After decades of experience leading performing arts organizations, as well as consulting on dozens of facilities projects throughout the United States, Victor opened his Performing Arts Facilities Planning practice in January 2018.

Victor Gotesman provides consulting services for the development and operation of performing arts spaces, including feasibility and business planning studies, market demand analysis, facility operations, operating estimates, programming, staffing, and governance. Prior to starting his own practice, Victor was a Vice President at Arts Consulting Group (ACG), leading the firm’s Facilities and Program Planning area. While at ACG, he oversaw major planning studies at the Lake on Wilshire Cultural Center in Los Angeles and at Artpark in upstate New York. 

A career arts administrator with more than 40 years of experience working in the performing arts, Victor has held leadership positions at an array of nonprofit cultural organizations and government agencies, as well as executive roles with theater consulting and planning firms, overseeing some of America’s most important cultural facilities projects.

From 2011 to 2016 Victor was the Executive Director of ODC in San Francisco, where he was responsible for all aspects of the dance organization’s $5.7 million budget. Prior to joining ODC, he co-founded The Center for Creative Resources, which provided consulting services in arts management, marketing, and fundraising to artists and arts organizations in the New York metropolitan area. Serving as CCR’s President, he was contracted by The New York Times to develop and implement an operating business plan for the Times Center, a 378-seat venue within its Times Square headquarters. The three-year contract included implementation of the business plan and full management of the Times Center during its first year of operation.

Victor was the President and Principal-in-Charge of feasibility studies and planning projects at Theater Projects Consultants (TPC) beginning in 1996. While at TPC, he managed the firm’s business development and acted as lead consultant on numerous projects, including facility redevelopment master plans, cultural facility studies and program plans, and new performing arts center market feasibility studies. His clients included the City of Dallas, Kodak (Dolby) Theater in Los Angeles, and New York’s Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. For two years, Victor served as Managing Director of Jaffe Holden Acoustics, overseeing the firm’s operation and business development.

Prior to becoming a consultant, Victor was hired as the first Executive Director of the Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts in Los Angeles, where he opened and led the organization for its first five years of operation.  He developed dynamic programming in the competitive Southern California market and created the infrastructure, policies, and organizational design. The Cerritos Center was recognized nationally by Performance Magazine as the top venue under 3,000-seats for its overall earned revenue in 1995. He previously held executive positions at performing arts centers throughout the United States, including Director of Programming for the Fine Arts Center at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, Program Manager/Consultant at the University of Montana, and Director of Marketing at Kimball Recital Hall at the University of Nebraska.

Victor holds a Master of Fine Arts in Arts Administration from the University of Iowa and a Bachelor of Arts in Music from the University of Rochester/Eastman School of Music.