What Will It Take to Create a Sustainable Arts Environment in Nashville?

Jennifer Gilligan Cole (Jen) is the Executive Director of the Metro Nashville Arts Commission where she leads the city’s efforts in art, culture and creative economy. She has over 20 years of experience in organizational leadership and change management.

Nationally, Cole serves as a board member of Americans for the Arts, chair of the US Urban Arts Federation and as a member of the PolicyLink cohort on arts and cultural equity. She has served as grant reviewer for ArtPlace America and the National Endowment for the Arts and delivers lectures and talks on the role of community transformation through the arts. Cole has worked extensively in the public and non-profit sectors in a variety of executive leadership positions including as Vice President of Strategy at HandsOn Network in Atlanta, GA and as principal in a private consulting practice focused on change management and strategic long-range planning. In addition to her active work in the arts, she is an active civic and community leader in Nashville. She is Board Member of the Music Makes Us Program and the Metro Disaster Response Fund. She is a graduate of Leadership Nashville and Leadership Tennessee. Cole served on Mayor Karl Dean’s transition team and was appointed by him to temporarily lead the Office of Flood Recovery following a county wide flood disaster in May 2010.

Under her leadership at Metro Arts, Nashville has increased its public art collection by 4700%, finalized a city wide general plan focused on creative economy and the arts, passed artisan zoning policies, expanded artist affordable housing and production space and launched a sector-wide effort to deepen racial equity within the arts.

Cole is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Mary Washington College (now the University of Mary Washington) in Fredericksburg, VA where she earned her degree in English.