Arts advocate Peter Herrndorf receives the Lifetime Artistic Achievement Award from Governor General Julie Payette during the Governor General's Performing Arts Awards at Rideau Hall in Ottawa on Friday, June 1, 2018. Herrndorf, a lawyer, media mogul and the former president and chief executive officer of the National Arts Centre, has died at 82. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang
TORONTO – Peter Herrndorf, a lawyer, Canadian media mogul and the former president and chief executive officer of the National Arts Centre, has died. He was 82.
Matthew Herrndorf confirmed the news, saying his father died early this morning “surrounded by family” at Toronto’s Hennick Bridgepoint Hospital, but did not provide his cause of death.
Peter Herrndorf served as head of the National Arts Centre from 1999 to 2018 after a long career in media, and is credited for establishing the NAC Foundation and NAC’s Indigenous Theatre Department.
He joined the CBC in Winnipeg in 1965, eventually becoming a vice-president, where he helped develop long-standing series including the Fifth Estate and The Journal.
Herrndorf later took on roles as publisher of Toronto Life magazine, as well as chairman and CEO of TVOntario.
He was awarded the Order of Ontario in 2007 for having “revolutionized Canadian broadcasting, publishing and the performing arts” at the various organizations where he served.
“He had a big and consequential and important life, and (it’s) hard to put into words what he meant to us and what he meant to Canada,” Matthew Herrndorf said in an interview Saturday.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 18, 2023.
