In early July, after six months of increasingly strained relations, the board of directors of the Center for International Performance and Exhibition (CIPEX), which governs the nonprofit arts and culture venue HotHouse, suspended founder and executive director Marguerite Horberg without pay. Horberg and the board had fallen out over HotHouse’s impending transition to a dual-leadership structure–she was to remain executive director, handling programming and fund-raising, and a business director was to be hired to take over other day-to-day operations. Her suspension provoked a flurry of media coverage and online argument, much of it framing the conflict as a face-off between Horberg and board president Martin Bishop, but both parties have been publicly silent since then.
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“The board just took the action it thought was in the best interest of the organization, which was to formally end the relationship and communicate that to her,” says Bishop. “It’s not really a surprise that HotHouse and Marguerite won’t be working together anymore. She publicly stated that the way the board is currently constituted, she doesn’t want to work with the organization anyway–that was her position.” Since her suspension Horberg has had no official contact with the board except through her attorneys, and she chose not to comment for this story.
Horberg also claimed that her departure would cost HotHouse many of its sponsors, grants, and contributors, which together provide about a fifth of its budget, but so far Bishop says he’s seen no evidence of that. “We’re looking forward to talking directly with all our funders. We’ve talked with some already, and we’ve certainly answered inquiries,” he says. “But no, we haven’t noticed any mass exodus. Nobody has expressed their desire to stop funding us among those who historically have. In fact, it’s been the opposite. As I thought before, people have supported HotHouse because of the programs and the product it presents, not because of any one person. So that’s very encouraging.”
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Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): photo/Yvette Marie Dostatni, Joe Wigdahl.
