Lucia Neare is a 21st-century pioneer of larger-than-life theatre in public spaces. Her mission is as much social and political as artistic: to confront and transform urban dilemmas with the power of free theatre, nurturing community by inspiring kindness and radical joy in the public realm. In 2014, the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation honored Neare with one of its inaugural Impact Awards for her groundbreaking public performances.

In 2019, Artist Trust and the Dale and Leslie Chihuly Foundation bestowed upon Lucia the prestigious Arts Innovator Award, a much-sought-after prize that each year honors only two Washington State artists for outside-the box innovation in their art practice. In 2022, Lucia served as a Doris Duke Charitable Foundation Fellow of the Arts, Entrepreneurship, and Innovation at Indiana University's Center for Cultural Affairs.

Neare is a site-specific theatre artist, director, producer, designer, sculptor, writer, soprano, creative facilitator, and de facto urban planner. She uses these skills to create performances that transform miles of urban acreage into immersive public rites. In 2006, she founded her company, Lucia Neare’s Theatrical Wonders, and has since presented more than 50 of these works, drawing together tens of thousands—of all ages and backgrounds—in the Pacific Northwest.

Neare has garnered a list of awards, commissions, and honors that reads like a who’s who of arts funders in the Pacific Northwest: Seattle Art Museum, 4Culture, Artist Trust, Seattle Office of Arts and Cultural Affairs, On the Boards, Seattle Arts Commission, Washington State Arts Commission, Olympic Sculpture Park, Seattle City Light, and Seattle Parks and Recreation.

In 2009, she was the recipient of an Artist Fellowship from Artist Trust and received a Spotlight Award from Seattle Magazine. In 2012, Neare received Seattle’s Mayor’s Arts Award, which recognizes artists, arts, and cultural organizations that enrich the city through the arts. The same year, she was appointed artist-in-residence for both Seattle and the City of Redmond, a position she held through 2015. With support from an Exploration Grant from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation’s Building Demand for the Arts program, Lucia served as Doris Duke artist-in-residence from 2015 to 2016 at Seattle’s ACT Theatre, where she pioneered a 20-person cultural think tank to explore the intersection between live theatre, gaming, millennial-technological culture, and the quality of Seattle’s civic life.

Notable performances include the 2008-2009 cycle Lullaby Moon, which transformed many square miles of Seattle’s urban landscape into an interactive world of dreams for audiences numbering in the tens of thousands; Ooo La La, a May Day Spectacular (2008), which refashioned downtown Seattle into a grand corridor of surreal delights, inviting thousands into a realm of inclusive elegance; and 2015’s Dream for Redmond, two nights of mythic, participatory spectacle and lyrical rite—for contemplation, celebration, and renewal of public spirit in Redmond, Washington.

A devotee of author Lewis Hyde (The Gift) and legendary urban planner Frederick Law Olmsted (to whom she is related), Neare believes that benevolent society is created not so much by commerce as by fostering a Culture of Generosity through widespread participation.

Neare studied theatre at Naropa University’s MFA program and holds a degree from Mount Holyoke College.