Emerging Gallerist

Erin Cluley departs Dallas Contemporary to ignite art scene at Trinity Groves

In her role as director of exhibitions at the Dallas Contemporary, Erin Cluley has worked with today’s most renowned artists — including K8 Hardy, Richard Phillips, Rob Pruitt, Jennifer Rubell and Julian Schnabel. Cluley will take everything she’s learned in the past five years as she exits her current position on August 23 to embark on a new journey: opening her own gallery.

With her eponymous space in Trinity Groves, she hopes to bring a new outlook on contemporary art. Kicking off September 13, with an exhibition of works by René Treviño, the Erin Cluley Gallery will be the first focused on this genre to reside on the west side of the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge.

“There’s an excitement in Dallas right now around artists and collectors, and it’s a good time for the art community,” Cluley says.

“I’d been thinking about going back into the commercial world,” says the native Texan, who originally joined the Contemporary after four years at C. Grimaldis Gallery in Baltimore. “When I moved back to Texas, I thought I was going to come here, get the lay of the land and open my own space. But when I started working at the Contemporary, I thought the museum path was where I was going to stay.”

That is, until the fates intervened. During a trip last summer to Salem, Massachusetts, on a lark Cluley sat down for a psychic reading. When it was predicted she’d open her own space, she decided to have a sit-down meeting with Trinity Groves developer Butch McGregor upon her return.

Cluley’s time spent overseeing the execution of murals by Shepard Fairey, Faile and JR in the area gave her unique insight into the Groves’ artistic potential. McGregor gave her the perfect launching pad in the guise of an affordable 2,000-square-foot metal building on Fabrication Street.

“There’s something happening over there, and I feel like there’s room for what I want to do,” she says. “Having worked with the people in Trinity Groves, I have great relationships, enabling me to make a great physical space.

“There’s an excitement in Dallas right now around artists and collectors, and it’s a good time for the art community.”

The Erin Cluley Gallery will exhibit 10 shows a year from local and East Coast talent, and she hopes to add California artists to the mix in the coming year. In addition to Treviño, Cluley has already slated shows and projects by Baltimore’s Jimmy Joe Roche; Brooklyn’s Hidenori Ishii; and Texas artists Josephine Durkin, Francisco Moreno and Kevin Todora.

Cluley also plans on continuing the strides she’s made exhibiting public works. These may come in the more traditional sense of murals and sculpture, or as “public interventions,” such as Roche’s “Baltimore in Dallas” ’zine that will appear in the rooms of a local hotel in the coming months.

“I want to keep the public element going by helping to produce these ideas that are conceptualized by the artists. It might not be in the traditional sense, but it’ll be something that you’re going about your daily routine and you’re unexpectedly surprised.”

Erin Cluley Gallery will open to the public with a reception on September 13, 6-8 pm. The exhibition “Estrellas” by René Treviño will run through October 11. Hours are Tuesday-Saturday, 10 am-6 pm, and Sunday and Monday by appointment.

Jimmy Joe Roche, Great Alaskan Meta Dripper, 2013. Paper, acrylic paint, spray paint, 144 x 180 x 8 in. Installation view at Baltimore Museum of Art.

Photo courtesy of Baltimore Museum of Art

Jimmy Joe Roche, Great Alaskan Meta Dripper, 2013. Paper, acrylic paint, spray paint, 144 x 180 x 8 in. Installation view at Baltimore Museum of Art.

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Season Announcement

Dallas Theater Center finds rhythm and rhyme in 2025-26 season

Photo by Joan Marcus

"Ragtime" was recently staged in New York by City Center Encores.

The 2025-26 season for Dallas Theater Center is a mix of classic and new, large and small, and it even raises the curtain on more collaborations with the Tony Award-winning regional theater.

This season includes the launch of a three-year partnership between Dallas Theater Center and Stage West Theatre in Fort Worth, as well as a multi-year partnership with SMU’s Meadows School of the Arts and the Sexton Institute for Musical Theatre. An ongoing collaboration continues with TheatreSquared in Fayetteville, Arkansas, and DTC will newly partner with Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra on a concert to be performed at Bass Performance Hall featuring FWSO, conducted by Robert Spano, and actors from DTC’s Brierley Resident Acting Company, directed by DTC's executive director Kevin Moriarty.

“Collaboration is at the heart of DTC’s mission,” Moriarty says. “It’s wonderful to join with TheaterSquared to support Jonathan Norton’s brilliant playwriting and introduce his work to a national audience. Further, by partnering with Stage West Theatre, SMU’s Meadows School of the Arts and the Sexton Institute for Musical Theatre, and the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra, we are able to expand opportunities for artists, introduce new audience members to the arts, and enrich our artistry. I’m grateful to be surrounded by so many talented, visionary artists and arts leaders here in North Texas and honored to be partnering with them this season.”

“In curating Dallas Theater Center’s 2025-26 season, I chose to follow my mission as a playwright, which is to break down barriers through the shared joy of great storytelling,” says interim artistic director Jonathan Norton. “And the five shows in our upcoming season will do just that."

First up is the classic slapstick farce Noises Off by Michael Frayn, directed by Ashley H. White.

This play-within-a-play plunges you into the chaotic world of Nothing’s On, a fictional touring production tormented by backstage romances and onstage blunders. From flubbed lines to slamming doors, witness the hilarious unraveling of a troupe of eccentric actors. It runs October 3-26, 2025, at the Kalita Humphreys Theater.

Next is the Pulitzer Prize-winning Fat Ham by James Ijames, a co-production with Stage West that's directed by vickie washington.

In this Dallas premiere of the hit Broadway comedy, Juicy’s got a lot on his plate — his mom just married his uncle. All he wants is to make his own way as a queer Black man in a Southern family. But here’s the rub: his father’s ghost just turned up at a backyard barbecue demanding vengeance. In this delicious and sizzling reinvention of Shakespeare’s masterpiece, a young man vows to break the cycles of violence in service of his own liberation and joy. It runs January 30-February 8, 2026, at the Kalita Humphreys Theater

The regional premiere of Donnetta Lavinia Grays' Where We Stand, another co-pro with Stage West, follows.

Directed by Akin Babatunde, Broadway actor and Dallas legend Liz Mikel plays a lone storyteller who weaves a world through music and magic — part fable, part call-and-response. Your town stands at a crossroads. A neighbor — desperate and out of options — has struck a dangerous bargain. Now, their fate lies in your hands. In this interactive play presented as a town hall gathering, the audience must choose: mercy or justice? The future of the town — and the fate of a soul — hang in the balance. This isn’t a game. It’s your choice. It runs February 27-March 22, 2026, at Bryant Hall on the Kalita Humphreys Theater campus.

The grand, sweeping musical Ragtime will be produced in partnership with SMU and AT&T Performing Arts Center, with direction and choreography by Sexton Institute for Musical Theatre director Joel Ferrell.

Based on the novel by E.L. Doctorow, with music by Stephen Flaherty, lyrics by Lynn Ahrens, and book by Terrence McNally, the musical tells the intertwined stories of three families from different walks of life, all chasing the American Dream in 1902 New York. It runs March 27-April 19, 2026, at the Wyly Theatre.

The world premiere of Jonathan Norton's Malcolm X and Redd Foxx Washing Dishes at Jimmy’s Chicken Shack in Harlem closes out the regular season.

A commission by and co-production with TheatreSquared, which previously supported the development of Norton’s I AM DELIVERED’T, the play will be directed by Dexter J. Singleton. In the sweltering summer of 1943, two young men — Little & Foxy — forge an unlikely bond over leftover fried chicken and dirty dishwasher. But as the world outside erupts in chaos, their friendship is tested by betrayal, ambition, and the call of history. Inspired by a true story. It runs May 8-June 7, 2026, at the Wyly's Studio Theater.

"There is nothing like the rejuvenating sensation of rollicking laughter spreading through packed houses at Noises Off and Fat Ham," says Norton. "Where We Stand will inspire rich conversations about forgiveness and redemption. Ragtime will send audiences home lifted by the stirring music and feeling ever more hopeful in these changing times. And Malcolm X and Redd Foxx Washing Dishes At Jimmy’s Chicken Shack in Harlem will leave you empowered with the knowledge that true friendship can change the world. I can’t wait for October, when I get to welcome audiences at the start of our new season. We will throw open our doors and become Dallas’ town hall — a place for the community to gather for conversation, celebration, and ultimately, connection.”

There are also two add-on productions, beginning with the company's annual presentation of A Christmas Carol.

Based on the novel by Charles Dickens, adapted by Kevin Moriarty, and directed by Alex Organ, with musical direction by Cody Dry, and choreography by Joel Ferrell, DTC's production takes audiences on a magical Christmas Eve adventure with Ebenezer Scrooge, as three otherworldly spirits whisk him away on a breathtaking journey of hope and redemption. From the nostalgic warmth of Christmases past to the stark truths of the present and the ominous shadows of the future, Scrooge's journey is a spectacle of wonder. It runs November 28-December 28, 2025, at the Wyly Theatre.

Under the direction of Robert Spano and Kevin Moriarty, the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra and Dallas Theater Center collaborate to bring musical drama and theatrical intrigue center stage in the FWSO's newest "Theater of a Concert" concept: Shakespeare at the Symphony.

Featuring Mendelssohn's Selections from A Midsummer Night's Dream and Prokofiev's Selections from Romeo and Juliet, interspersed with scenes from Shakespeare, the multi-discipline production brings The Bard to life. It runs February 27-March 1, 2026, at Bass Performance Hall in Fort Worth.

DTC’s Diane and Hal Brierley Resident Acting Company members will be featured throughout the 2025-26 season. Company members include Christina Austin Lopez, Tiana Kaye Blair, Blake Hackler, Bob Hess, Liz Mikel, Alex Organ, Molly Searcy, Tiffany Solano, Sally Nysteun Vahle, Esteban Vilchez, and Zachary J. Willis.

“The talent and collaborative spirit of my colleagues in the Brierley Resident Acting Company constantly inspires me,” Norton says. “And later this spring I look forward to announcing a new company member who will further enrich our artistry.”

Subscriptions are available now and can be purchased at DallasTheaterCenter.org and by phone at 214-522-8499. Single tickets are not yet available.

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