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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE -- March 29, 2005
Contact: Scott Hirko, Public Relations Officer
(517) 372-7770 -- shirko [at] mihumanities.org

TWO DETROITERS ELECTED TO HUMANITIES BOARD

Dominic Pangborn, Shaun Nethercott To Serve Statewide Nonprofit Organization

(LANSING)-----Two individuals from Detroit have recently been elected to the Board of Directors of the Michigan Humanities Council: Dominic Pangborn, President/CEO of Pangborn Design, Ltd.; and, Shaun Nethercott, Executive Director of the Matrix Theatre Company. Each was elected to complete a three-year term beginning January 1, 2005, and ending December 31, 2007.

The Michigan Humanities Council’s Board of Directors consists of 19 members whose responsibilities range from program and proposal review, planning, fundraising, advocacy for the humanities, liaison to projects and other representation of the Council at activities around the state. Two members of the Council are gubernatorial appointees while the Council Board elected 17.

Dominic Pangborn is founder, President and CEO of Pangborn Design, Ltd. He has established an international reputation in the graphic design industry. His clients include Fortune 500 companies The Procter & Gamble Company, Audi of America and Pfizer. Over the past 10 years, Pangborn has established his own fashion label, the Pangborn Design Collection, with retail stores located throughout metropolitan Detroit and St. Thomas US Virgin Islands. Pangborn has been very active in the community, including service on the boards of ArtServe Michigan, the Detroit Chamber of Commerce, New Detroit, Latino Family Services, U.S. Pan Asian Chamber of Commerce, Meadowbrook Theatre, and the Detroit Medical Center. He was instrumental serving in planning and fundraising for the Detroit Science Center, the College for Creative Studies, and the southeastern Michigan chapter of the American Red Cross. Pangborn studied at the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts and continued his education at Syracuse Universtiy and the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia.

Shaun Nethercott serves as the Executive Director of the Matrix Theatre Company since 1991. She co-founded this nationally-recognized non-profit theatre which is dedicated to creating a community of creativity through original theatre. Under her leadership, the Matrix Theatre Company has won a variety of awards, including most recently the 2004 Imagining Michigan Outstanding Community University Partnership, the 2004 Ginsberg Center Exemplary University Community Partnership, and the 2003 Governor’s Art Award for Community Art Organization. In 1994, the Michigan Humanities Council recognized the Matrix Theatre project, “Beyond Violence,” as an Exemplary Humanities Project for its 20th Anniversary Event. From 1996-2000, while at Matrix Theatre Nethercott also served as Program Director of the El Arte Alliance for the Detroit Institute of Arts. Prior to founding the Matrix Theatre Company, she was a Producer for MediaVision in Detroit, a Director/Guest Artist with Worker’s Concept Theatre in Ypsilanti, and a Guest Artist/Visiting Assistant Professor for the University of Michigan-Flint. Nethercott earned a Ph.D. in Theatre from the University of Utah in 1985, a Master of Arts in Theatre from the University of Wyoming in 1980, and a Bachelor of Arts in Theatre and in English from the University of Wyoming in 1978.

The Michigan Humanities Council, founded in 1974, is the state’s independent, non-profit affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

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