About Nataki

A change-maker, trailblazer, and nationally recognized Artistic Leader, Nataki Garrett is the co-Artistic Director of One Nation/One Project and the national Arts and Health initiative #ArtsforEveryBody. She made history as the first Executive Artistic Director and the sixth Artistic Director of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF) and the first Black female in this role. She is the first female and person of color in the country to lead a $44M theater company. Sounds like you. There are over 1.5 billion websites out there, but your story is what’s going to separate this one from the rest.

Washington, D.C. born and raised Oakland, CA her family of artists, educators and civil rights organizers instilled with a deep appreciation for collaboration, coalition building, and for centering access and cultural justice through performance. A multi-hyphenate artist and director of films, Opera and Theater Garrett’s vision is to support artists; to manifest innovation; to inspire creativity and to ensure the future of performance by centering artists as thought leaders and change makers who transform culture.

Nataki previously served as Acting Artistic Director at the Denver Center Theatre Company where she was also the first black person and the only woman to serve in that role as well. for nearly a decade Nataki stewarded the careers of emerging artists at CalArts School of Theater where she served as Associate Dean and Associate Artistic Director at CalArts Center for New Performance.

Amongst her many accomplishments, Nataki used her platform to organize the Professional Non-profit Theater Coalition – a national coalition organized to help the theater industry advocate for the $15B Shuttered Venue Operators Grant of historically unprecedented funding from the federal government. Nataki saved OSF from sunsetting during the pandemic closure in 2020 by raising $19M from government, foundational and individual donors without the support of a full development team.

Garrett has supported artists around the world serving on nominating committees and panels including the prestigious 2022 Windham Campbell Prize, the Pew Arts and Culture Award, the MacArthur Award, Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust Award, The Kilroys, Fox Foundation Resident Actor Fellowship, Mellon Foundation Playwrights Award Panel, the Hermitage Greenfield Prize, the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, several NEA panels, and countless juries

While at OSF Nataki created and produced “Quills Fest,” the first of its kind fully immersive digital event intersecting XR and Theater. She created and directed an episode of The Cymbeline Project which received the 2023 Young-Howze Award for Digital Theater. Garrett executive produced the 2022 Sundance award winning film “YOU GO GIRL!”, and the film ASHLAND both by Shariffa Ali. Her leadership in this new frontier has garnered her several awards including the 2023 Bronze Telly Award and the OMPA Creative Innovation award.

Nataki is the first recipient of the Ammerman Award for Directing from Arena Stage in 2019, the 2022 United States Artist Fellowship and the National Directing Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts and Theater Communications Group in 2007.

Garrett is frequently sought voice for her thought leadership and expertise, Garrett can be read, watched, or listened to regularly across regional and national news media.