Denise Montgomery is founder and president of CultureThrive, a consulting practice focusing on organizational development, program development and implementation, audience development, and communications for arts and cultural organizations. Her clients have included the Australia Council for the Arts, Balboa Park Learning Institute, New Children’s Museum, La Jolla Playhouse, Nevada Humanities, National Performing Arts Convention, and WESTAF (Western States Arts Federation), among others.
 
The depth and range of Denise's experience are key assets she brings to clients. She has held leadership positions at the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, as Director of the Denver Office of Cultural Affairs (DOCA), as Executive Director of the Colorado Business Committee for the Arts, and in the corporate sector. Denise’s work at the Denver Office of Cultural Affairs earned national attention and was cited in RAND’s Arts and Culture in the Metropolis report, which during her tenure ranked DOCA as one of the top two municipal arts agencies in the United States. The Create Denver program, which she initiated and launched, continues to be on the leading edge of creative economy work in cities.
 
Denise has linked programming, recommendations, and strategic plans to a larger entity’s overall goals and vision; guided complex processes involving stakeholder input and community engagement; successfully created and launched major new programs involving numerous organizational partners; and designed matrices for the purposes of evaluation and achieving measurable outcomes.
 
She has written and published three full-length Op-Ed pieces in major daily newspapers on the value and role of arts and culture, and was commissioned to create the advocacy content for a major national cultural advocacy resource.
 
Denise holds a B.S. in Marketing and Minor in Art History from Miami University of Ohio. She was selected as a fellow for the Stanford University National Arts Strategies program for arts leaders in 2005. She serves on The San Diego Foundation’s Arts and Culture Working Group and is an active volunteer with the San Diego Regional Arts and Culture Coalition. Her past community involvement includes service on The Denver Foundation’s Arts and Culture Advisory Group as well as on the boards of Denver Civic Ventures, the Clyfford Still Museum, the Alliance for Contemporary Art of the Denver Art Museum, and as a volunteer mentor with Big Sisters.