Cleveland Institute of Art CEO and leadership

Kathryn Heidemann is a senior arts management and higher education leader, educator, and artist who joined Cleveland Institute of Art as dean of faculty and vice president of academic affairs in 2019. As a chief academic officer, Kathryn provides leadership for the college’s educational programs in support of the college’s mission including program and curricular development and delivery, accreditation and assessment, and academic operations and strategy.

Before coming to CIA, Kathryn worked at Carnegie Mellon University, where she served as Assistant Dean at the College of Fine Arts and Heinz College of Public Policy & Information Systems Management. As part of her role, she also spearheaded the arts and entertainment management graduate programs in Pittsburgh and Los Angeles, creating data- and tech-informed leaders in the visual arts, performing arts, interactive and entertainment media.

Kathryn brings two decades of art industry experience to her work at CIA, having worked in artistic programming, operations, external relations, and education and community engagement for a variety of cultural institutions including The Pittsburgh Cultural Trust, Chicago Academy for the Arts, and Edinburgh Festival Fringe, to name a few.

Kathryn holds a Master of Arts Management (MAM) degree from Carnegie Mellon University and a Bachelor of Arts degree from Columbia College Chicago.

John Tortelli previously served as the Vice president for Finance and Administration at Notre Dame College in South Euclid and CFO at Western Reserve Academy in Hudson. He has also served as a Certified Public Accountant at the Cleveland-based auditing firm now known as Maloney + Novotny and as a supervisor at Swagelok Company in Solon. In addition, Tortelli has consulted for the Eleanor B. Rainey Memorial Institute in Cleveland and the Cleveland chapter of Say Yes to Education.