Jacob's Pillow director Pamela Tatge earns national award for efforts to make the arts more accessible to Berkshire residents

Originally published in the Berkshire Eagle | By Matt Martinez, The Berkshire Eagle Jan 10, 2025

BECKET — Pamela Tatge, creative and executive director of Jacob’s Pillow, has received a national award for making the arts more accessible to Berkshire County residents.
Tatge was awarded the 2025 Fan Taylor Distinguished Service Award by the Association of Performing Arts Professionals, recognizing her contributions to equity and accessibility at the famed dance center and her achievements in curation and programming throughout her career. That includes her time at Wesleyan University prior to joining Jacob's Pillow in 2016.

The award is given out annually, recognizing “outstanding service, creative thinking and leadership,” according to the association's website. Tatge will be honored alongside five other recipients at an awards ceremony Jan. 13 in New York City.

It is Tatge’s second recognition by the organization, which also presented her with the William Dawson Award for Programmatic Excellence in 2010 for her work integrating the arts into different areas of study at Wesleyan.

The Fan Taylor award, by contrast, is more “holistic,” she said, recognizing an array of impacts made over the years. Tatge pointed to changes made during her leadership, including the establishment of a community engagement department and an engagement committee for its board of trustees, as examples of that work.

Pamela Tatge, executive director and artistic director at Jacob’s Pillow, is the recipient of the 2025 Fan Taylor Distinguished Service Award by the Association of Performing Arts Professionals. She will be honored alongside five other recipients at an awards ceremony Jan. 13 in New York City.

She credited Thasia Giles, director of community engagement for Jacob’s Pillow, with the implementation of the outreach efforts, which have been crucial in reaching underrepresented groups.

“I think first of all we have to fight the intimidation and the fear factor of, ‘What is that entity on the mountaintop in Becket, and why would I go there?’” Tatge said, noting that the Pillow’s approach to bridging that gap has been building “reciprocal relationships” with organizations like Latinas413 and the Berkshire branch of the NAACP.

Gwendolyn VanSant, CEO and co-founder of the nonprofit Bridge, helped Jacob's Pillow down that path as a diversity, equity and inclusion consultant. One of her first rules of thumb: meet the community where they're at before trying to bring them to the woods of Becket.

"From my training, the best way to do equity work for a college or institution is to be in relationship with your place ... that's the best way to get to know community and develop relationships" VanSant said. "I think Pam agrees with that, and she really lives that out loud."
VanSant was elated that Tatge had received the award, and described her as an authentic and earnest leader who has done a great deal to make the Pillow's audience more diverse. VanSant pointed to Pittsfield Moves, an effort to find and support dance programs in the city, as a place where much of the organization's "elbow grease" has been applied.

VanSant also said that, under Tatge's leadership, community groups and organizations are invited to performances at the Pillow when dancers representing their identities are on stage. Having taken her up on it personally, she said, it often means getting to meet the dancers and choreographers involved in the programming.

"There's a real effort to have the Pillow be a place where the community is comfortable," VanSant said.

The organization also has engaged in antiracism efforts, she said; in 2019, she concluded that it was “no longer acceptable for a single white woman to be the gatekeeper at Jacob’s Pillow.” That resulted in Tatge making her curatorial process collaborative with two other people, which has “widened the pool of artists and the lens through which we think about the work we do,” she said.

Tatge also pointed to improvements in accessibility for visitors to the grounds at Jacob’s Pillow, which have been tackled by the organization’s idea steering committee. In recent years, artists with a range of disabilities have been featured on the dance center’s stage, she said.

She also reflected on her time at Wesleyan, where her efforts to infuse the arts into everyday learning garnered attention in 2010. One of the lasting impacts she made was the implementation of a “common moment” for the entire first-year class, where they are led in a dance experience on the university’s football field during the first week of classes.
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That’s part of the overarching goal of instilling an appreciation for the arts, she said.