UCLA Names Blachly Director of Arts Center : Blachly Named Director of UCLA Arts Center

In a choice that came as little surprise, Michael Blachly, 45, who has been acting director of the UCLA Center for the Performing Arts for the past year, was named director on Tuesday. Afterward he said his priorities will encompass presenting “more and more” of a “diverse perspective” in the arts.

“The priorities are to make sure that the arts are relevant to where the community is, that we’re interacting through the arts with one another, and that we’re growing through our cultural similarities and differences . . . to make our community better.

“We’re really trying to broaden the program to include as much diversity as exists within our community,” Blachly added, “so that the arts become a part of everyone.”

Blachly, who led performing arts programs at four universities and was vice president and director of West Coast sales for Columbia Artists Management before going to UCLA, succeeds Pebbles Wadsworth, who had held the job for a dozen years and left for a comparable position at the University of Texas. He is the fourth director in the center’s 56-year history.

The Center for the Performing Arts, part of the UCLA School of the Arts, presents about 200 performances a year to an overall audience of more than 200,000. It is one of the leading presenting organizations in the nation, and one of the largest university arts presenters. In recent years it has operated on a $4.5-million annual budget.

Blachly said he wants to expand in areas that “we’re currently beginning to explore,” such as having “Asian-American taiko drummers interface with a gospel choir” and contemporary musicians performing with post-modern dance companies.