Margie Johnson Reese is a founding faculty member of WESTAF’s ELC and current faculty of LoCF. She has a 40-year portfolio as an arts advocate and arts management professional. She received a B.A. from Washington State University in Pullman, Washington and an MFA in Theater from Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas. She is an adviser to the International Council of African Museums based in Nairobi, Kenya and is a Fellow at the Salzburg Global Seminar in Salzburg, Austria. She continues to serve as an advisor to the Wichita Falls Alliance for Arts and Culture in Wichita Falls, Texas, a local arts agency that seeded and developed under her guidance as its first Executive Director.
Her work in the local arts agency arena also includes a six-year tenure as Director of the Office of Cultural Affairs for the City of Dallas and General Manager for the City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs. She held that position under three mayoral administrations managing grant making, arts education, festival production, cultural facilities and public art staff teams. She is credited with launching the Los Angeles International Cultural Exchange Program leading artist delegations to represent the city in Italy, Germany, Greece, France and Brazil. Her visionary city-wide music education program, Music L.A.! continues to provide music instruction, instruments and performance opportunities for young people.
Margie continues to contribute to the field of Arts Administration as a consultant to national, regional and local arts agencies, helping them develop inclusive arts policies that respond to contemporary civic goals. Recent clients include The Houston Arts Alliance, The Sacramento Metro Arts Commission, One Columbia (South Carolina) Mid-America Arts Alliance and Americans for the Arts. She is an adjunct professor in the graduate school of arts administration at Goucher College. She currently resides in Atlanta, Georgia.
