Martha Richards
Martha Richards is the Founder and Executive Director of WomenArts, a non-profit organization dedicated to increasing the opportunities and visibility of women artists. In 2008 Richards and film critic Jan Lisa Huttner created Support Women Artists Now Day/SWAN Day, a grassroots international holiday that has now been celebrated with approximately 1700 events in 36 countries. Prior to WomenArts, Richards served as the Executive Director of Brooklyn Center for the Performing Arts at Brooklyn College and as the Managing Director of StageWest, a LORT theatre in Springfield, Massachusetts. She writes and lectures frequently on arts and cultural policy issues. Richards has a B.A. in Economics from the University of California Berkeley and a J.D. from the University of California Hastings College of Law. She was one of the founding directors of California Lawyers for the Arts, and one of the three “founding mothers” of the Women’s Fund of Western Massachusetts. She currently serves on the Cabinet of the U.S. Department of Arts and Culture as their Senior Strategist for Women Artists.
