University of Virginia Library

New Fine Arts Center To House
Architecture School, Drama, Art

During recent years the lack of
facilities for the study and
perpetration of the arts has become
an increasingly growing and
embarrassing problem for the
University. Present buildings housing lecture halls and studios for
studies in such fields as art, speech
and drama, and architecture are
either non-existent or obsolete. In
order to alleviate this problem a
new fine arts center is presently
being constructed on Carrs Hill
which promises to be one of the
most interesting, as well as one of
the most needed, building
complexes on the Grounds.

As now envisioned, the new
center will be completed in the mid
1970's and will house the School of
Architecture and departments of
speech and drama, music and art as
well as the Radio-Television Center.
A central library will serve all
departments.

The new center, begun last
spring, will be a place for study as
well as an arts center for the public,
with a theater, concert and recital
halls and art exhibit areas.
Tentative plans outline five major
stages of construction, with the
final phase to be started in 1974.

The School of Architecture,
now located in Fayerweather Hall
and spilling over to the Bayly
Museum, will transfer its locations
to the new center in 1969. Joseph
N. Bosserman, dean of the
architecture school, discussed the
meaning of a new brick and
concrete building: "Physically, the
new building will have a great effect
on curriculum. It will permit us to
do things we've always wanted to
do.

"We'll be able to demonstrate
things that we try now with
lectures. The lowest level for
instance, will be given over to
technical and structural areas-real
demonstration rooms and
workshops. There will be an
outdoor workshop where students
can literally mix concrete if they
want to. There will be a heating
system they can control to see and
feel the effect of hot and humid, or
hot and dry weather. They can
change the shades and power of
light to see its influence on the
color of walls.

"What the building will do, is
put students into real contact with
materials and methods."

When asked about the new
library, the dean replied, "We just
don have room for the students to
sit and study in our present one. We
are certainly looking forward to the
move."

In one of the school's most
popular courses, urban planning,
the new facilities will come as a
great boon. "Everybody is involved
in urban planning and studies these
days whether they want to or not.
It's part of our lives-men will use
this training on city planning
boards or town councils. We will be
able to render this training more
extensively when we have the
facilities.

"Architects are becoming more
and more aware of their
socio-political roles," said Mr.
Bosserman. "They are getting more
involved with the urban scene. We
recognize that. But we don't want
to forget aesthetic design. In
addition to working well, a building
should look good."

The school offers undergraduate
degrees in architecture, city
planning, architectural history and
landscape architecture. Graduate
degrees are the master of planning
and urban design, and the master of
architectural history.

These prepare the architect for
20th Century roles. "The
architectural history study is not
ivory tower scholarship as it may
sound, but is a whole new field,"
Mr. Bosserman said. "We've
discovered that just bulldozing a
section of town isn't necessarily the
best way to build a beautiful city.
Many buildings are worthy of
renewal, but it takes a qualified
person to tell you which ones.
That's where architectural history
comes in. So it is more than the 'So
and So Slept Here' kind of
restoration. That is important too,
of course, but not the whole
function of the historian."

The University department of
speech and drama presently has
classrooms and offices in Cabell
Hall, a 214-seat theater in Minor
Hall and production costumes
stored "all over the place,"
according to department chairman
David W. Weiss.

The department's public face is
a full season of production by the
Virginia Players. Their presence has
permeated Minor Hall with the
authentic aura of the theater, as
box office telephones rings against
a background of set construction
racket, rehearsal noise and the
heavy smell of greasepaint.

The Players present eight major
shows a year. "We always have a
number of townspeople in the cast,
although we try to give preference
to students," said Mr. Weiss. "We've
been doing very good business in

recent years and have to turn
people away on the week ends."

To accommodate student
interest, the department presents
dozens of small workshop
productions each year. "We did 42
last year, and, at one point, had six
in rehearsal at the same time. The
students can do anything they
want, within obvious reason."

The planned facilities for the
department in the new center will
allow expansion of student
participation. The drama building
will have a theater, seating 600,
with a proscenium stage. Elevator
lifts will allow a 16-foot front
extension of the stage. There will
be a separate large room for

workshop operations.

An art history class can consist
of students sitting in a dark
classroom and looking at a lot of
slides, while the professor, at his
podium, reads notes with his back
to the screen.

This is not the way Frederick
Hartt sees teaching. A noted art
historian, who came to the
University this fall as chairman of
the art department, he approaches
art as life itself and his soft- spoken
enthusiasm is contagious.

'One thing I love about this
department is that it contains both
art historians and practicing artists,'
he said. 'It's a unified department
and must remain so.'

Practicing artists in the new fine
arts center will find two-story
sculpture studios, well-lighted
painting studios and amp storage
space at their disposal. Art
historians will find three sizes of
lecture rooms to suit their needs.

"Art history is growing to such
a fantastic degree that getting
teachers is really cut-throat," Mr.
Hartt said. 'The classes are filled
with liberal art students who want
to know about art. It's a general
growth of interest which is also
reflected in museum attendance
and gallery sales and it's not
entirely healthy.

'I get a sinking feeling when I go
to the National Gallery and see
people wandering around with a
Tour-Aide to their ears. I wish
people would look more for
themselves. We're tour-aided to
death.'

Teaching students to 'look' is
his crusade. 'One of the most
difficult things for Americans is
learning how to see. We buy labels-French
Provincial furniture, Italian
spaghetti. People have to bring
something to art. It isn't like a
sunny day or a rain shower, just to
be experienced passively. It takes
some participating. I love to see
students batting around Europe on
their own, not on tours. I want my
classes to have as close an
experience to the works of art as
possible. If you're showing slides,
maybe you need a whole projection
wall, with the professor
looking, too-he might see
something new himself.'

The practice of buying paintings
for investment purposes is 'The
kind of thing I feel like attacking,'
he said. 'Today's artists have to
have the New York stamp of
approval and then they become
fads. We've got to the point at
which art is like anything else-it's
got to be a nationally advertised
brand and you must have this year's
model.

"People are really perplexed
about understanding art, and this
system is a ready-made solution to
their perplexity."

What his students will learn is to
feel and taste what is really
there, not what someone tells them
is there. "The visual and inner
experience of a work of art cannot
be duplicated. It depends on each
person."

The art department situated in
Cocke Hall is experiencing the
growing pains felt throughout the
University. "We're going to take on
a new art historian each year, and
hope to have senior seminars and an
honors program before long," Mr.
Hartt said.

"I just hope we don't
mimeograph the history of art to
death. I hate to give out those
outlines with names and dates, but
sometimes you must. What we want
to do is teach the philosophy of art
as one of the highest forms of
human experience."

Within the space of five or
six years it is hoped that the new
art center will be completed and in
full operation. The days of
sculpturing in an old, vacated closet
and constructing plat sets in
someone's apartment are soon to
end. With the completion of the
center the University will enter into
a new and more diversified era of
more complete learning and
teaching.