Glorya Kaufman, the philanthropist who remodeled dance in Los Angeles by the institution of an eponymous dance faculty at USC in addition to a outstanding dance sequence on the Music Heart, amongst many different initiatives, died Tuesday. She was 95.
“Glorya was a pressure of nature — a visionary philanthropist whose love for dance, training and neighborhood uplifted generations,” her household stated in an announcement Thursday. “Via her generosity and unwavering dedication, she remodeled levels, colleges and neighborhoods throughout Los Angeles and past.”
Kaufman’s loss of life was confirmed by a consultant for the Music Heart, which was the recipient in 2009 of a $20 million reward from Kaufman that established Glorya Kaufman Presents Dance on the Music Heart. The cash, which represented the most important donation in L.A.’s dance historical past, went towards the continued staging of appearances by a number of the world’s most well-known dancers, troupes and firms, together with the Joffrey Ballet, American Ballet Theatre, the Royal Ballet, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and Ballet Hispánico.
“Her reward to the Music Heart has made it doable for us to convey the enjoyment and great thing about dance into the hearts, minds and souls of numerous Angelenos and guests from all over the world,” Music Heart President and Chief Govt Rachel Moore stated in an announcement Wednesday. “Because of Glorya’s vital visionary management and generosity, Glorya Kaufman Presents Dance on the Music Heart at present stands as a significant a part of Los Angeles’ cultural cloth.”
Kaufman additionally donated an undisclosed sum to create and endow the USC Kaufman College of Dance, and to construct its dwelling, the Glorya Kaufman Worldwide Dance Heart. When it launched in 2012, this system was the primary new faculty to be established on the college in 40 years. It opened in 2015 with 33 college students and has nurtured the abilities of dancers who went on to work with internationally acknowledged firms and artists together with Alonzo King LINES Ballet, Staatsballett Berlin and Ballet Jazz Montreal.
In a tribute revealed by USC employees on the college’s web site, USC Interim President Beong-Soo Kim stated, “Glorya’s love for dance was contagious, and he or she unfold that love by creating alternatives for folks in every single place to expertise the transformative influence and pleasure of the humanities.”
“We’ve got a lot [dance] expertise right here in L.A.,” Kaufman informed The Instances in 2012 when the reward to USC was first introduced, “and there’s no place for them to go. We need to get the perfect college students, the perfect academics, and the children, once they graduate, will have the ability to make a residing straight away.”
Later that 12 months, The Instances described Kaufman’s significance to the dance world:
“The brand new largest title in dance is Glorya Kaufman, who shook up the humanities world final month when she gave the College of Southern California a present that regardless of its undisclosed quantity, has been referred to as one of many largest donations in dance historical past.”
USC was not the primary L.A.-area establishment of upper studying to learn from Kaufman’s largesse. In 1999 she gave $18 million to fund the restoration of the UCLA Ladies’s Health club — now referred to as Glorya Kaufman Corridor. The Instances wrote that her donation was, “the most important particular person reward the college has acquired outdoors of the well being sciences space, and the most important arts donation ever within the College of California system.”
Kaufman additionally gave cash to colleges in New York Metropolis, together with 4 lifetime endowments for undergraduates at Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. A 2,300-square-foot dance studio on the Juilliard College, which she funded, can be named after her.
Though dance was her main focus, Kaufman’s affect was felt throughout L.A.’s cultural panorama. She was a founding member of the Los Angeles Museum of Modern Artwork and likewise gave to the Los Angeles County Museum of Artwork. As well as, she was a founding trustee of the Geffen Playhouse and donated cash to construct an out of doors reception space on the theater.
Kaufman believed that dance ought to be skilled by as many individuals as doable and was dedicated to serving to much less advantaged college students acquire entry to packages of their communities. She created an endowment for a devoted dance instructor at Inside-Metropolis Arts in East L.A. and supplied funds for greater than 17,000 children to take free dance courses there every year.
The Glorya Kaufman Performing Arts Heart — a 299-seat, multi-use performing arts house, together with school rooms, rehearsal rooms and a theater — opened two years in the past at Vista Del Mar Little one and Household Providers, a nonprofit that gives psychological well being providers for neurodivergent youngsters and people experiencing behavioral problems. Kaufman’s reward got here with the launch of three new community-focused packages: a USC Alumni Residency, an L.A. Unbiased Choreographer Residency and UniverSoul Hip Hop Outreach.
The Glorya Kaufman Performing Arts Heart at Vista Del Mar was based with the announcement of three new packages: a choreography residency, a USC alumni residency and a partnership with UniverSOUL Hip Hop.
(Nic Lehoux)
Glorya Kaufman was born in Detroit to Samuel and Eva Pinkis. Her father was the manufacturing supervisor of Automotive Information and her mom was a homemaker who held management roles at numerous charities throughout the Jewish neighborhood. In interviews all through her life, Kaufman recalled early reminiscences of dancing whereas standing on her father’s toes. She additionally liked to go to Detroit’s many jazz golf equipment, which knowledgeable her lifelong love of music and dance.
Kaufman was identified with strabismus as a toddler. The situation — which causes one eye to look in a special route than the opposite — and her early experiences making an attempt to appropriate the problem, alongside along with her struggles with poor imaginative and prescient, contributed to her curiosity in serving to these with disabilities.
In 1954 Kaufman married Donald Bruce Kaufman, a builder and entrepreneur who in 1957 partnered with businessman and outstanding philanthropist Eli Broad to co-found a homebuilding firm referred to as Kaufman & Broad (now KB Dwelling). In 1963 the Kaufman household moved to Huntington Harbour after the corporate expanded to California. Three years later, they once more moved to Beverly Hills. In 1969 the Kaufmans relocated to a 48-acre Brentwood ranch they referred to as Amber Hill.
In 1983, Donald died in a aircraft crash with the couple’s son-in-law Eyal Horwitz whereas piloting an experimental biplane. To take care of her loss, Glorya threw herself into philanthropy. She created the Glorya Kaufman Basis and devoted its first main undertaking — the ten,000-square-foot Donald Bruce Kaufman Brentwood Department Library — to her late husband, a prolific reader.
Kaufman is survived by her 4 youngsters, Curtis, Gayl, Laura and Zuade; 10 grandchildren; and 13 great-grandchildren.
