Finding dollars – and delight – in the arts

In 33 years as CEO of ArtsWestchester in White Plains, one of the flagship arts councils in New York state, Janet T. Langsam has been a kind of magician – transforming the arts into something that can be measured, to an extent, in dollars and cents. During her tenure, ArtsWestchester has raised $75 million for arts and culture in the county, while growing its budget from $1 million to $7 million. The annual return on that investment in post-pandemic economic activity has been $182 million.  

Langsam will be leaving her post June 30 – her successor will be announced in the spring after a nationwide search – but don’t say she is retiring. The woman who began her career as a journalist and served three New York City mayors – John V. Lindsay, Abe Beame  and Ed Koch – in various planning, cultural and housing positions is already writing a memoir and returning to painting abstract acrylics.   

All this while suffering from dry macular degeneration, an incurable eye disorder that has robbed her of her central vision and ability to read. (She dictates her This and That blog for ArtsWestchester and is using the Fusion program for her memoir.) While she may have lost her central, though not peripheral, vision, she hasn’t lost her sense of humor. For a wide-ranging interview at her woodsy, light-filled home in White Plains, graced by her paintings, other artists’ works and two frisky Coton de Tulears named Thelma and Louise (after the seminal 1991 film), Langsam sported vibrant, thick-rimmed Iris Apfel-style glasses and a red blouse speckled with black and white eyes.)

“The kind of thing I like to do is to take something from the past and put a new spin on it for what is happening today,” she said. That’s exactly what she did when ArtsWestchester purchased the 12-story, 95-year-old People’s National Bank & Trust Co. in 1998 for $1.2 million and transformed it into Arts Westchester’s Arts Exchange headquarters, home to artists’ studios and arts-related businesses like architectural firms as well. 

For Langsam, the past, present and future are a continuum, with one flowing into the next, giving her insight into what’s trending in the arts and the economy. While the arts and humanities may have ceded pride of place to the STEM-centric curricula that students, parents and educators assume will ultimately lead to higher-paying jobs, Langsam said the arts have still managed to survive and even thrive partly by becoming more accessible to communities. Arts Westchester’s ArtsMobile, for instance – a colorful Ram van outfitted with art supplies and supported by Con Ed and White Plains Hospital – offers free programming and workshops to kids in their own neighborhoods. Municipalities are nurturing such organizations as the Bedford Playhouse, the Chappaqua Performing Arts Center, the Pelham Art Center and The Rye Arts Center, to name a few. 

“People want to know there is something in their own backyard,” Langsam said, adding that with the help of State Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins, ArtsWestchester secured $3 million in state funds to “Restart the Arts” post-Covid for 65 artists and 100 organizations that included schools, libraries, wellness centers, environmental groups and parks.  

Recently, Westchester County Executive George Latimer and the Westchester County Board of Legislators joined the arts council to announce that 85 Westchester arts organizations were the recipients of matching funds from the Art$WChallenge grant program.  

In a record-breaking 2023, participating arts organizations raised $819,759 – the largest amount in a single year – in new private funds from 1,234 donors. These private funds were matched with $463,325 in Westchester County support, providing $1.28 million for the arts community.  

“Since the inception of the Art$WChallenge in 2007, this powerful public/private program has raised nearly $7 million to support Westchester’s arts and cultural sector, matched with over $3 million in county support,” said Latimer, the fourth county executive with whom Langsam has partnered, after Andrew O’Rourke, Andy Spano and Rob Astorino. 

Meanwhile, a growing immigrant population has been served by a Westchester Roots series that has delved into cultures ranging from Afghan to Vietnamese. Arts Westchester’s Teen Tuesdays & Thursdays program has addressed mental health issues.  

Over the last quarter-century, the arts council has also worked with government agencies and corporations, including the New York State Thruway Authority, the Cappelli Organization and Ginsburg Development Cos., to create a place for more than 30 public artworks.  

Art, Langsam said, “is the first and the last thing you remember,” referring to early childhood experiences of drawing and singing and the increasing role of the arts in confronting dementia. “But that’s not the only thing. It’s about joy.” 

Growing up in Far Rockaway, Queens, she was introduced to the joy of the arts by a mother who was a teacher, “schlepping” her initially reluctant child via the Long Island Railroad to the New York Philharmonic’s Young People’s Concerts, made famous by composer-conductor Leonard Bernstein; dance classes; museums; and other cultural happenings. After attending Syracuse University, Langsam received a Bachelor of Science degree in journalism from New York University and later a Master of Public Administration degree from NYU’s Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Administration. (At NYU, she also studied with representational painter Gregorio Prestopino and abstract painter and collagist Leo Manso.) As a journalist, Langsam worked for The Long Island Free Press, the New York Post and House Beautiful before being selected by Mayor Lindsay to lead a pilot program to decentralize New York City government through planning boards. (As community board chair in Queens, Langsam spearheaded the budget hearings that led to the establishment in 1972 of the Queens Museum, for which she also served as board chair.) 

She was deputy commissioner of cultural affairs for Mayors Beame and Koch, securing $30 million in new funds for arts institutions during the city’s fiscal crisis in the mid-1970s. In 1987, she became president and CEO of the Boston Center for the Arts, helping the Boston Ballet create a new building and rehearsal space. 

Before she transitions to CEO emerita in the summer, Langsam will be feted by the Neuberger Museum of Art at Purchase College (April 13). The Vault of ArtsWestchester’s gallery will be named for her and feature exhibits by contemporary artists. 

It is her support of artists that has been most special to her, and as an arts consultant that support will continue. So she’s not moving on. Rather Langsam is going forward, taking her beloved artists and arts lovers with her.  

For more, visit artswestchester.org.