the Scottsdale arts center in early 1988. She developed a knack for spotting and booking emerging talents such as musicians Joshua Bell and Wynton Marsalis and satirist David Sedaris.
"That's the best part of it - to book something like (the percussionist group) STOMP, that you know is new and exciting," Hotchner said.
Her work earned her the Jerry Willis Award for excellence in programming from the Western Arts Alliance, the Medallion of Merit from the Arizona chapter of the National Society of Arts and Letters, the Arizona Governor's Arts Award and a Champion of Diversity Award from the city of Scottsdale.
Hotchner cited "new leadership and direction" on the cultural council and her own personal interests as reasons for her departure.
"It's kind of an exciting time for me. There are lots of possibilities," she said. "I might get back to writing or producing theater or consulting with local arts groups. I don't know yet. I'm going to play with my grandchildren, take some time and see what comes."
Bill Banchs, president and CEO of the cultural council, will serve as interim director of the Scottsdale arts center until a permanent replacement is named.
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