Patti Pon is the president and CEO of Calgary Arts Development. A passionate and visionary champion for her community, she holds a deep belief in the power and potential that creativity and innovation bring to cities and communities. One of her greatest honours was to be gifted the Blackfoot name Miss’tommohtsaamiaakii – Two Standing Headdress Woman, in 2021.
Patti has served in senior leadership positions at the EPCOR Centre for the Performing Arts (now Werklund Centre), the Alberta Performing Arts Stabilization Fund, and Alberta Theatre Projects, among others. She has been president and CEO of Calgary Arts Development since 2013 and led the organization through the process of tripling its budget in 2019.
Patti currently chairs the board of the Agora Foundation, publisher of The Philanthropist Journal. She was the first person of colour to be elected to the Calgary Stampede board, a position she held from 2021 to 2024, and in 2020 she completed her full nine-year term on the board of Calgary Foundation. She is a founding board member of the Asian Heritage Foundation (Southern Alberta), served on the steering committee for imagineCalgary, and is a past board chair of Canada’s oldest public radio station, CKUA Radio. She also served as a board member for the Calgary Bid Exploration Committee and related entities that explored the potential for Calgary to submit a bid for the 2026 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games.
From March to June 2025, Patti was the inaugural policy fellow at the Cultural Policy Hub at OCAD University. Also in 2025, she was appointed to the boards of the National Theatre School and Inspirit Foundation.
Patti has been awarded the Queen Elizabeth II Platinum Jubilee Medal, the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal, and was the 2013 Harry and Martha Cohen Award recipient, recognizing significant contribution to Calgary’s theatre community. In 2025, she received an honorary doctor of laws from Mount Royal University in recognition of her community service and work in the arts.
Artists can offer new perspectives to shape policy and tackle complex challenges, says Patti Pon, president and CEO of Calgary Arts Development. She calls on local institutions and funders to be co-conspirators in engaging artists to play a bigger role in shaping Canadian society.
