Participating on a new committee that is endeavoring to pull together arts and cultural organizations across Rensselaer County (more on this in an upcoming issue), I had the privilege of getting to know Tanya Gorlow. I mean, I had met her before at Sand Lake Center for the Arts where she is the current Executive Director but seeing her up close and in action in this work group, her professionalism and attention to detail…well, I knew I had to know more. Having not done a piece on the organization before it just seemed that now was the time.
Please state your name, organization, title. Can you give us a bit of backstory?
My name is Tanya Gorlow, I am the Executive Director at Sand Lake Center for the Arts in Sand Lake New York. My history with the center started in late winter/early spring of 2024 in a show called Little Wars. I was cast as Lillian Hellman in the fictional historical play by Steven Carl McCasland. I loved the kind, creative community that was part of SLCA. During my interview, I shared that supporting and fostering that community was a large part of my interest in the role.
I come from a background that includes leadership, marketing, production, and business development. I hold a Bachelors Degree in Anthropology and Theatre, Dance and Performance Studies from the University of California, Berkeley. I’ve held leadership roles at Dun & Bradstreet and Butcher Bird Studios. My professional endeavors supported a semi-professional career producing and performing in theatre. I found that I was learning and developing as a professional no matter what I was working on: leading a team of marketing professionals working on a product launch, breaking down a character or fundraising for an independent play. The ED role of SLCA feels like the culmination of the skills I developed in my day jobs and in the pursuit of my art.
Can you tell us a bit about SLCA? What does your programming look like? Your annual budget? How do you fit in the tapestry of such a small community?
SLCA is a not-for-profit community arts center offering theatre, music, visual arts, educational programs and more. We have a theater space, with flexible seating; a lobby that also serves as our gallery; and a small cafe that provides refreshments for our events or a place for catering to land during a rental. My understanding is that we are one of the few theaters in the Capital region that is accessible with a ramp up to the stage.
We have a 5 show theatrical season. For 2026, we opened with A Raisin In The Sun on January 30th; 1776 on April 10th; The Wolves on June 5th; Agatha Christie’s Black Coffee on August 7th; and Neil Simon’s Broadway Bound on October 16th. We also have a free concert series sponsored by Troy Sand & Gravel and Bonded Concrete, youth concerts, and musicians throughout the year. Our gallery is host to local artists – currently we have photographs on exhibit by Phil Caruso from when he was a set photographer. Vincent Caruso NYC street photography has been in the gallery during the month of February. We have workshops for all ages throughout the year, as well.
As a not-for-profit, we have fundraising events, including a Broadway revue at a local venue, and our gala, Taste of Sand Lake, where local restaurants offer a sampling of the area’s delicious cuisine.
Our annual budget is about $230,000.
We’ve been in our current location since 2002. Originally, when Circle Theatre Players signed the lease for the building it wasn’t ready for performances, visitors, or even staff. It was through the efforts of the community that the performance space was created, the backstage area set up, storage and offices established, etc. I have been fortunate enough to meet the community members who raised the barn, put the siding on the building, wired the building, put the ceiling in the performance spaces, and did just about everything else you can imagine. I was at an event where one of our community members walked up to me and said, “I have your organ in my garage.” The history of this building and this organization is in the community around it, both the immediate Sand Lake/West Sand Lake/Averill Park area and the wider Capital Region.
Currently, I am the only full-time employee. We have a few highly-appreciated part-time folks. Everything else is done by our community, from our volunteers to our sponsors to our artists to our audience. Without any one of those groups, we wouldn’t function. My hope is that through our programming that we are able to give back to the community that gives so much to us by providing opportunities to create and learn more about art, as well as experience it. I also hope that we’re a place to reconnect with old friends or meet new ones in the gallery over a coffee from Gipfel’s (ED NOTE: For our story on Sand Lake Merchant) or at a show on a Friday night after enjoying happy hour or dinner at any of the wonderful local bars and restaurants. Whenever we can collaborate with a local organization, we’re always very happy to do it and have ongoing relationships with several.
You have a strong arts and business background which gives you a rounded perspective. What would you say are the biggest challenges you have running SLCA and your methods for overcoming them?
Right now, I would say the biggest challenge is that there’s a ton of things to do that involve our programming, facilities management, fundraising, and community building and not enough time in the day. My joke last year was that I was keeping track of my surprise priority of the day: I’d go in to the center with a list of things to do, only to be surprised by something completely out of left field! Bees in the mailbox is still my favorite. My primarily method for figuring out how to tackle the growing to-do list is asking myself the following questions:
Does it impact the health and safety of anyone who comes into the building? I have shoveled the snow off the stairs more times than you can imagine because of this one. Also, the bees in the mailbox falls into this category!
Is there a deadline that affects our ability to operate? Our insurance and utility bills fall into this category, as do many other things.
Is someone waiting on me to move forward with something with will improve/impact the center? Grants, our committees, our employees and contractors, etc. are all part of this.
Is someone waiting on an answer that impacts their relationship with the center?
What will move us forward? That upper left hand corner of Stephen Covey’s Time Management Matrix for the biz nerds out there.
I’ll never get everything done, but I hope each day to be as effective as possible.
Image: Provided
You mentioned Arts Letter and Numbers in addition to Sand Lake Mechant above. How have you been able to synergize with local businesses and other mission oriented organizations in a way that creates a ‘there there’ for community?
Sand Lake Merchant has co-hosted the Merchant Market in the spring and the Holiday Market in the fall with us for a few years now. They’ve been fantastic partners, and also helped us in an incredible way during our Style on the Stage event in 2025. Brian Sheldon, who was SLCA’s previous ED for 7 years before me, worked with Arts Letter and Numbers and Nopiates for the Transformation project. There was also a performance experience that ALN held at SLCA in August of 2024.
In 2026, we’re working towards a collaboration in the gallery with ALN during the month of May. ALN does some really incredible work and there are a few things that I’d love to work with them on in the future, if we’re able. In my mind, collaboration between SLCA and ALN (and this applies to our other groups and businesses in the community) needs to take into consideration the needs of both organizations and ensure that both organizations, the artists, and the audience benefit. Since we both have physical spaces, I could imagine events in the future that has the audiences travel between the spaces to create a full experience.
SHAMELESS PLUG: Anything coming up we need to know about?
Yes! Coming up, we have our collaboration with AP Live, the Youth Music Showcase on 3/7, which highlights our areas local student musicians. We have an awesome ZenTangle craft workshop on 3/14, which is only $10 to register. We’re lucky enough to have Triskele here for St. Patrick’s Day on 3/17. And our next play is 1776, opening on 4/10.
WEB: slca-ctp.org | IG: @slca-ctp