Hermitage Artist Retreat Adds Mark Ronson, Will Butler to Curatorial Council

The Hermitage Artist Retreat recently announced its 2026-2027 Curatorial Council, comprised of distinguished national arts leaders spanning the fields of theater, music, visual art, literature, and arts education.

The newest additions to the Council include Mark Ronson, Academy Award and nine-time Grammy Award-winning songwriter and producer; Will Butler, Grammy Award-winning and Academy Award-nominated composer; Bill Rauch, Tony Award-winning Artistic Director of the Perelman Performing Arts Center; Ian Alteveer, Beal Family Chair of Contemporary Art at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; and Justin Torres, a National Book Award-winning author and Hermitage alumnus.

(Full bios below for new Hermitage Curatorial Council members below.)

The full National Curatorial Council for the Hermitage's 2026-2027 season, comprised of fifteen accomplished and diverse nominating members from across the United States, includes:

• Ian Alteveer* (Visual Art), Chair of Contemporary Art, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
• Courtney J. Boddie (Arts Education), VP, Education & School Engagement, New Victory/New 42
• Will Butler* (Music), Grammy Award-Winning & Academy Award-Nominated Composer
• Kimberli Gant (Visual Art), Curator of Modern & Contemporary Art, Brooklyn Museum
• Lauren Groff (Literature), New York Times Bestselling Author & Time '100 Most Influential People'
• Cathy Park Hong (Literature), Pulitzer Prize Finalist & Time '100 Most Influential People'
• Rajiv Joseph (Theater), Obie Award-Winning Playwright & Screenwriter
• Christine Kuan (Visual Art), President & Executive Director, Creative Capital
• Tina LaPadula (Arts Education), Founder of Arts Corps & Arts Ed Manager, City of Seattle
• Lynn Nottage (Theater), Two-Time Pulitzer Prize-Winning Playwright
• Shara Nova (Music), Grammy Award-Nominated Recording Artist & Performer
• Bill Rauch* (Theater), Tony Award-Winning Artistic Director of Perelman Performing Arts Center
• Mark Ronson* (Music), Academy Award & Grammy Award-Winning Songwriter & Producer
• Justin Torres* (Literature), National Book Award-Winning Author
• Du Yun (Music), Pulitzer Prize-Winning & Grammy Award-Nominated Composer

*New to the Council as of 2026

'We are honored to welcome these visionary and forward-thinking arts leaders to the Hermitage Curatorial Council,' says Andy Sandberg, Hermitage Artistic Director and CEO. 'Ian Alteveer, Will Butler, Bill Rauch, Mark Ronson, and Justin Torres are innovative creative minds with a finger on the pulse, each highly regarded for their unique contributions to their respective fields. The members of this esteemed Curatorial Council share a collective passion for the development and creation of new work from bold and diverse voices, and we are incredibly fortunate to have these luminaries of the arts in the Hermitage family. With their breadth of experience, their vast networks, and their insightful ability to identify extraordinary talent, the selection of this next wave of Hermitage Fellows is in exceptionally capable hands.'

Mark Ronson is a globally celebrated DJ and a nine-time Grammy Award, Academy Award, and Golden Globe Award-winning producer and songwriter. He began his career DJ-ing in 1990s New York before rising to fame with standout collaborations, including Amy Winehouse's Back to Black, which earned him multiple Grammys including Producer of the Year, and the global smash 'Uptown Funk' with Bruno Mars. He co-wrote the Oscar, Golden Globe, and Grammy-winning hit 'Shallow' for A Star Is Born and has worked with artists like Lady Gaga, Adele, Paul McCartney, Miley Cyrus, and Dua Lipa. In 2023, he served as executive producer and composer for Barbie: The Album and its score, earning another Grammy, and in early 2025, executive produced SNL50: The Homecoming Concert with Lorne Michaels. His memoir, Night People: How to Be a DJ in '90s New York City, was released in September of 2025 and earned him a spot on The New York Times Bestsellers list, and the Sunday Times 'Top 10 Bestsellers' list. The memoir was quickly snapped up by Brad Pitt's Plan B and Warner Brothers Studios for a film adaptation. Most recently, Mark received the 2026 Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music and highlighted the show with a seven-minute live performance featuring Ghostface Killah and Dua Lipa.

Will Butler is an award-winning musician and composer. As a member of the band Arcade Fire until 2022, he released era-defining records such as Funeral and The Suburbs, which won the 2011 Grammy Award for Album of the Year. Along with Owen Pallett, he was nominated for the Oscar for Best Original Score for the Spike Jonze film Her. He has collaborated with a wide range of artists, including Emma Stone, Terry Gilliam, Greta Gerwig, choreographer Ryan Heffington and comedians Jo Firestone and Patti Harrison. He is currently a recording artist for Merge Records. Stereophonic was his Broadway debut, earning 13 Tony Award nominations, including Best Score and Best Orchestrations.

Bill Rauch is the inaugural Artistic Director of the Perelman Performing Arts Center (PAC NYC), at the World Trade Center. His work as a theater director has been seen across the nation, from community centers to Broadway in the Tony Award-winning production of All The Way, its sequel The Great Society, and most recently co-directing Cats: The Jellicle Ball, for which he won the 2026 Tony Award for Best Director of a Musical. From 2007 to 2019, Bill was Artistic Director of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, the country's oldest and largest rotating repertory theater. Bill co-founded Cornerstone Theater Company where he served as artistic director from 1986 to 2006, directing collaborations with diverse, rural, and urban communities nationwide.

Ian Alteveer, a 2026 Hermitage Greenfield Prize juror, joined the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston in 2023 as the Beal Family Chair of Contemporary Art, where he leads the department focused on art made after 1955 and where his project Martin Puryear: Nexus, a 50-year survey of the American sculptor, is currently on view. Prior to his current role, Alteveer was the inaugural Aaron I. Fleischman Curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, where he curated the survey Cecily Brown: Death and the Maid, as well as retrospectives for Kerry James Marshall, Marisa Merz, David Hockney, and Vija Celmins. Alteveer is a graduate of Stanford University and New York University's Institute of Fine Arts.

Justin Torres is a Hermitage alumnus and the author of Blackouts, which won the National Book Award for Fiction and the California Book Award, and was a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Lambda Literary Award, the Inside Literary Prize, and the Orwell Prize for Political Fiction. A 2025 Berlin Prize Fellow at the American Academy, he's also received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard, and the New York Public Library's Cullman Center. His first novel We the Animals was a national bestseller and adapted into a feature film. He lives in Los Angeles and is a professor of English at UCLA.

Members of the Hermitage Curatorial Council are experts in their disciplines and connected to some of the world's most renowned artists and cultural institutions. Each year, the Council selects artists of extraordinary ability who are already making an impact in their field – artists, writers, performers, and educators who are eager to continue developing bold and impactful new works, and who may benefit creatively from a distinguished Hermitage Fellowship. Since national and international Hermitage Fellowships are curated, there is no application for a Hermitage residency; neither the Hermitage staff nor members of the Curatorial Council can accept applications or solicitations. However, Sarasota County artists and arts teachers in Florida schools can find information on how to apply to select programs (John Ringling Towers Fellowships and Hermitage STARs) through the Hermitage website.

A leading national arts incubator, the Hermitage is the only major arts organization in Florida's Gulf Coast exclusively committed to supporting the development and creation of new work across all artistic disciplines. The Hermitage hosts artists on its Gulf Coast Manasota Key home for multi-week residencies, where diverse and accomplished artists from around the world and across multiple disciplines create and develop new works of theater, music, visual art, literature, dance, film, and more. As part of their residencies, Hermitage Fellows participate in free year-round community programs, offering audiences in the region a unique opportunity to engage with some of the world's leading artists and to get an authentic 'sneak peek' into extraordinary projects and artistic minds before their works go on to major galleries, concert halls, theaters, and museums around the world. These free and innovative programs include performances, conversations, readings, music concerts, interactive experiences, open studios, school programs, teacher workshops, and more, serving thousands in our regional community each year.

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