After an eight-month search, Harbourfront Centre, the sprawling 10-acre arts, culture and recreation campus on Toronto’s central waterfront, has hired a new CEO with a high profile on the arts scene — Gideon Arthurs, executive director of Soulpepper Theatre Company.
“I feel pretty damn lucky,” said Arthurs, who announced in September that he would be stepping down as executive director of Soulpepper Theatre Company and the Young Centre for the Performing Arts, effective Oct. 30.
“I think the waterfront is becoming the new beating heart of downtown Toronto in a way that, certainly in my lifetime, it hasn’t been, and I think Harbourfront Centre is right in the middle of it and that is a huge opportunity,” said Arthurs, 47.
Harbourfront Centre sits at the centre of a dense residential neighbourhood along Queens Quay west of Yonge Street, and a series of new waterfront precincts being built to the east that are expected to eventually accommodate more than 150,000 new residents and workers.
“We had three really good candidates, all different, that brought different attributes to the table,” said Tenio Evangelista, chair of the board of directors at Harbourfront Centre.
“We decided that Gideon, with his experience, his network, his relationships, would be the perfect person to build upon the work we’ve done in the last couple of years, turning it around.
“I think everybody just loved his energy and his vision and his enthusiasm.”
Arthurs succeeds Cathy Loblaw, credited with improving Harbourfront’s finances by making difficult decisions that included letting go of the lease for the Fleck Dance Theatre; making the Power Plant art gallery financially independent; and downsizing the workforce. She stepped down as CEO at the end of 2025.
Loblaw also helped Harbourfront Centre secure more federal government funding, including capital funding, said Evangelista.
“I’m really keen to see how, after the past couple of years of growth and stabilization, we can just kind of supercharge that and move forward,” said Evangelista.
Arthurs believes passionately in the transformational power of the arts, at a time when he believes the human soul is being fracked, the way fracking draws every last drop of oil or gas from exhausted rock.
“The world’s most important economic engines now run on making profit off our emotional states,” said Arthurs. “Just like fracking, it leaves behind some pretty bad by-products, and I think that we need to do a lot of work as a civil society … to help people preserve those inner landscapes.”
Arts can also build community, Arthurs believes.
“The feeling of catching a glimpse of a fellow audience member going through the same emotions as you creates a kind of electric bond that is incredibly powerful and I believe allows us to access the best parts of what it means to be human.”
Arthurs said that Harbourfront Centre has been an important cultural touchstone for him throughout his life.
His love of theatre was sparked as a five-year-old, when he attended an immersive production about Inuit culture at Harbourfront with his mother. A few years later, he played the boy in “Waiting for Godot” at what was then the du Maurier Theatre Centre at Harbourfront.
“It’s part of my founding mythology,” said Arthurs, who has two daughters with his wife, playwright Erin Shields.
“My kids went there for camp. So, I’ve had a full life-cycle there.”
One of the biggest challenges facing Harbourfront Centre is managing its vast array of programming, from theatre, ballet and concerts to boating and sailing opportunities, marinas and summer camps for kids. Most of the programming is free.
“You’ve got 10 acres, and you’re dealing with marinas and commercial leases and maintenance — it’s an eclectic space, but I am more than confident Gideon has the skill set to adapt,” said Evangelista.
He added that recreation remains one of the four pillars of Harbourfront Centre, in addition to arts, culture and education.
“I think he won’t lose track that it has to be a balanced approach.”
Arthurs served as CEO of the National Theatre School of Canada, from 2014 to 2022, based in Montreal.
He joined Soulpepper in January 2022, where he grew the organization’s donor base, developed major strategic partnerships, expanded community programming and generated new revenue streams.
In 2025, Soulpepper welcomed more than 200,000 attendees.
As one of the sites for events related to World Cup 2026, Harbourfront Centre is on track to welcome more than seven million visits this year.
Arthurs is the son of York University president emeritus Harry Arthurs.
