Marietta Ulacia
Executive Director of Afro Latin Jazz Alliance

Marietta Ulacia is a Cuban-American artist and arts administrator with over 20 years of experience working in the non-profit cultural field. In May 2014 Marietta joined the Afro Latin Jazz Alliance of New York as Executive Director, with the mandate to lead the organization through its next phase of institutional growth.

At the Alliance, Marietta works alongside Artistic Director Arturo O’Farrill to strengthen the organization’s mission, vision and core values, spearheading the development of a strategic plan that places the organization at the center of progressive jazz programming, and formulating education, performance and conservation programs that prioritize equity and equality.

Marietta spent over fifteen years in the Washington, DC area performing with various music groups. In 2000 she became Executive Director of the Latin American Folk Institute (LAFI), conducting research on Latin American music and dance and producing performances for numerous venues. As a cultural leader in the Washington Metropolitan area, she spearheaded valuable partnerships among music, theater and dance institutions, working with cultural institutions such as the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center, the Smithsonian Institution, The Washington Ballet, the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Gala Hispanic Theater, the Washington Performing Arts Society, the InSeries of George Washington University, and many others. She led her own Afro-Cuban dance and music ensemble and spent two years in Brazil researching the connection between Afro Brazilian and Afro Cuban music.

In New York, Ms. Ulacia has worked as Executive Director of the Isadora Duncan Dance Foundation and at Dance Theater Workshop (currently LiveArts) as manager of Institutional Giving.  She was Director of Theater and Performing Arts and Director of Development at the Museum for African Art, and served as Director of Development for Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet.

Ms. Ulacia is a graduate of the prestigious Amadeo Roldán Music Conservatory in Havana, Cuba, where she studied classical guitar. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Communications and Visual Media and a Master’s Degree in Arts Management from American University in Washington, DC. She is a Board member of EducArte, a Maryland nonprofit dedicated to bring cultural arts education programming to underserved communities in the Maryland/DC/Virginia area. She is a member of the Rolling Stone Culture Council.

Marietta’s work as an independent artist and producer includes 7 years as a jazz programmer for WPFW radio station in Washington, DC; 2 years of service as advisor to the annual FLIC Dance Festival in Brooklyn, and ongoing work as co-producer of the documentary Fandango at the Wall currently showing on HBO.

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