On Saturday, May 5, Purchase College President Thomas J. Schwarz officially announced the appointment of Seth Soloway, who has excelled as Interim Director for the past two years, as the Director of The Performing Arts Center, Purchase College. Received with a warm round of applause from attendees of The PAC’s 40th Anniversary Gala, President Schwarz remarked that the comment he had heard most frequently in recent meetings was “when will you remove ‘Interim’ from Seth Soloway’s title?”
Barry Pearson, Purchase College Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs, remarked in his letter to The PAC staff, “Seth’s work has been instrumental in setting The PAC on a path that will greatly enhance the academic and educational life of the college. His ideas have served to create a strategy that will secure fiscal and artistic sustainability and make The PAC a center for innovation and incubation.”
Soloway remarks, “It is truly the great honor of my career to be named Director of The Performing Arts Center, Purchase College. I have always wished to spend my life doing creative work, that in whatever small way, keeps the live arts thriving and brings them to communities that both want and need them. That vision has been more than fulfilled these last two years at Purchase, and I look forward to continuing on that path. The intersection of a thriving campus and public assembles the most wonderful community any Director could ever ask to serve. I’m extremely grateful for the opportunity to continue to serve you, and I promise that the best is still to come.”
Looking forward to the 2018-2019 Season, Soloway is already hard at work, curating the invited artists specifically, “to plant The Performing Arts Center firmly on the road to the future. In 18/19 we double down on our vision of The PAC as an incubator by welcoming more residencies and combining our Arts in Education with our mainstage programs in significant ways. We commit fully to welcoming the audience of the next 40 years with new types of programs that received positive receptions during test runs over the last two seasons.”
Seth Soloway holds a BFA in Stage Directing from Marymount Manhattan College an MFA in Performing Arts Management from Brooklyn College. Prior to coming to Purchase, Soloway and his wife Jen conceived of and converted Newburgh’s West Shore Train Station into the Railroad Playhouse. Within the new organization they created the Railroad Playhouse Playmaking Project, which teaches students to collaboratively write an original play or musical while focusing on an important area of class room curriculum. Along the road Soloway has held many producing/ management positions including Director of Programming at The Paramount Center for the Arts, Artistic Director at Brooklyn Center for the Performing Arts, Director of Booking at OBB, a theatrical booking and touring agency, Associate at Richard Frankel Productions and served as the Lortel Administrator for the Off Broadway League. He currently teaches Arts Management at Purchase College and Brooklyn College.
Please join us in congratulating the new Director of The PAC!
