DanceArt, Inc. is a nonprofit organization supporting dance and performing arts organizations and independent artists in the San Francisco Bay Area with an array of management and production services.



Board of Directors
Kelly James Draganov
Linda E. Rawlings
Sue Li-Jue
Lorraine Padden
Meg Musick-Makely
Michael Armstrong
Laura Elaine Ellis
Jane Schnorrenberg
Joan Gillette
Inez Kelly
Joan Lazarus

Joan Lazarus (Executive Director, DanceArt, Inc.) has served as Executive Director of Oakland Ballet, General Manger of the Cowell Theater at Fort Mason, and is Executive Director of WestWave Dance Festival, an annual festival of new choreography presented in San Francisco. She was the Capital Campaign Consultant for the ODC/San Francisco expansion project, and has also served as ODC Development Director. She is the former President of Dance Bay Area and served on the Steering Committee of Bay Area National Dance Week for six years. Joan has performed with or in the works of many local and national choreographers, including Alonzo King, Cliff Keuter, Ellen Bromberg, Victoria Morgan, Krissy Keefer, Frank Shawl, Bill DeYoung, Toni Pimble, Richard Colton and Alan Ptashek. She has taught at the University of Oregon, Mills College, San Francisco Ballet, Dance Circle of Boston, The Princeton Ballet, RoCo Dance & Fitness, and Shawl-Anderson Dance Center. She is the Administrator for The Moving Center School in Marin County, which teaches a dance meditation practice. Ms. Lazarus was co-author of the Dance Curriculum Guide adopted by the San Francisco Unified School District in the mid-1980s. She holds a BA in Psycholinguistics from Indiana University, a MA in Dance from the University of Oregon, and a MA in Arts Administration from Golden Gate University. She received Bay Area National Dance Week’s Contribution to the Field of Dance Award in 2006. In 2012 along with Cathleen McCarthy, she received an Isadora Duncan Dance Award for Sustained Achievement for 20 years of producing WestWave Dance. Lazarus was also named 2011 Dance MVP by The San Francisco Chronicle.



Shannon Atlas
Public Relations and Communications

Claudia Stillwell
Finance

Nancy Quinn & Associates
Development

David K.H. Elliott
Principal Lighting Designer
WestWave Dance

KT Graham
Production Stage Manager and Technical Director
WestWave Dance

Sara Linnie Slocum
In memorium
Technical Director

The performing arts are simply the most expensive kind of art to produce, and DanceArt Inc. is committed to supporting choreographers with seamless, professional, technical and administrative support. For more information on how to support DanceArt Inc. with a donation, please click on the donate button. Thank you!