When Monica Holt talks about Des Moines, it isn’t as a consolation prize or a detour from the coasts.
Asked why she chose Iowa, she pushes back at the premise. “I don’t know why you keep saying it that way,” she said with a laugh. “I’m thrilled to be here.”
Holt, the new president and CEO of Des Moines Performing Arts, arrived after nearly two decades at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. She is, in her own words, “a Broadway baby at heart who never wanted to be on stage.” She grew up steeped in musicals, records and Sunday-afternoon opera on the radio.
“I was really lucky to grow up in a household that celebrated music and celebrated all art forms,” she told the Register. “My parents were in marching band together in high school. He was a drum major. She played the flute. So music was in our lives.”
Her path into leadership, though, stayed firmly offstage.
“There is a whole wide business world in fundraising or public relations or marketing going on behind arts organizations and nonprofit arts,” Holt said she discovered in college.
That realization led her to Washington National Opera, and then to the Kennedy Center. She arrived with skills that were considered “new media” at the time, such as Facebook, Twitter, email and the website.
She spent 16 years at the center in marketing and eventually led the team. Later, she shifted into programming, working with Broadway tours and eventually into a role overseeing artistic planning, production and the Kennedy Center orchestra.
“The thing that I take away from it the most is just leading with curiosity,” Holt said. “Being surrounded by people who were willing to foster that curiosity, I was just really nurtured in that environment.”
That idea — leading with curiosity — has become a touchstone as she settles into Des Moines.
Taking the reins from Jeff Chelesvig, a generational arts leader
Holt is stepping into a role defined by her predecessor, Jeff Chelesvig, over three decades. He retired in 2025.
Chelesvig’s accomplishments include launching the Willis Broadway Series, restoring the Temple Theater and investing in numerous successful productions as part of the Independent Presenters Network, a consortium of 40 Broadway presenters, theaters and performing arts centers that spans from Los Angeles to the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., and includes Chicago, Buffalo/Rochester, Cleveland, Denver, Charlotte and Las Vegas.
“We are so lucky to have benefited from Jeff’s leadership over the past 30 years and what he built here. The foundation is so strong,” Holt said. “That’s part of the excitement of why I wanted to join an organization that had been so well cared for and stewarded. It allows us the opportunity to imagine the next chapter together, and build upon what DMPA can mean to this community in the years ahead.”
‘A complete home for the arts and community’
Holt’s overarching vision for Des Moines Performing Arts centers on a single phrase: “a complete home for the arts and community here.”
One of her first major initiatives was a comprehensive audience survey, “which I understand is the first time that’s happened in a couple of decades,” she said. More than 1,000 responded.
The responses showed a community that wants both tradition and expansion.
“There is an appetite for more community collaboration, an appetite for becoming good collaborators with the artistic community,” she said. “But there’s also an appetite for more Broadway and for more theater.”
Holt sees those interests as part of a single system.
“If a family goes to a free event in the park, and then a year later takes one of their kids to go see ‘Billy Goats Gruff’ in the Wellmark Family Series, and then the kids get older and the parents have a date night and they come to see (a Broadway show), we’re building an ecosystem that everyone can be a part of, no matter what part of life they’re in,” she said.
That commitment to “arts for every life,” as she calls it, includes reaching people who may not be able to come to a show downtown. “How can we reach out to them and bring art into their life where they are? That’s what gets me excited in the morning,” she said.
Arts, well‑being and loneliness
Some of Holt’s most animated comments come when she talks about the intersections between art and daily life, particularly health and social connection.
“We are seeing more and more that arts interventions are meaningful in the care for individuals and community,” she said.
She points to the “epidemic of loneliness” and to programs like “Dance for Parkinson’s,” a movement program where those with Parkinson’s are “able to gain some agency over their body for those moments.”
She calls it “arts for non-arts outcomes.”
“An arts intervention in that way is meaningful for an individual, it’s meaningful for a family, it’s meaningful for a community,” she said.
Education remains a core strength at DMPA — one she wants to deepen.
“We have our amazing education programs that have only grown in recent years,” she said. “But we can also do more to make sure that we’re making arts available to every life in the Des Moines metro, in Iowa and in the Midwest.”
Des Moines punches above its weight when it comes to the arts
Holt describes Des Moines as a city that overachieves when it comes to the arts.
“It’s one of the things that drew me to Des Moines,” Holt said. “To see how this community really shows up for arts and culture in a big way that you don’t see everywhere. It’s something very special here.”
She points to the Willis Broadway Series as a prime example.
The new season features four new musicals — “Maybe Happy Ending,” “Buena Vista Social Club,” “Hell’s Kitchen” and “Just in Time” — and the return of one of Broadway’s most cherished titles: “The Phantom of the Opera.” Comedy lovers can look forward to “Spamalot,” and several popular add-on titles — “The Sound of Music,” “Legally Blonde — The Musical,” “Waitress,” “Mark Twain Tonight” and “Mamma Mia!”— round out the year.
Her connection to the field is rooted in that same local‑center experience. She saw her first “Nutcracker” and her first Broadway tour at a local theater in Washington, D.C. It’s an experience she wants everyone to have in Des Moines.
“There are people working in this building because someone once took them to see a show here,” Holt said. “On any given day, when there are people walking through the halls, that could be happening. We could be making a life‑changing experience happen.”
Beyond the ticketed shows inside the Civic Center, Holt is interested in how DMPA can animate public spaces — from Cowles Commons to neighborhood parks. She points to illuminated seesaws, giant harp installations and family programming outdoors as examples that should be expanded.
This summer, that expansion continues to extend outside the theater.
The Summer Out series includes ”Storytime Under the Green Umbrella,“ where children can hear books read aloud under the “Crusoe Umbrella” designed by Pop Art sculptors Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen on Cowles Commons, 221 Walnut St., Des Moines, on June 10 and 24, July 8 and 22 and Aug. 5 and 10.
FLIP Fabrique: ”Summer Break,“ a circus that celebrates summer camp, comes to three locations across the metro on June 13-15.
Polyglot Theatre’s “BEES,” where three human-sized bees busy themselves in the creation of a community alongside children who transform into bees as they play, takes place across the metro July 14-17.
“Domino Effect” by Ingrid Ingrid, filled with oversized luminous dominos spread across several stations, takes over Cowles Commons Aug. 31-Sept. 30. Each station has its own music and visitors can push over these works to watch them topple.
Looking ahead a decade
Holt is already thinking in cycles of years, not seasons. Planning for performing arts is on two‑ to five‑year cycles, and next season is already planned. She is now focusing on what’s beyond, such as the 50th anniversary of Des Moines Performing Arts in 2029 and collaborating with other arts organizations in the metro.
“The things that will always pique my interest long term are when we have opportunities to bring artists of different genres together,” she said. “Because I also think that that starts to create shared understanding, new people at the table.”
Holt’s answers often circle back to a simple conclusion: she genuinely likes it here. Meeting the staff confirmed the decision. “That was when I knew without a doubt that I really wanted this job,” she said. “The culture that’s been established is healthy and supportive and joyful and kind, which are all things I am seeking in this moment.”
Asked why Des Moines, her answer is direct. “I tell people here every day that I feel very lucky to be here,” Holt said. “Because it’s great here.”
Meet Monica Holt
(This article was updated to correct a factual error.)
Susan Stapleton is the entertainment editor and dining reporter at The Des Moines Register. You can reach out to her on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram, or drop her a line at sstapleton@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Des Moines Performing Arts’ new president thrilled to expand community
Reporting by Susan Stapleton, Des Moines Register / Des Moines Register
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Susan Stapleton, Des Moines Register | USA TODAY Network
