The executive director of the Madison Ballet will be departing after less than two years on the job.
Valerie Dixon's last day will be July 31. She made the announcement today in an e-mail to friends of the company. She's departing to join her husband, Sidney, in California, where he has a new job.
Madison Ballet trimmed its staff and production schedule in 2009, owing to the economy.
"It is not easy to leave when it feels like we have just begun to thrive," Dixon wrote in her announcement. "The last two years have been economically challenging, but we have paved a path ensuring stability and a bright future, both immediate and distant."
The search for a new executive director has already begun. A new executive director will hopefully be in place by July 1, so that Dixon can overlap with her successor. Madison Ballet had no executive director for six months before Dixon took over.
She joined the Madison Ballet in June 2008. Before that, since 2005 Dixon had served as the regional director of the Wisconsin chapter of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.
Dixon was not immediately available for comment.
