Meet the new faces shaping South Dallas’ cultural landscape

Three newcomers to Dallas recently arrived on the scene at South Dallas’ key arts and cultural institutions: the African-American Museum, the Forest Theater and the South Dallas Cultural Center.

The City of Dallas hired VanAnthony Williams in June as the new general manager of the South Dallas Cultural Center after John Spriggins’ departure. After a nationwide search, in July the African-American Museum made Lisa Brown Ross its second president and CEO, after the retirement of Dr. Harry Robinson Jr. And just recently, Forest Forward selected Nijeul X as its inaugural artistic director.

Dallas Free Press invited Williams, Ross and X to sit down and discuss everything from their own artistic backgrounds to the responsibilities of their institutions to care for artists, and from how they plan to involve South Dallas students and residents in their spaces to what they have planned for next summer’s FIFA Fan Festival at Fair Park, when hundreds of thousands of visitors will descend on our neighborhood.

It was the first time for all three to meet in person, and at Williams’ invitation, they convened at South Dallas Cultural Center’s black box theater on opening night of the State Fair of Texas — no small feat for recent transplants from Fort Worth, Washington, D.C. and Los Angeles whose institutions are either in, adjacent to or down the street from the annual fair traffic.

Watch their conversation below.

Additional reporting by Jennie Trejo and Keri Mitchell