Amada Cruz is the director and CEO of the Santa Barbara Museum of Art. She was director of the Seattle Art Museum until October 2023 and was The Sybil Harrington Director & Chief Executive Officer of Phoenix Art Museum from February 2015 through mid 2019.[1] Cruz has been a bold museum leader, who has prioritized equity as a contemporary art curator and a museum director, as well as fiscal sustainability. In 2018, she received the annual Virginia Cardenas Award for her outreach to communities of color while director of the Phoenix Art Museum.[2] In 2015, she was named by W magazine as one of the 11 most powerful museum directors.[3] Cruz has been embroiled in several controversies over the course of her career, including alleged discrimination of unhoused individuals at the Seattle Art Museum,[4][5] allegedly creating a hostile work environment at the Phoenix Art Museum,[6] and terminating the employment of an Asian American museum curator at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art.[7][8]