Newport
Dominique Alfandre has been involved in arts management since college, where she managed the Radcliffe Choral Society, produced plays and inhaled a seminar in arts management taught by Tom Wolfe. On graduation, she moved to New York City, becoming Assistant Manager for Nikolais Dance Theatre and then a press representative at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. She moved to Newport with her husband Thomas Palmer in 1982 just at the time that Miki Ohlsen and a group of dancers were forming the Island Moving Company. First as a Board member and later as a paid manager, Dominique worked with the ballet company throughout, recently retiring as Executive Director. Meanwhile, she became active in the arts community in Rhode Island, especially interested in the need for a performing arts space for Newport. In that time, she helped found the RI Dance Consortium; RI Citizens for the Arts; and the Arts & Cultural Alliance of Newport County, which she chaired for 8 years. She has worked as a consultant with Janice Kissinger at Non Profit Advisory Services and has offered counsel to many fledgling arts organizations. She has served on the Boards of Island Arts, RI Citizens for the Arts and the Newport Performing Arts Center. She currently serves on the Boards of the Newport Performing Arts Center, the Arts & Cultural Alliance and the RI State Council on the Arts. She is co-Chair of Island Moving Company’s Choreographing Our Future capital campaign and chairs the newly formed Board of the Newport String Project. Dominique was a 2005 RI Foundation Fellow and received the Arts & Business Council’s Arts Advocate Award in 2005. In 2010, she was recognized for her contribution to the arts community with the inaugural annual “Dominique Award” by the Arts & Cultural Alliance of Newport County.