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 Mary Lou Aleskie, Executive Director of the International Festival of Arts & Ideas in New Haven, Connecticut since September 2005, has provided leadership at the helm of numerous international organizations and projects as an executive, producer and presenter in the support of landmark premieres as well as masterworks of the performing arts.
Prior to her leadership of Arts & Ideas, Ms. Aleskie served as President and CEO of La Jolla Music Society, San Diego's premier presenter of world-renowned orchestras, dance companies, and soloists, as well as the producer of the award-winning chamber music festival La Jolla SummerFest.
Her decade long tenure as Executive Director of Da Camera of Houston resulted in the company's first major international tours to include the world's most prestigious venues, from the Barbican Centre to the Kennedy Center, at the same time establishing essential working capital and endowment funds.
As General Manager and Managing Director of the Alley Theatre in Houston, she produced many ground-breaking projects, including the international tour of Edward Albee's "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" to Russia and the Baltics, as well as the world premiere of Frank Wildhorn's, "Jekyll & Hyde", which transferred to Broadway for a long and successful run.
Ms. Aleskie has been a frequent speaker and panelist for the National Endowment for the Arts, Creative Capital, and the Massachusetts Arts Council, among others. She currently serves as a member of the International Society of Performing Arts Board and Executive Committee, Arts Presenters Association's Classical Connections Advisory Committee, and is a Fellow of Branford College at Yale University.
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 Russell Willis Taylor, President and CEO of National Arts Strategies since January 2001, has extensive senior experience in strategic business planning, financial analysis, and all areas of operational management. Educated in England and America, she served as director of development for the Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art before returning to England in 1985 at the invitation of the English National Opera (ENO) to establish the Company's first fund-raising department. During this time, she also lectured extensively at graduate programs of arts and business management throughout Britain. From 1997 to 2001, she rejoined the ENO as executive director.
Mrs. Taylor has held a wide range of managerial and Board posts in the commercial and nonprofit sectors including the advertising agency DMBB; head of corporate relations at Stoll Moss Theatre Group; director of The Arts Foundation; special advisor to the Heritage Board, Singapore; chief executive of Year of Opera and Music Theatre (1997); judge for Creative Britons; and lecturer on business issues and arts administration. She received the Garrett Award for an outstanding contribution to the arts in Britain, the only American to be recognized in this way, and in England served on the boards of A&B (Arts and Business), Cambridge Arts Theatre, Arts Research Digest, and Society of London Theatre. Currently serving on the advisory boards of The University Musical Society of the University of Michigan, The Curtis Institute, and the Center for Nonprofit Excellence In Charlottesville, Mrs. Taylor is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.
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