Broadening the Centre

April 23, 2013

Almemar
March 25, 2013
By Ernest Hoffman

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Broadening the Centre: Manon Gauthier on Edgy Classics, New Leaders, and Montreal’s Cultural Geography

Manon Gauthier became Chief Executive Officer of the Segal Centre for Performing Arts in 2009, and has overseen a revamping of its programming, audiences, and image. The first non-Jewish head of the Centre, Manon discusses the path that led her there, the ambitious goals which her team is pursuing, and the unique opportunities that Montréal offers arts organizations.

EH: I understand that you got involved in arts management very early. Can you tell me a bit about how you got started? How did you learn what you needed to know?

MG: When I was around 18 years old, I began working with one of Montréal’s art visionaries in Jacques Primeau. At the time, Jacques was working with Rock et Belles Oreilles, the band, which was in the prime of their career, and Jacques asked me if I could join the agency and help build up the music side of things. I was in school at the time, but I thought ‘okay, this is the best way to learn.’

I learned to look at every single aspect of arts management, and I was surrounded by the best. We worked very closely with Spectra, they had artists in management and we took over, so we had Jim Corcoran, Louise Forestier, several artists that had long and very fruitful careers. I worked with Jacques for several years and he really was always interested in the innovation part of the business: above and beyond managing artists, what’s next? How do we bring a model where you’re promoting someone’s career by looking at absolutely every aspect of them? So from touring, from managing, from producing, from partnering with other arts organizations and with festivals… that was the best school.

EH: It sounds like it, getting in on the ground floor of something like that! You’re very young, but you’re being brought into something where you can really contribute to many aspects of the organization.

MG: It was the best way. I love school, but I thought at the time, what if we could really combine the academic learning with life experience? How am I supposed to be ready to jump in and start working if all I have is the academic or the theoretical knowledge? So for me, things worked out for the best. The more complex the more challenging it’s been the better I’ve performed.

EH: So you then end up working for some big PR and management firms, you were at Cohn & Wolfe, Weber Shandwick… What were you learning, and what challenges were you tackling during those years?

MG: Learning about the politics of it all, learning about the business side of things. I was recruited by Weber Shandwick, and they had just a very small shop in Montréal, and they were looking to build a model that would bring all the offices across Canada to work together. The first challenge was really to look at Canadian heritage. They were trying to launch the Virtual Museum of Canada at the time, so we’re starting with technology, starting to understand the possibilities of bridging that virtual/real world. I think that the entrepreneur side of me was really uncovered at that point. I had no idea where I would end up, but I knew that that was a ‘passage obligé’.

EH: And I guess you were very fortunate to be working for organizations that are already on that path, and they recognize that it’s something you want to do.

MG: Yes, when I started working with Weber Shandwick, it was really my first business experience, and they took a chance. You need to take chances on people in life, you have to learn that it’s about people. If you make a journey in the arts, if you make a journey in business, what you acquire you take wherever you go, and it’s about people before it’s about money. I’ve always followed my instincts, and I think it’s always served me well.

EH: So then how did you end up transitioning from these firms to working at the Segal Centre? How did that happen?

MG: The arts never left me, and I never left the arts. I think that it’s something that was always in me, and something that I really was missing after a number of years in the business world. I continued to be involved with different organizations, the Montréal Chamber Music Festival, the Governor General’s Performing Arts Awards, which were always very close to my heart, but something was missing. I consulted with some of my business peers and colleagues at different levels at the time, and I had a very enlightening discussion with Isabel Hudon, who had just left the Montréal Board of Trade. I was telling her ‘you know, there’s something here that I need to feel complete.’

EH: Did you find that moving up in these organizations, getting to more senior executive-level positions, that you were more distant from the arts world itself? Of course you’re working at a high level, but was it more business-y and less artistic the higher you went?

MG: That’s right. Things went so fast, I ended up being a Senior Vice President when I was 28 years old, and there’s a disconnect… you know, ambition is not how high you get, it’s about your capacity to make things happen, and I think that the more personally involved you become, the more rewarding it is. So for me, I think that you’re right. This is why the disconnect weighed very heavy on me, and I did not feel that sense of accomplishment.

I found myself drawn to not-for-profit organizations, to things that I really wanted to have a direct impact on, and say ‘how can I help make this a better place? How can I contribute modestly to helping organizations?’ The arts always spoke to me as an area of need, but also as an area that brings people together. You look at politics, you look at the economy, across cultures, across the planet, there’s always an artistic component that helps people define who they are.

EH: You’re in a bit of an interesting position. I believe you’re the first director of the Segal Centre who isn’t actually Jewish themselves, and of course it’s a very strong component of the Jewish community… How did you prepare for this role in the community, that aspect of it?

MG: The discussion with Isabel really introduced me to the man that I have the utmost respect for. She said ‘Manon, you have to meet Alvin Segal.’ At the time, I knew I wanted to take a bit of a step back to have a clear idea of where it was that I wanted to go. So I met him, and I just loved the vision he had of his community, and more importantly, the dream that was really leading his decisions for the Segal Centre. And it dawned on me that this was the perfect example for how we can build bridges and use a model that is strongly rooted in the community, and share it with the world. I found it so fantastic!

We have this ambition of becoming a cultural metropolis, but when you look at the cultural landscape in Montréal, there is still a linguistic divide, there’s often a cultural divide. On the one hand we say ‘we have a cosmopolitan city, we’re a cultural metropolis, we’re a diverse city,’ but have we actually bridged that artistic, linguistic, and cultural diversity? How do arts become bigger than anything to do with language or politics or religion or culture?

He asked me to take this on, and to help him build that bridge. In 1967 when this institution was created by the Bronfman family, it spoke to the strength of the community model, a living legacy from the Montréal Jewish community to all Montrealers. Here I was, tasked with the role of becoming a kind of ambassador for a community, and bridging that gap with the broader Montréal, and I could not think of a better thing to do with my life.

EH: So you’re drawing on this community-based model, and expanding on it within the broader Montréal community.

MG: Yes. We’re located in one of the most diverse neighborhoods in Canada, but there’s a slice of Montréal here that really should resonate with the broader city. When you look at the cultural geography of Montréal, we have a very strong core, which is the cartier des spectacles, but where do artists live, where do they create, where do they interact? It’s in the heart of the neighborhoods…

EH: …in their own neighborhoods, yes!

MG: …so I find it interesting that when you look at our map, from West to East you look at the TOHU, what they’ve created in St-Michel, you look at the Da Vinci Centre in St. Leonard, another exemplary model of what communities can build, and then you look at the Segal Centre for Performing Arts. This is Montréal, and this is what we’re supposed to be doing. The trees that grow the tallest are the ones that have the deepest roots. This is the example of the Centre.

EH: So there were a couple of stages of expansion of the Segal Centre. It gave you another stage for performance and some very new facilities. How have you taken those resources and expanded what you do? What have you been doing that you weren’t doing before?

MG: I think we’ve built upon the heritage left to us by the Bronfman family, the strength of English theater, the reaffirmation of Yiddish theater, a very, very important part of cultural Montréal. No matter where you go, you never forget where you come from.

But we also needed to face the reality of an aging community. Across Canada, when you go to any theater, the average age is always on the high side. We needed to build on a base of loyal patrons, but we needed to look at what our community wants, and what we can bring to Montrealers that will really bring people together.

EH: You’ve been going after younger audiences as well. You’ve had some edgier interpretations of traditional works and you’ve also had some very different things. Can you tell me a bit about that experience, of how you attract younger and more diverse audiences?

MG: Absolutely. Building on the strength of English and Yiddish theater, we needed to look at new ways to attract audiences, and our second stage has allowed that. Two things that are not limited by language are music and dance. So we started to program on the music side, and that really attracted a whole new audience that we would not have been able to capture before. Whether it’s jazz, classical, indie music, world music, we’ve been able to tap into a whole other audience.

In emerging theater, when you look at the theater landscape in Montréal you have young, hip, and audacious theater companies, and our second stage became a lab for creating, presenting, and experimenting in a more multidisciplinary fashion.

We also needed to look at how much of it is about artistic appreciation and how much of it is about audience development, because you need to please both sides. It became clear that if we wanted to renew our audiences, while maintaining our loyal base, we needed to be more open, more inclusive, and more diverse.

EH: So having two stages allows you to continue the core mission of the Segal Centre, but then also bring in music and a lot of emerging artists and pull in that other audience as well?

MG: That’s correct, but also, how do we mix tradition and modernity? Our core mission has been based on reinventing classics, taking older works and making them new, and we’re doing that at every level. Whatever comes to our stage is reinforcing tradition and making it new, making it more innovative. We have Tales from Odessa coming in June as one example. We’re really looking at an old Russian story, and we’re putting it on stage with Socalled. We’re innovating, were bringing a modern twist to the classics, and I think that this also helps bring different audiences together.

EH: So what’s on the horizon for the Segal Centre. What can audiences expect from you in the coming years?

MG: It’s all about engagement and interaction, and a dialogue between the artist and the audiences. We want to continue focusing on our classics, but really giving them today’s flavor. Nothing says that if you’re perceived as more classical, if you want to focus on revisiting the Western canon, you can’t do things in a new way. We want to continue to focus on theater, music, dance, and arts education in the most innovative way possible, but also trying to reach out to all Montrealers.

I think that if you have any ambition of becoming a meeting place for performing arts and for communities, you really have to open up and reach out. We’ve been very successful at partnering with other organizations in Québec and in Canada, and more recently in South Africa, and we want to continue doing that. I think what’s also been a part of our growth is taking chances. There’s no other city in North America where you can take the same work, present it in French with one of our peers of Québec theater with the same actors, and then present it here in English, and that also speaks to the reality of Montréal.

EH: And that you have enough venues and enough of an audience that you can actually do both, and successfully!

MG: Absolutely! So it’s using a very exemplary community model, and taking that model and opening your doors wide to really reach out.

Also, for the arts to thrive, to survive even, you need to look at the interdependence between arts, philanthropy and business. I think that very few models can really show that reality. What was done by the Bronfman family and then continued with the Segal family really speaks to a very strong philanthropic model. But if you want the arts to become a public good, if you want the arts to belong to communities, you need to involve businesses in supporting the arts.

I found that among the boards of directors and in philanthropy, it was always the same wonderful and generous individuals, but that the next generation of philanthropists was nonexistent. So we created a young leaders division with the specific purpose of representing our community, but reaching out across broader Québec and Montréal to really mobilize young leaders 25 to 45 to become engaged in the arts and to become those philanthropists of tomorrow, with their time and their generosity. We’ve seen in our efforts to diversify our age groups, the next generation becoming more and more active, engaged, and involved.