Washington, District Of Columbia
Abel López is associate producing director of GALA Hispanic Theatre, and Chair of the Americans for the Arts. He is also past president of the National Association of Latino Arts and Culture, the Helen Hayes Awards, Theater Communications Group, the Performing Arts Alliance, Salud, and Leadership Washington; past Chair of the Creative Communities Initiative of the Community Foundation of the Community Foundation of the National Capital Region; and past Chair of the D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities and the Board of Governors of the Helen Hayes Awards. López is a member of the boards of directors of the Alliance for Inclusion in the Arts, TheatreWashington, In Series, and Black Women Playwrights Group; and served on the board of the Association of Performing Arts Presenters and the Strategic National Arts Alumni Project. As past chair of GALA Hispanic Theatre, López and Rebecca Medrano, GALA Executive Director, spearheaded a $4.4 million capital campaign to build the GALA Theatre that opened in 2005. As a director, his productions have been presented in theaters in Washington, D.C., Arizona, Texas, California, New York, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Cuba, and Venezuela. Among the honors he has received are the 2016 Herb White Award from DCAC for his contributions to the Washington, D.C., arts community, the 2015 Arthur L. Johnson Award from the Sphinx Organization, 2014 Distinguished Alumni Award from Texas A&M-Kingsville, the Selima Ottum Roberts Award from Americans for the Arts for his contributions to the arts, a 1991 Washingtonian of the Year Award, a 1991 Distinguished Leadership Award from the National Community Leadership Association, and The Washington Post Award for Distinguished Community Service at the 1990 Helen Hayes Awards. A graduate of Harvard Law School, López taught in the graduate arts management program at George Mason University.