With this issue, KC Studio co-founder Heidi Nast steps back from her day-to-day role as fundraiser and all-around organizer of board functions, promotional events, special sections and consortium pages, while also serving for many years as advertising sales coach and manager.
Heidi was instrumental in working with Guy Townsend to plan and launch this magazine. With the encouragement and support of the Muriel McBrien Kauffman Foundation, Heidi and Guy put together the plan and got KC Studio off the ground. She has been conducting the business of the magazine ever since, with a particular focus on raising contributed support — and she has been, in every sense, the public face of KC Studio in the community.
Heidi approached her many and changing roles with unflagging dedication to the magazine’s quest for quality, diversity and fiscal health, bringing charm and good humor to hundreds of meetings with donors, foundations and partners.
In her years with the magazine, Heidi compiled mountains of statistics and figures for our annual reports and regular solicitation letters. She stuffed countless envelopes to get that information out to readers and donors and was always on hand to assist in a crunch, pitching in when we were shorthanded, dealing with vendors, chasing late ads, helping with proofing and weighing in on cover choices.
No one knows the inner workings of KC Studio like Heidi, and we go forward without her in this role with no small bit of trepidation and bottomless thanks for all her contributions. Now she’s looking forward to spending more time with her family, especially her grandchildren. Although she is stepping away from the day-to-day, Heidi will remain on the board and continue to advise publisher Guy Townsend on our ongoing fundraising efforts. Going forward, our friend C.J. Charbonneau, a seasoned writer, curator, artist and arts advocate, will be taking over many of Heidi’s duties. C.J. is not a stranger, having previously worked for the magazine as a valued contributing writer.
KC Studio readers will notice a new column by one of our best-known contributors in the September/October issue. In “Break a leg: Robert Trussell on Kansas City theater” the respected longtime critic will offer a regular overview of important developments and upcoming productions in the theater community. Celebrating this must-read new addition to our pages and the vitality of KC theater is a specially commissioned cover involving the best efforts of our photographer Jim Barcus and the cast of KCAT’s upcoming production of “Eureka Day.”
As always in the September/October issue, we present our annual roundup of theater, dance, classical music and visual arts exhibitions, and this year, for the first time, jazz performances, thanks to the expertise of Kevin Morris.
In all disciplines, it’s clear artists are aware of the trying times we live in, offering analysis, protest, succor and lament, roles examined in Jose Faus’s always provocative Cultural Meanders column. As he reminds us, “The commitment to tell the truth and fight oppression is a simple dictum become part of our social contract.”
