The Wallis Announces That ED/CEO Rachel Fine Will Step Down For Yale Position

 

Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts announces that Executive Director & CEO Rachel Fine is stepping down from her post in October 2022 to become executive director of the Yale Schwarzman Center at Yale University, according to Michael Nemeroff, The Wallis' Chairman of the Board.

During Fine's seven-year tenure, she helped propel The Wallis to great heights, significantly bolstering its operations and fiscal strength and fueling its national reputation as a vibrant cultural hub and performing arts campus for Southern California. Widely recognized as a prominent community builder, she led The Wallis team in forging significant artistic, community, and education partnerships, as well as building dynamic artistic collaborations and projects between The Wallis and Los Angeles' great cultural organizations, and numerous educational and social service organizations. Fine, among other significant endeavors, helped launch and implement a $55 million campaign in 2021, which more than doubled the organization's endowment and established a healthy cash reserve in the campaign's first year.

"The Wallis has thrived under Rachel's outstanding, creative, and dedicated leadership," says Nemeroff. "She built the most complete and well-rounded senior management team in the organization's history, ensuring that operations and business will continue without disruption. While she will be greatly missed, Rachel took great care to have a senior management team in place that will both keep The Wallis on track and help it proceed with compelling new initiatives. Due to the combined efforts of our management team, along with those of our patrons, donors, subscribers, the City of Beverly Hills, and our Board members, The Wallis is as financially strong as it has been in its history. On behalf of everyone at The Wallis, we wish her the very best."

In outlining next steps for The Wallis, Nemeroff adds, "The Wallis Board is committed to enhancing the leadership team with the recruitment of a world-class CEO and Executive Director. We will be launching a search in the very near future to engage with the best candidates in the performing arts world and identify the next leader who will help propel The Wallis going forward."

Fine says, "Because of my love for Los Angeles and The Wallis, both of which provided me the very best and most fulfilling professional opportunities of my life, my decision to leave is filled with mixed emotions. I am grateful to the entire Wallis community, including the artists who have continually brought their talents, wonder, awe, joy, and community connection to our breathtaking venue; Jerry Magnin, David C. Bohnett, and Michael A. Nemeroff, the fearless Board Chairs with whom I worked closely over the past seven years; Wallis Annenberg, who remains deeply dedicated to the mission and vision of The Wallis; the City of Beverly Hills; the entire Board of Directors; and the phenomenal staff, who love and believe in The Wallis as much as I do. Every morning that I entered the historic Beverly Hills Post Office and our very special arts campus, I saw and felt potential. Not a day ever went by when I didn't feel grateful to oversee such extraordinary performing arts spaces, which allow artists to do their very best work. It has been an honor and a privilege to be part of The Wallis' remarkable legacy.

"That said, Yale University has provided unprecedented new professional opportunities for both my husband, Christopher Hawthorne, and me. Going forward, I'm eager to work with the brand-new multifaceted Yale Schwarzman Center and embrace a major life change. While my family has relished its time in Southern California over the past 17 years, arguably the most exciting time ever for arts and culture in Los Angeles, Christopher, our two daughters, and I are enthusiastic about this new phase and will relish the family adventure ahead."

Christopher Hawthorne, Chief Design Officer for the City of Los Angeles and former architecture critic for the Los Angeles Times, will be teaching courses in journalism, criticism, and urban design in Yale College and the Yale School of Architecture.

 

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