SALEM, MA – The Peabody Essex Museum (PEM) proudly announces the appointment of David Snider as Director of Learning and Civic Engagement, effective February 20, 2024. Currently serving as the Executive and Artistic Director of Hubbard Hall, a multidisciplinary arts and education center in Cambridge, NY, Snider brings over 25 years of experience as a director, educator, producer and arts administrator.
In his role at PEM, Snider will be a pivotal force in shaping the museum's Learning and Civic Engagement strategy, prioritizing engaging diverse audiences and historically underrepresented groups through impactful public programming and pioneering community partnerships. Snider will join PEM’s Executive Leadership Team in fostering creativity as a nourishing force in people's lives and help to advance key priorities outlined in the PEM FORWARD strategic plan.
"We are thrilled to welcome David to PEM, where he will champion opportunities to educate and inspire new visitors, students, educators and families. With a proven record of creative problem-solving and proven tactics for engaging underrepresented audiences with the arts, David is poised to make significant contributions to PEM's mission and strategic objectives and directly impact the lives of community members through lifelong learning opportunities," said Lynda Roscoe Hartigan, PEM’s Rose-Marie and Eijk van Otterloo Executive Director and CEO.
Snider will oversee PEM's diverse array of public programs, intern and fellows initiatives, K-12 school programs and teen programs and create an array of inclusive offerings designed to engage visitors of all ages and backgrounds. Additionally, he will focus on cultivating and strengthening relationships with schools, universities, PEM volunteers and community groups.
Snider’s role as Hubbard Hall’s Executive and Artistic Director involved leading a dynamic arts and education center across a campus of four historic buildings, where he defined and implemented the organization’s vision, strategic direction, administrative management and artistic focus for a yearlong season of theater, opera, dance, music and other programming. In addition to mainstage offerings, Snider established several artist-in-residence programs and pioneered critical partnerships with area school systems to supplement arts education, providing much-needed school day and afterschool programming for the community.
Previous to Hubbard Hall, Snider served as the Director of Artistic Programming at Arena Stage at the Mead Center for American Theater in Washington, DC and as the Producing Artistic Director and CEO of Young Playwrights’ Theater (YPT). Under his leadership, YPT was awarded commissions from the White House, the Kennedy Center and the Smithsonian Institution while establishing a resident company and an advisory panel of nationally recognized playwrights.
"I am honored to join PEM and eager to strengthen the organization’s connections with its community. I am equally excited to work with PEM’s talented teams to produce compelling, engaging and memorable experiences of creative expression,” noted Snider.
Snider is a respected lecturer at Skidmore College and Winthrop University and is the author of Managing Arts in Rural Areas (Rowman & Littlefield, 2023) and Managing Arts Organizations (Rowman & Littlefield, 2022). He earned his MFA from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, and his BA in English Literature and Russian language from Dickinson College, magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa.
PHOTO CREDIT: Photo by John Sutton
ABOUT THE PEABODY ESSEX MUSEUM
Founded in 1799, the Peabody Essex Museum (PEM) in Salem, Massachusetts is the country’s oldest continuously operating museum. PEM provides thought-provoking experiences of the arts, humanities and sciences to celebrate the creative achievements and potential of people across time, place and culture. By connecting people through inquiry, empathy and dialogue, PEM encourages an understanding of our shared humanity and fosters a sense of belonging in a complex, ever-changing world. We build, steward and share our superlative collection, which includes African, American, Asian export, Chinese, contemporary, Japanese, Korean, maritime, Native American, Oceanic and South Asian art, as well as architecture, fashion and textiles, photography and one of the nation’s most important museum-based collections of rare books and manuscripts. PEM's campus offers a varied and unique visitor experience, with hands-on creativity zones, interactive opportunities, performance spaces and the Art and Nature Center, as well as numerous gardens and more than a dozen noted historic structures, including Yin Yu Tang, a 200-year-old Chinese home that is the only example of Chinese domestic architecture in the United States.
MEDIA CONTACT
Whitney Van Dyke | Director of Marketing & Communications | whitney_vandyke@pem.org | 617-259-6722