Harold Steward

Harold Steward is a modern philosopher, strategist, and educator currently serving as the Executive Director of the New England Foundation for the Arts (NEFA), a position he assumed in July 2023. In this role, he oversees the agency's strategic vision, governance, and overall organizational excellence. Before joining NEFA, Harold was the Executive Director and Cultural Strategist at The Theatre Offensive (TTO), a Boston-based nonprofit organization dedicated to presenting liberating art by, for, and about queer and trans people of color. His leadership at TTO emphasized transcending artistic boundaries, celebrating cultural abundance, and dismantling oppression. Harold’s previous experience includes serving as the Manager of the South Dallas Cultural Center, which focuses on providing instruction and enrichment in the arts with a particular emphasis on the African contribution to world culture. In 2009, he founded the Fahari Arts Institute in Dallas, recognizing a gap in the landscape for local LGBTQ artists of color. The institute celebrated, displayed, and produced the work of queer artists from the African Diaspora. An active leader in the arts community, Harold is a former chair of the board of directors of Theater Communications Group and serves as the board clerk for MASSCreative. He is also a founding member of the NextGen National Arts Network and a founding partner of Steward Cultural Development Group. Harold has contributed to cultural equity as a facilitator with Equity Quotient. He has also served as a faculty member for American Repertory Theater's Arts & Cultural Organization Management (ACOM) executive leadership program at Harvard University and as an affiliate faculty member in the Department of Theater Studies at Emerson College. His current research interests focus on Art as Applied Social Science and Identity Reclamation, which examines the process in which oppressed individuals reclaim agency over their identity through cultural production.