High Concept Labs Welcomes New Managing Director
High Concept Laboratories announced today that Angee Lennard recently joined HCL as its new Managing Director. She joins HCL Artistic Director Yolanda Cesta Cursach Montilla in a co-leadership position with the organization. In partnership with Yolanda and HCL’s Board of Directors, Angee will steer the organization through its next phase of growth and innovation.
“We are so pleased and fortunate that Angee has joined our team as Managing Director,” stated Kevin Simmons, HCL founder and Co-Chair of HCL’s Board of Directors. “She embodies the passion and commitment required to build a creative community, while understanding the inherent challenges in sustaining and growing a non-profit arts organization.”
“Angee brings a depth of experience and expertise as an arts administrator and will bring much needed stability to HCL,” added Co-Chair Peter Taub. “After an extensive search, the Board is confident that Angee is the right person to elevate our operations in a way that will compliment and support the outstanding artistic excellence Yolanda has achieved since joining HCL.”
Yolanda, HCL’s Artistic Director since 2019, states, “I welcome Angee as a co-leader as we investigate how residencies and public events can better support current and future artists. HCL has always tended to artists whose multidisciplinary work reveals the concerns of the time. I am eager to work alongside Angee to broaden access to artists who amplify their communities and to provide a full range of resources guided by the principles of equity and inclusion.”
Ms. Lennard is an arts administrator and printmaker. Her deep involvement in the arts has spanned organizational leadership, operational management, program development, studio maintenance, and print production. She was the founder and Executive Director of Spudknik Press Cooperative, a community-based printmaking studio for fifteen years. As a professional printmaker, she has collaborated with local and nationally-recognized artists. She has been a lecturer at School of the Art Institute of Chicago in the Arts Administration and Policy and the Printmedia departments, and served as a Marwen Foundation Teaching Fellow and Treasurer for the Chicago Printers Guild (CPG). These experiences led her to a variety of local, regional, and national speaking engagements, as well as a variety of roles with colleges, universities, non-profits, and museums.
“I am deeply invested in HCLs’ mission to provide artists with the space, time, resources, and community that is required for sustained artistic experimentation,” Lennard said. “I look forward to collaborating with Yolanda to advance HCL programs through an artist-first approach.”