Abel Lopez, associate producing director of GALA Hispanic Theatre, is Treasurer of the Association of Performing Arts Presenters. He is a former chair of the D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities, and immediate past chair of the National Association of Latino Arts and Culture (NALAC). He is a past president of the Helen Hayes Awards, the Performing Arts Alliance, Leadership Washington, the Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation, and Theater Communications Group, the national service organization for professional theaters. Lopez is also past chair of the Creative Communities Initiative of the Community Foundation of the National Capital Region.  Mr. Lopez is also a member of the Boards of Directors of the Alliance for Inclusion in the Arts, NALAC, In Series, and Black Women Playwrights Group. He is a member of The Kennedy Center Community board, Latino Advisory Board of the Museum of American History of the Smithsonian Institution, and Advisory Committee of The Playwrights Forum. He has directed productions at GALA, Horizons Theatre, DC Arts Center, The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Source Theater, and In Series in Washington, DC, as well as many other theaters across the nation. His productions have also been presented in Venezuela, El Salvador, Costa Rica, and Cuba. In 1991, Mr. Lopez was named a Washingtonian of the Year.  Mr. Lopez resides in Washington, D.C.