CULTURAL COORDINATOR PAULA RUBENSTEIN BRINGS ARTS TO LIFE AT WESTCHESTER COMMUNITY COLLEGE

The office of Dr. Paula Rubenstein (Dobbs Ferry resident) at Westchester Community College is unlike any other office on the campus. The tables are loaded with huge stacks of telephone books, newspaper clippings, theater programs, CD’s, DVD’s, video and audio cassettes. A TV set is surrounded by an assortment of electronic media equipment, and the walls are covered with photographs and posters of various entertainers including Chinese acrobats, Romanian gypsy dancers, bluegrass musicians, Flamenco dancers, and a troupe of Shakespearean actors. To the uninformed visitor it might seem that Rubenstein’s job is all play and no work.

Nothing could be further from the truth. As coordinator of the Office of Cultural Affairs, she is responsible for scheduling the cultural events presented at the college. She puts together a full program of entertainment offerings each semester and brings an amazing variety of performers to the Valhalla campus every year. Her efforts have established Westchester Community College as one of the county’s most important venues for performing artists from all over the world.

The Alvin Ailey Dance Company, the Harlem Boys Choir, and the St. Petersburg Ice Ballet are just a few of the famous groups who have performed in the college’s 394-seat theater. There are also performances by not-so-famous entertainers. Some are keeping alive old and unfamiliar music and dance genres such as Appalachian clog dancing; others come to share a culture that is virtually unknown to Americans, like the group of Tibetan monks who performed their sacred music and dance. In her desire to educate as well as entertain, Rubenstein assembles a lineup of performances that, it is probably safe to say, cannot be found anywhere else.

The Dobbs Ferry resident, who lives with her husband and their daughter, came to Westchester Community College in 1993 as a part-time program coordinator for Mainstream, the college’s retirement institute. A year or so later she was asked to take over the fledgling Office of Cultural Affairs. Prior to that, the various cultural events presented at the college were booked through individual departments and faculty members. In the early 1990’s President Joseph N. Hankin decided that these events needed a central clearinghouse. And he also envisioned something more. He believed that, with professional direction, the college had the potential to expand its cultural offerings and become a major center for the performing arts in Westchester. To this end he established an Office of Cultural Affairs, and in 1994 he named Rubenstein as the permanent Coordinator.

“We do a lot of premieres here,” she says. Many performers like the intimacy of the college’s theater. “I love that there is an educational component to all of this”, she says.  “It’s not just a show where people pay money, watch, and leave. There’s a magic that’s very special. You sit close, interact, and often get to meet the performers. There’s a sense that the audience is being brought along on the journey”.

The journey has not always been a smooth one.  When the St. Petersburg Ice Ballet agreed to appear, she had to oversee the complicated process of turning the theater’s stage into an ice rink to accommodate 24 skaters. She hired two workers to build a frame around the perimeter of the stage, fill it with water, and freeze it. The workers slept in the theater for two nights, taking turns adding layers of water as each previous layer froze. She checked in on them regularly, and when the ice rink was completed she brought in her ice skates and tested it out. She was happy with the frozen surface, the Russian skaters were happy, and ultimately, the audience was happy.

Performers often meet the audience members. A troupe of New Zealand Maori performers once paused between numbers in their show to talk to the audience about their culture. A group who made music with early and ancient instruments taught some Girl Scouts in the audience how to play a song with kitchen spoons.

“These experiences touch people’s lives”, she says. “What always amazes me is what happens to, say, a student who’s never seen a live performance of anything before. It takes them away from their everyday life, it gives them something extraordinary, and it gives them insight into an art form they never knew existed. They come away changed—they’re not the same person they were when they entered the theater”.

Having built a worldwide circle of friends, Rubenstein is no stranger to compliments. But perhaps the one she was most touched by came from a faculty member. You bring so many cultural treasures here to the college”, he said. “You have become a cultural treasure yourself.”