Fine and Performing Arts Documents List

Fine and Performing Arts Commission
Interim Status Report
December, 1999

The Arts are an enriching, vital and necessary part of our society. Over its history, the University of Virginia has not dedicated its energy or resources to strengthen the Arts in our community and it is time for this to change. The Fine and Performing Arts Commission applauds the University for its recent commitment to foster this change. By the year 2020, we wish nothing less than to have the Arts at UVA be considered one of the University’s strongest components.

Interest in the Arts is evident everywhere within the University; student demand for courses in the arts exceeds supply to an overwhelming degree; broad University and community interest in studio skills, performance opportunities, theatrical, visual, and musical productions is constantly thwarted by the shortage of facilities, faculty, and staff, and support for these projects. We wish to meet these compelling interests by envisioning the Arts as a fundamental component of the educational experience in the classroom, the research lab, the scholar's study, and the speaker's podium. When understood as a basis of form-giving and communication necessary to every human activity, the Arts provide students with skills to realize a broad range of personal and professional goals. By offering experience of the Arts to future lawyers, doctors, parents, educators, and community leaders, the University recognizes the integrated and fundamental role of the Arts within a broad conception of human knowledge. We seek to meet this existing demand for the Arts in the University community by combining an integrated Arts program with the existing strengths of departmental, discipline-based expertise to create the vibrant, vital, reinvigorated model of the Arts envisioned by this Commission.

I. Scope: Assumptions and definitions that underlie the commission's work.

During the first phase of work, the commission looked at the current status and the future goals of the following Arts departments and units at the University of Virginia. This was expanded to include future programs as well, such as Dance and potential interdisciplinary Arts programs.

School of Architecture

McIntire Department of Art (Art History and Studio Art)

Bayly Art Museum

Creative Writing Program (Department of English)

Dance (future program/department/or part of another department?)

Department of Drama

Fiske Kimball Fine Arts Library

Heritage Repertory Theatre

Media Arts/Media Studies Program

McIntire Department of Music

Music Library

Virginia Film Festival

Although it is clear that all of these units, departments, and programs will become better with continued planning and added resources -- it is clear that certain programs need more immediate attention than others. It is also assumed that the Commission's primary work will be focused around the assessment and eventual strengthening of the three major fine and performing arts departments -- Art (especially Studio Art), Drama, and Music as well as the Bayly Art Museum -- without neglecting the current status and needs of the other units.

Included in an addendum to this report are overviews of the current status and future goals of these three departments as well as the Bayly Art Museum which they each presented to the Commission last spring. As the members of the commission have come to firmly believe, there in nothing inherently weak with any of the University's Arts

programs except for the dire need for increased funding for programmatic needs, faculty and staffing, and facilities, the lack of which will keep us forever in the back of the pack in the various national rankings. In a recent report from the Registrar's Office, it was noted that for the Spring semester, 2000, the following number of students had to be turned away from taking introductory Arts classes -- Art History: 44, Studio Art: 375, Drama: 602, Music: 274.

As the potential creation of a major arts center (or "Arts Village," as it is now being called) is in the planning stages, it also is clear that those programs, departments, or units affected by the design and building of this center be a principal focus in regards to programmatic assessment and benchmarking. This would principally include History of Art (Fayerweather Hall), Studio Art (a new building), Music (a new music building, new performance/concert hall), Bayly Art Museum (a new building), Drama (an expansion to its present building), Fine Arts Library (building to be determined, presumably close to Art, Studio Art, and Architecture), Music Library (presumably close to the new music building) and Architecture (redesign currently underway). Dependent on location, one thought would be to incorporate both the Music Library and the Fine Arts Library in the same building. The new Media Studies Program (and its media arts component), would certainly be affected by these plans but as they are interdisciplinary in nature and will be utilizing many different spaces around Grounds, a specific new building is not anticipated for the Program at this time. The Heritage Repertory Theatre and the Virginia Film Festival fall under the umbrella of Drama and will be included in assessment of needs of that department. Creative Writing is currently a very successful program and is not in need of new space but is indeed in need of increased graduate funding. Similarly, the School Architecture is also one of the most respected in the nation and thus primary focus will not be directed at the present to that unit, although it is clear that if it is to remain on top, it has very definite additional needs as well

1. The departments of Art (History and Studio), Drama, and Music all believe that an undergraduate student who is considering lifetime work in the Arts is best served by receiving as a foundation a solid liberal arts education such as the University of Virginia offers while at the same time being able to explore h/her own artistic interests. Thus, not only is academic study important, but if a student wishes to perfect h/her abilities in performance, h/she should be provided the opportunities to do so. Learning to "do" in both the fine and the performing arts and getting the chance to "do" are extremely important.

2. The fact that the University of Virginia even has Arts programs is a well-kept secret to the Commonwealth and to the rest of the nation. This must be changed.

3. Especially in the case of Studio Art and Music, space is woefully inadequate and until this is rectified, these programs have little chance for growth. Until new space is created, there is no chance for the institution of a Dance program.

4. We can't do everything. We can't be all things to all people. Thus, it is important that each Arts unit be clear in its mission and its future goals. Dreaming "out of the box" is also important and must be encouraged if we wish to be innovative and unique in our respective areas. Copying other "benchmark" programs is not necessarily the answer as we forge our own strong collective artistic identity.

5. The Arts also play a vital role in the cultural life of not only the University community, but also our extended communities of the city, county, and region. It is important in developing our programs that this extended audience's wishes and needs are considered, and, whenever possible, addressed.

6. It is important that the Arts programs explore ways of collaboration through various artistic projects and possible creation of interdisciplinary programs.

7. With the beginning of the new Media Studies Program, innovative ways of involving media and information technology in what we do must continue to be explored in many of our artistic endeavors.

8. It is crucial that not only must we explore ways to create interdisciplinary programs, projects, events, and courses, we must also continue to strive to find ways to present programs and create and offer courses with expanded multi-cultural perspectives outside the Western European canon.

II. Aspiration groups and benchmarks: Which institutions or organizations will serve as the commission's aspiration group(s) and why? By what measures is the commission identifying the gaps and opportunities?

For the recent October 8-9 retreat, Studio Art, Drama, Media Arts, Music, and the Bayly Art Museum were each asked to invite leaders from two institutions which represented nationally recognized programs to which each of five units wish in some or all ways to aspire. Principal criteria used in most cases included programmatic vision, as well as resources for staffing and facilities. Studio Art: Harvard and Ohio State; Drama: University of California/Irvine and University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Bayly: University of Georgia and University of Minnesota (Yale's representative, the Bayly's first choice, was initially set to come but became ill); Music: University of California/Santa Barbara and New York University; Media Arts: University of Washington and Cornell University.

"It should be noted that one of these guests, Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, pointed out that benchmarking and innovative thinking may be at odds, since in benchmarking one is measuring oneself in relation to extant programs, rather than imagining new ones." (Judith Shatin, Chair, Music)

McIntire Department of Art

Art History -- selected six departments ranked higher than UVA's graduate Art History program in the last National Research Council rankings (UVA's Art History department is currently ranked # 16).

University of California/Berkeley (ranked # 3; 12 faculty).

Johns Hopkins University (ranked # 7, 12 faculty).

University of Pennsylvania (ranked # 9, 14 faculty).

University of Michigan (ranked # 11, 26 faculty).

University of California/Los Angeles (ranked # 13, 14 faculty).

University of Delaware (ranked #15, 13 faculty).

Five of the six are public institutions.

Johns Hopkins was selected as it has a faculty close to the same size as UVA's and its program is comparable to UVA's in scale.

University of Michigan was selected as it has for many years been considered as one of the top Art History programs in the nation.

University of Delaware was chosen as it has advanced in the rankings over the past five years from the mid-20's to # 15. Delaware also has worked hard to improve their faculty and has considerable financial resources.

Larry Goedde, Chair of the Art Department, points out that the University of Texas (ranked # 19) is undergoing a similar transition and growth and he predicts they will advance in the next round of rankings.

The major difference between these schools and UVA is that these programs have greater resources, especially in regards to financial aid for the recruitment and support of graduate students and proper offices and larger facilities for their respective faculty and department.

Studio Art

Harvard -- offers B.A. as UVA does; exceptional facility; innovative programs supported by seemingly unlimited funds; wonderful integration of traditional studio practice with new media like video, film and performance. Ten years ago, engaged in similar self-scrutiny as we are undertaking.

University of Chicago -- Small program similar to UVA's; intellectual, innovative climate; offers exceptional interdisciplinary M.F.A. program which is smaller than we would want but which serves as a good model for theory and criticism in relation to studio practice.

Bard College -- Small like UVA; excellent, well-organized curriculum, from first year foundations through fourth year theses.

Ohio State University -- One of the largest programs in the country; the top in the rankings; excellent curriculum in which their innovative foundations programs successfully integrate the generalist college student with those who have professional aspirations. Also a prime example of a university art department working in concert with an internationally recognized Art Center, the Wexner Center, which promotes a wonderful integration of visual arts into campus life.

University of California/Los Angeles -- Small like UVA (14 faculty), but still one of the top-ranked M.F.A. programs in the country. Outstanding faculty, exhibition spaces and galleries, and an example of exceptional integration of programming into the local community.

Columbia University -- Outstanding, well organized visiting artist program which is effectively integrated into their curriculum (being in New York City, of course, helps).

Department of Drama

University of California/Irvine (for performance) -- Offers similar programs with a similar philosophy as UVA, i.e., a B.A. in Drama and an M.F.A. in Design, Stage Management, Acting, and Directing; however, a much larger program. Ranked # 12; public institution;

Much larger faculty (12 full-time, 11 part-time) while only producing two more productions per year than UVA; one of the best known programs in the nation and an excellent example of one which excels in part due to self-promotion. Three  performance spaces; connection with professional theatre (the South Coast Rep) which provides internships for third-year M.F.A. students.

University of Illinois/Urbana-Champaign (for design) -- Ranked # 16; public institution; extremely strong design programs and technology support with very large faculty of diverse race and gender and well-funded staff support (19 full-time, 12 part-time); three performance spaces situated in the Krannert Center which is one of the finest fine and performance art centers in the country in a community not much larger than UVA/Charlottesville/Albemarle. Production budget double UVA's Drama Department budget with plus an OTPS of $100,000 per year (3 times that of UVA’s Drama Department). Separate undergraduate and graduate faculty.

University of Wisconsin/Milwaukee (for performance) -- Public institution; offers BA and MFA as UVA does; separate undergraduate and graduate faculties; excellent guest artist program; emphasis on international exchange on the graduate level.

University of Michigan -- Much larger student body, however produces only four more shows than UVA and has a production staff of 22 full-time and 1 part-time, compared with our staff of 3 (including our technical director who is on the general faculty). The

University of Michigan is a university which has an understanding in regards to the labor and funding it takes to produce first-class student and professional shows and which has a history of great support for its Arts programs. The Arts are so important that U-M created the position of "Provost for the Arts."

McIntire Department of Music

Music currently is engaged in citing program benchmarks while at the same time they are working hard to develop their own vision as they challenge themselves to create aspects of their program which are groundbreaking and do not lend themselves to benchmarking.

Music programs concomitantly being examined:

Brown University

Columbia University

Cornell University

Dartmouth College

Duke University

Princeton University

University of California/Berkeley

University of California/San Diego

University of Chicago

Other programs which are at institutions that are larger than UVA and feature conservatories are being looked at specifically in regards to facilities include:

Indiana University

Northwestern University

SUNY/Purchase

SUNY/Stonybrook

University of Michigan

University of Illinois/Urbana-Champaign

University of Pennsylvania

University of Texas/Austin

Other programs which have interesting elements to them include:

Wesleyan University

UCLA

University of Richmond

Virginia Commonwealth University

Judith Shatin, Chair, Music: "In regards to peer institutions, Music is looking at a mix of state schools and private institutions that have programmatic content that intersects with its own and whose programs are highly regarded in the field. From the figures that have been gathered to the present time, it becomes clear that the resources allocated to Music, from facilities to support of applied music lessons and graduate assistantships/fellowships do not come close to comparing with those cited in Music's benchmarking list."

"For the October retreat, Music invited three individuals who represented creative thinking about innovative program designs -- Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett was one of the creators of NYU's Performance Studies program; composer Richard Karpen has developed an Arts and Humanities Computing Center at the University of Washington; musicologist Michael Beckerman form UC/Santa Barbara has brought new ways of thinking to bear on more traditional musicological pursuits."

"The vision of the Music Department integrates performance within the framework of a liberal arts program; moreover it situates the study of music as an expression of culture. In doing so, Music is trying to break the barriers that so often exist between the study of the western musical tradition, and study of the music of other cultures. In addition, in Music's focus on digital music, we are moving into an area that has important implications for musical creation and performance. Thus, though there are elements of various programs Music admires, we are also trying to forge a new kind of interaction that both honors the liberal arts tradition and expands upon it."

Bayly Art Museum

"All of the following are among the top university museums in the country with fine collections and excellent exhibitions and public programs. Some of these have new or renovated buildings." (Jill Hartz, Director, Bayly Art Museum)

University of Georgia Museum of Art

Ackland Art Museum, University of North Carolina/Chapel Hill

Williams College Museum of Art

Yale University Art Gallery

Cantor Arts Center, Stanford University

1. Physical Plant: Total square footage; square footage devoted to gallery space; space for visitor parking. Are earned income centers incorporated into the facility?

2. Collections and Exhibitions: How many works in permanent collection; what is permanent collection; how many exhibitions are held annually?

3. Staffing: Size?

4. Budget: Annual Budget; sources of annual revenue?

5. Membership: How large?

The answers to these questions are included in the Bayly Art Museum/Jill Hartz memo of November 11 included in the addendum to this document.

 Media Arts

It should be noted that although there is no formal program in media arts, the following benchmark programs can be used as possible good examples as the Media Studies Program is developed by Johanna Drucker.

Benchmark Programs and Criteria (Richard Herskowitz, Director, Virginia Film Festival)

University of New Mexico Media Arts Program -- This program focuses on the study and practice of film and video as art. There are courses in history and criticism as well as low-budget production, courses more oriented to self-expression than commercial production.

Cornell University Department of Theatre, Film, and Dance -- Also provides a model for teaching low budget media production, and integrating its teaching with film studies and other arts departments.

Telluride Film Festival -- Although there is no other "benchmark" film festival for UVA based on another university film festival, Telluride which is in the top tier of film festivals in the U.S. can serve as a benchmark. Like the Virginia Film Festival, the Telluride Film Festival is also a long weekend retreat, rather than a film market, with an emphasis on film appreciation and discussion. Its organization, staffing, and marketing methods have many things to teach us, and are well worth visiting. Although it is approximately the same size as Virginia’s Film Festival, it has a much larger staff and budget in order to produce its festival.

Measures For Identifying Gaps and Opportunities

It becomes clear that tangible measures can be identified when comparing UVA's Arts programs with those considered to be some of the finest national programs. Certainly the types of programs and their underlying educational philosophy are to be considered, but, as important, it becomes clear that exceptional resources and a strong commitment on the part of respective institutions have much to do with the success of these university Arts programs. The faculties of UVA's Arts programs have clearly articulated who we are, what we want to be, and what we need to get there (see Arts departments’ documents in addendum to this report). It becomes clear that the reasons these benchmark programs are nationally recognized is due to the commitment of their respective institutions on their behalf in all regards, as well as the leadership of these programs.

The size of an Arts program’s faculty and staff is extremely important as well as the quality of the faculty and staff. Although it is clear that UVA's Arts' faculties are strong, each department needs to expand its faculty in order to fulfill its educational mission and to accommodate the number of students wishing to take its classes. Each department also needs to increase its staff in order to be able to be a viable producing entitity. In all cases, the arts faculties and staffs are expending their energies above and beyond the call of duty in order to continue to produce the amount and quality of artistic programs and projects that the University and extended communities have come to expect. In the Drama Department, for example, it has come to be called the "theatre of human sacrifice." All programs are overworked and understaffed. Those which we have cited as our benchmarks are not.

The size of the arts facilities and their infrastructure (i.e., dimmer and fly system in a theatre, climate control in an art museum, sprung dance floor in dance space, proper practice rooms in a music building, etc.) are extremely important in enabling an Arts program to create and present its art. In all cases, the current facilities at UVA are inadequate -- with old and decrepit spaces for Art History, Studio Art, Music and with too small a building for Drama with no space for Dance.

The operational and production budgets must be sufficient to enable an Arts program to create and present its art as well as educate its students. Although UVA's operational budgets have recently been increased, the production budgets remain much too low to sufficiently cover the rising costs of materials used in production. As the student fee/Arts Dollars Program remains at the same level as when it was instituted in 1992 and, as production costs continue to rise, each department has less and less with which to present its cultural events.

There must be adequate funding to promote our university's arts programs, both locally and nationally. This funding at UVA is woefully inadequate nor is there a central person who is in charge of coordinating this promotion. The hiring of this central PR person as well as the establishment of a healthy promotional budget would be of great help toward letting the rest of the world know about the Arts at UVA.

III. Future direction: Early indications of strategic priorities or directions; structural or organizational changes/barriers that are on the table for discussion. What will it take for you to see the commission's vision implemented? What steps could be taken in the near term to help achieve the vision? At what cost?

Although the following strategic scenario is possibly too simplistic, it is, in essence what we must do.

1. Mission of all arts units are clearly defined and articulated (completed).

2. Needs, based on the mission of each arts unit and, when applicable, benchmark comparisons, are prioritized (completed).

This includes:

a. Programmatic needs (completed).

b. Faculty/Staff needs (completed).

c. Operational needs (completed).

d. Facility and infrastructure needs (completed).

e. Administrative and staffing needs of new facilities (still to do).

3. Cost base for answering these needs is determined (still to do).

do).

5. Throughout this entire process, UVA alumni, the citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia, and Arts programs around the nation need to be regularly informed about the excitement generated by this major commitment on the part of the University in regards to its Arts programs (still to do).

Strategic Priorities for Departments, Programs and Units

Art History

Resources needed: facilities, additional faculty, student fellowships.

2. Provide our faculty with individual offices.

This is a critical issue in the recruitment and retention of faculty. Faculty now have to prepare classes and meet students and advise them in shared offices which is very awkward. The move of 5 junior faculty to a trailer will give more faculty individual offices, but the arrangement is still only a stop-gap.

Resources needed: a new or renovated building.

This is one of the most significant weaknesses in our graduate program and severely limits our ability to compete for the top students. All of our benchmark programs have better graduate financial aid.

Resources needed: 10 three-year fellowships.

4. Establish new graduate travel fellowships.

This too is a weakness relative to other programs and slows down degree production. Travel fellowships are critical for training students in art historical scholarship, and especially in developing and researching the dissertation.

Resources needed: 5 fellowships to support both shorter trips and longer research stays abroad.

More course offerings in non-Western fields would significantly enrich and broaden our students’ educations and would attract students from all parts of the College. Possible fields include African, Native American, Meso-American, and Latin American. A specialist in Japanese art would complement our two faculty members who specialize in South Asian and Chinese.

Resources needed: faculty lines.

6. House the Visual Resources Collection in properly designed quarters with adequate work space for staff and users and adequate storage.

Resources needed: a new or renovated building.

7. Increase the department’s use of digital media in teaching.

This is in progress now in the Visual Resources Collection. Planning is beginning to convert classrooms in Campbell Hall and the Drama building for digital technology.

Resources needed: classrooms fitted with digital technology and staff to digitize images.

Establish museum studies in the undergraduate and graduate curricula. This too is a deficiency relative to our benchmark programs.

Resources needed: new museum building and increased museum staff.

We plan to devise a course in modern culture that will incorporate film, video, drama, and photography.

Resources needed: time for faculty to develop the course.

Including Architectural History alone, Art History could present itself not as a department of 13, but as a program of 18, on of the largest and best staffed programs in the country.

Significant concentrations of faculty in Renaissance, 19^th and 20^th Century, Medieval, and Asian.

Excellent courses of great use to our program are also being taught in Religious Studies and Anthropology.

Studio Art

1. A new and expanded facility.

Present facility: 18,000 sq. ft.

Proposed facility: 65,000 sq. ft. (per Dagit-Saylor Architectural plan).

2. 2. Additional faculty.

Currently: 9 faculty (8 full-time, 1 adj.)

Proposed: 14 faculty, including 2 full-time Visiting Artists Faculty (1 year appointments), 2 additional faculty in drawing; 2 additional faculty in New Genres (a combination of photography/video/film/performance/installation/site-specific sculpture) as well as 1-5 annual guest artists in these disciplines.

These additional faculty positions should be conceived as joint appointments, for instance, between Studio Art and Architecture, between Media Studies and Studio Art, between Drama and Studio Art, etc. If we are seriously going to think about a Vision for the visual and performing Arts at UVA, we need to think outside existing departmental and college parameters.

3. An expanded Gallery and Visiting Artist Program.

As we are outside major metropolitan centers, the importance of an ambitious visiting artist and gallery exhibition schedule cannot be overemphasized.

Present galleries: 1086 sq.ft.

Proposed galleries: 4000 + sq.ft., divided between a professional gallery and student gallery. We should consider that this professional gallery, possibly in

collaboration with the new Art Museum, will exist on West Main St. or on the Downtown Mall.

4. Additional Staff support.

A Gallery Director

Full-time technical staff position in our studio operations (divided between sculpture and metal shops and gallery operations). Currently, students are supervising students. Ohio State has 5 such positions, UCLA has 2.5, UVA has 0.

5. Scholarships for incoming undergraduates and a more direct participation in the undergraduate admissions process; more fellowships for our innovativepost-baccalaureate program; graduate fellowships (assuming an M.F.A. program).

6. Studio Art wishes to exist within a new College of Visual and Performing Arts, or a College of Arts and Architecture, or within some other similar administrative structure.

Please bear in mind that Studio Art respects and truly believes in the traditionalliberal arts education, but within the existing administrative structure, Studio Art has not been allowed to thrive, much less truly blossom.

7. Studio Art will participate in a program offering an M.A. in Critical Studies.

This may be conceived as an interdisciplinary program offered through Art History, Studio Art, Museum Studies, English, Philosophy, Anthropology, History, Media Studies, etc. We should realize that existing departmental boundaries and the isolationist course offerings of existing separate departments are obsolete. Benchmark role models: University of Chicago and UCLA.

Department of Drama

1. Revise Undergraduate Curriculum.

Drama recently decided to scrutinize its undergraduate curriculum and its Mission Statement. It was decided that the curriculum once again needed to be changed so that it would distinguish the undergraduate program as one which truly reflects the liberalizing philosophy of undergraduate education at UVA and distinguishes and dignifies what we do as something truly unique. The strengths of our faculty will be strongly considered in the revision of this curriculum.

2. Hire more diverse faculty.

Our faculty is not ethnically diverse. It is important that we bring onto the faculty a person or persons which will allow for a broader diversity. The teaching and production of multi-cultural theatre is very important to us. There is no current ethnic role model on our faculty for a minority Drama major.

3. Increase faculty and staff in order to not only allow our program to grow, but to just be able to function doing the things we do now.

Senior Director/Theatre Scholar (faculty).

Sound Designer/Master Electrician (staff).

Properties Master (staff).

Voice/Movement Specialist (faculty).

Scenic/Lighting Designer (faculty).

Production Stage Manager (staff).

Facilities Manager (staff).

Shop Carpenter (staff).

Assistant Costume Shop Manager (staff).

Managing Director: Virginia Film Festival (staff).

Playwriting/Dramaturgy Professor (faculty).

Full-time Computer Technology Specialist (staff).

Benchmark programs (University of Michigan, for instance) all have a faculty and staff as large as we do plus those listed above (as well as more positions). If we hope to grow, we must be realistic about how labor intensive it is to produce first rate theatre, even on the university level.

4. Expand the current Drama building, especially in regards to office space.

With the exception of the Chair, all of our faculty currently share an office and, in two cases, three people share an office. There are no offices for our graduate teaching assistants and the Director of the Virginia Film Festival operates out of what used to be a janitor’s closet in the basement. We need at least 11 more offices. We are also in dire need of more rehearsal space, and, of course, would like to add two dance studios so that we might add a Dance component to our program. We have clearly outgrown our building. The initial plan we submitted to Dagit-Saylor we have now realized is too limited for our future growth, although that, of course, would be a great improvement.

5. Increased financial resources for teaching supplies, equipment, additional temporary staff support.

We have much equipment which is used and reused in our teaching and in our production program. This eventually wears out. Unless it is specifically

attached to our building, Facilities Management will not replace it. We have very limited funds for the replacement of this equipment. Therefore, we need increased funding for maintaining, updating, and implementing the department’s teaching supplies and equipment and to hire project-only support staff in order to complete work on a particularly heavy show.

6. Funds to maintain building.

Although our building is only 27 years old, it is beginning to break down in various areas. The hydraulic system which allows our scenery to fly is constantly breaking down. Our intercom system is faulty. The Culbreth stage floor is in very bad shape. It is important that funds be provided to make sure our theatres are safe. Emergencies arise and need to be addressed immediately in order for us to be able to present our shows. We live precariously from one production to another and we should not have to.

7. Accreditation by the National Association of Schools of Theatre and the University Resident Theatre Association.

We are currently beginning this accreditation process and this should be completed sometime in 2001. Many of the schools we compete with for graduate students already are members of NAST and URTA. Becoming members in these two national organizations will elevate our national profile.

8. Expand the Graduate Program by 2002.

Seven years ago we revised our graduate program and formed a three-year M.F.A. "company" of artists totaling 17 students. Recruitment for this company takes place once every three years. We have realized over the past cycle (1996-1999) that we need to reinstate our M.F.A. in Directing and to equalize the number of students in our design and tech areas (currently there are 3 costume designers and only 2 students in the scenic design, lighting design, and theatre technology areas). Our goal is to increase the 2002-2005 "company" by 5, totaling 22 students. As all of our graduate students are supported equally, additional funding needs to be found for the expansion of the graduate "company."

9. Continued and expanded funding for Guest Artists.

Continue to increase our connection with the professional world by being able to bring visiting artists to the University to work side by side with and critique our undergraduate and graduate students. We wish to urge the Provost to continue providing funds via the Arts Enhancement Fund. We also must continue our efforts to raise an endowment of $1.2 million for the Drama Department to ensure that this Guest Artist Program will continue. The $100,000 recently given for this purpose by the Caplin family is the beginning of this endowment.

10. Explore ways to create interdisciplinary programs, courses, and projects.

Work together with Music and Art and with other disciplines on Grounds to explore a possible interdisciplinary graduate program in the Arts as well as specific courses and projects on both the undergraduate and graduate levels

11. Film Studies and Media Studies.

With the advent of the new Media Studies Program, with an increased interest in Film Studies, and with the incorporation of the Virginia Film Festival under the umbrella of the Department of Drama, we wish to do all we can to increase and

enhance Film Studies as well as find ways to incorporate courses such as "Acting for the Camera" and television directing for our students. The new Robertson Media Center will possibly allow us to do this. We want to do all we can to foster and enhance the Media Studies program as it evolves.

12. Add Managing Director to Virginia Film Festival.

The Festival is terribly understaffed and simply cannot be adequately run by only two people plus temporary help during the Festival itself. Along with the Director, it also needs a Development Officer and a Managing Director. There is a constant turnover in personnel and much of this has to do with work overload.

13. Explore the formation of a Dance program.

Provided the Drama building is expanded, we wish to explore developing a new and formal Dance program within the department (or possibly in conjunction with Music). This would presumably encompass the teaching of ballet, jazz, tap, and modern dance. This will require the hiring of at least two dance faculty. We are convinced that we would be able to immediately fill up all dance classes offered.

Department of Music

Please see the documents included in the addendum to this document, entitled: "The McIntire Department of Music" and "Visions for Music at UVA," and "The McIntire Department of Music and the Carrs Hill Arts Precinct." These were prepared by Judith Shatin, Chair.

Specific needs cited by Professor Shatin include:

1. Graduate Program.

• Implement the Ph.D. program.
• Find resources to support 9 entering graduate students per year.

2. Additional Faculty.

• Composer/computer music specialist to expand our computer music offerings as well as to cover a broader range of composition courses, seminars, and non-major courses.
• Scholar or scholar/performer in historical musicology who would augment our strengths in critical and cultural studies.
• Scholar or scholar/performer in ethnomusicology, perhaps in the area of South Asian or Jewish Studies.
• Performer/Composer or Performer/Scholar who would help integrate performance into the academic program.

3. Performance.

• Increase the service from and compensation to our applied adjunct faculty; utilize their expertise in teaching courses such as musicianship and chamber music.
• Create a residency for the faculty jazz ensemble that would also support expanded course offerings in jazz, including jazz improvisation, theory, keyboard and guitar.
• Build endowment for trio-in-residence position.
• Build endowments for applied music lessons and coaching.
• Work with the Symphony Board to augment endowments for orchestral principals.
• Find resources to continue to support arts enhancement program, bringing outstanding performers, ensembles, and lecturers.
• Replace instruments as needed and purchase additional ones; this ranges from our concert grands to instruments used by student members of the orchestra and wind ensemble, as well as instruments for our practice modules.

4. Residency Programs.

• Establish annual residencies for master artists to work with performers. One example is to bring master performers to work with the African Dance and Drumming Ensemble.
• Establish annual residencies for a major composer who would work with students and coach performances by the new music ensemble.
• Establish annual visit by a professional ensemble to read and record student works.

5. Music and New Technologies.

• Continue to develop the Virginia Center for Computer Music by moving the technical director from a half-time to a full-time position
• .Add courses and physical plant for teaching recording techiques and for other aspects of digital and media arts.

6. Interdisciplinary Programs.

We have already begun limited interdisciplinary work in the following fields, and look forward to significant expansion in them:

1. Computer music, electrical engineering and computer science.
2. Music and cognitive science (have course in Psychology of Music included in this program).
3. Music and anthropology: we already have students in anthropology taking courses in ethnomusicology and look forward to developing a joint program.
4. Digital Arts: there are interconnections among the use of new technologies, particularly between music and art. We expect expanded offerings in multimedia, and look forward to the eventual establishment of a Center for Digital Arts.
5. Music and Drama: Collaborations in this area could include musical theatre productions, courses in diction and voice, and courses in musical theatre and opera.
6. Music, Anthropology, Public History, Woodson Institute: develop a focus on the performance of African-American genres in the region.
7. Music and Business: develop a program with the Commerce School or Darden Business School to prepare students to enter an aspect of the music business.

7. Staff.

• Administrator for the Applied Music Program.
• Receptionist/assistant to the office manager.
• Audio/visual staff to run the technical side of our concert production efforts and oversee class equipment.

8. Building.

Music needs a facility that will serve our current needs as well as development in the areas outlined above (and in the "Visions for Music at UVA" document found in the addendum). This is a pivotal moment to plan a facility a point where we have achieved important programmatic aims and laid the groundwork for future development. Our facilities needs are outlined in detail in other documents (see Dagit-Saylor plan and "McIntire Department of Music and Carrs Hill Arts Precinct" documents).

The Bayly Art Museum

Documents regarding Mission, History, Goals, Needs, and a shorter list of "Current Goals" can be found in the addendum to this document. I include them there, instead of here, only due to time constraint in preparing this document. Jill Hartz has clearly explained all of this in these documents.

Strategic Plans Regarding Buildings

Fayerweather Hall, presumably, will be renovated next year. Therefore, it’s imperative that funds be raised for the design and construction of a new Studio Art building.

A site has been determined for the new performing arts center/concert hall. A design must follow which can be used in attracting a donor or donors. Funding must be supplied for this design.

Site locations must be finalized for the new Music building, the new Art Museum, the the Fine Arts Library (if it is to change sites) and Music Library. Designs should follow and funds need to be supplied for these designs.

One very important piece of the puzzle is the student performance space/lecture hall. This must not be forgotten as student performance groups continue to be frustrated by the lack of performance spaces on Grounds. The site needs to be finalized and funds raised for the design for this building.

The design for the expansion of the Drama building (with dance studios) should be executed for use in attracting donors.

At the initial meeting at Mortimer Caplin’s office in Washington with the proposed UVA national steering committee for the "UVA Arts Campaign," it was stressed by several people that potential donors need to see substantial plans in order to get excited. Thus it is crucial that the University provide funds for all of the architectural plans and drawings for this "Arts Village" to be used as a tool to garner excitement from potential donors. People need to see why and to what they will be giving their money.

It should be noted that in regards to the Architecture School, it is already in the midst of raising funds for expansion as well as a re-design of its building and this expansion would take place as soon as funding and design are realized. It is important that the Fine Arts Library remain close in regards to location to Architecture, Art, and Studio Art and that the Music Library remain close to the new Music building.

It is recommended that one person from the University’s administration or faculty "own" this entire project and shepherd it to its completion. Thus priorities are specified in regards to which buildings need to be built first and the same donors are not bombarded on all sides by the various Arts entities, championing their cause for their particular building. It should be emphasized that in the actual design of each building the respective departments have major input.

Also, what is not mentioned above and which is of primary concern is traffic flow and parking. A careful plan must be created for the funding of additional or alternative parking and for the funding for administrative and operational staff for the actual running of these buildings before the first bit of ground is broken.

In regards to the cost of all of the above, a major question needs to be answered by the University administration: Do we wish these buildings to include everything we need in order to have the very best programs we can produce or is there a specific cost ceiling which is allocated to each of these buildings around which designs will be created? This question must be answered ASAP.

If we are to assume that in Phase I we would be able to raise $75-80 million -- we also assume that this would be for the following buildings: Studio Art, the performance/concert hall, the new Music building, a limited expansion of the Drama building (with added expansion set for Phase II), the new Art Museum, and, the new Arts Library (provided both the Fine Arts Library and Music Library are to share the same building).

The Fine and Performing Arts Commission has charged each Arts unit to clearly define who they are and what they wish to become. This charge has been met and these visions and goals have been articulated.

Immediate Tasks for the University and/or the Commission:

The University needs to provide funds for:

• The hiring of an Arts publications editor who would produce, twice annually, an "Arts at UVA" publication (much like that produced by the University of Michigan or University of Florida) as well as individual departmental newsletters, twice a year, for Art, Music, and Drama. Determine cost and provide funds for this enterprise ASAP

Determine realistic costs for:

• Design and construction of each new individual building or expansion of a building within the "Arts Village." The University needs to provide funds for these designs ASAP.
• The realistic administrative and operational costs of each new building within this "Arts Village." Is there a need for a central administrator?
• Additional faculty and staff as is listed under each unit’s needs.
• Additional programmatic needs for each unit.
• Find out what the 500 high schools in the U.S. are which have the finest arts programs and create an visually pleasing informational brochure regarding all of the Arts at UVA and send this to each of them. Also make sure that each high school in the Commonwealth of Virginia knows what we all do. Cost basis for this should be determined and the University should provide funds so that this canbe produced ASAP.

The Fine and Performing Arts Commission will do all it can to help various fundraising arms of the University plan a concerted and collaborative "Campaign for the Arts." The planning stage for this has already begun.

Revise the College's Core Curriculum:

It has been suggested that we should press the College of Arts and Sciences to dignify the Arts by requiring every student to take one course in either the fine or performing arts. Right now, the Arts is a choice between three areas and it is buried within the Humanities requirement. Currently, two of these three areas must be chosen. Thus, it is possible for a student to graduate from the University of Virginia without taking a single course in the Arts. The Arts are important for all students. However, at this point in time, due to lack of faculty and space, this would be very difficult to do. But it is a goal that should not be overlooked. Beyond that, might we encourage other schools outside the College, on both the undergraduate and graduate levels, to require their students to take at least one course in the Arts as well.

The Fine and Performing Arts Commission will continue to:

• Plan an "Arts Lecture Series." A sub-committee has been formed from the Commission and a long list of names has been drawn up. Representatives (agents) of our top choices are being called to determine cost. It is anticipated that this might begin in the spring, 2000.
• Foster greater communication and collaboration between Arts departments and programs by recommending the formation of a Faculty/Student Arts Council, (name subject to change) composed of faculty and students from all of the Arts units, which will meet on a regular basis to explore possible interdisciplinary projects as well as find ways to promote what each program is currently, or will be, presenting.
• Foster greater communication and collaboration by getting all of the Arts faculties together to meet each other and exchange information about what we do and what we each plan to do as well as discuss ways in which we all might work together. The first such meeting will occur on January 19, 2000.
• Look closely at the results from the survey that the Commission’s Student Task Force has conducted in regards to how students view the Arts at UVA, what they feel is good and what they feel is missing. The overall result of this survey will be presented at the December 14, 1999 meeting of the Commission. It should be noted that selected responses by a number of students from this survey are included in the addendum to this document.
• Explore various opportunities and possibilities for collaboration between the Arts departments as well as other departments around the University through the work of the Interdisciplinary Project and Programming Task Force. Ways to integrate the Arts into a multitude of various disciplines at the University need to be explored. It is recommended that funds be set aside for Arts faculty to stay during the summer months and plan possible interdisciplinary projects. In addition, funds need to be provided to hire temporary faculty to teach individual courses which would enable permanent faculty to take on team- taught interdisciplinary courses. The University needs to recognize that a faculty member who team teaches takes on as much of a teaching load, if not more, than one who teaches one class. As much, if not more, planning goes into team teaching if it is done right.
• Continue to foster communication and collaboration with the Charlottesville and Albemarle communities at large – keeping them apprised of the "Arts Village" planning as well as receiving feedback in regards to our programming of Arts events.

Site Visits:

Possible arts center site visits should take place in the very near future, with Arts representatives and University administrators going to the Krannert Center at the University of Illinois, and the brand new arts centers at the University of Maryland and the University of Minnesota as well as the concert hall in Minneapolis.

Additional Questions To Be Explored

Should the Arts remain a part of the College of Arts and Sciences or should a School for the Fine and Performing Arts be created as a separate unit of the University?

Should we try to create an annual "Arts Festival" at the University?

Should we plan a national conference next year? If so, what is the central focus?

Thoughts: "The Arts in the University and the University in the Arts," "New Technology and its Use in the Arts," "Interdisciplinary Programs and the Arts."

"Our biggest task is to set priorities."

"A school’s ranking is directly based on the quality of work its students’ produce. They either get into graduate programs and/or they can immediately get hired at the entry level into the artistic discipline they have been studying."

"Graduate students are drawn to a graduate program because of its wonderful faculty, facilities, and the fact that they are totally funded."

"UVA should build upon the fact that this institution is a great monument for democracy and that it is a great historical embarrassment that the Arts have not been supported in such an institution. It is time to bring the University up to date. The context for the importance of the Arts today is different than it was in Jefferson’s time."

"Because the building itself is so great, it boosts morale by itself. It is a pleasure to go to work in such a building, It is a true sphere of excellence." (Harvard's Art Building and Museum)

"You must make sure that the demands you make on your faculty artists do not at the same time destroy their artistic careers and thus the reasons why you brought them to your school."

"Our program is ranked high because of the high quality of our faculty as they exist and as they are perceived and because of the sharpness in focus of our program."

"Don’t trust any architect (unless they are on the faculty of UVA) or any contractor."

"Whatever the cost of a building that is imagined, double it."

"Do not build your building in phases."

"Parking is one of the most important considerations."

"Theory and practice are not incompatible."

"All forms of art are expensive."

"You must secure permanent funding for year to year operation of your buildings and programs."

"Cutting edge thinking in the Arts should be compared to cutting edge thinking in the Sciences and should be funded equally."

"One thing about being grounded in a discipline is to realize the limitations of what you can take on and what you know. You must have humility."

"All the disciplines we study are interdisciplinary."

"The synergy between theory and practice is the engine that distinguishes the Arts fields from other fields. What is lost when theory and practice are compartmentalized?"

"Cutting edge programs are not benchmark programs – they are beyond benchmark programs.

"Create something small and experimental that will not cost a great deal but will draw attention to itself."

"Decisions have to be made regarding what a department is not going to do anymore."

"The reasons why the University of Washington theatre program is in the top four: great faculty who are either superb professionals or world class scholars; the program is very active and maintains a high profile."

"A major source of income for the Arts at the University of Washington is the "Royalty Research Fund" from which patent royalties from other parts of the university help to pay for the Arts.

Finally . . .

I wish to once again emphasize that this Interim Report is focused mainly upon four units – the Art, Drama, and Music departments and the Bayly Art Museum. This is in no way intended to lessen the importance of the other Arts units on Grounds – The School of Architecture, the Fine Arts and Music libraries, or the just initiated Media Studies program. The Music Library is essential to the educational mission of the Music Department and is used by other programs around Grounds as well (especially the musical theatre students in the Drama Department). The Fiske Kimball Fine Arts

Library is integral to the educational mission of the Art History, Studio Art, and Drama programs as well as the School of Architecture.

A list of the Music Library’s "Successes/Limitations/Dreams" can be found in the addendum to this document as well as a list of the strengths and weaknesses of the Fiske Kimball Fine Arts Library. Jack Robertson has also included a listing of benchmark libraries.

A major task . . .

To create, from the research gleaned via this Commission, a compelling "Case Statement for the Arts at the University of Virginia" which will be used to generate interest and enthusiasm from prospective donors for gifts for buildings, programs, graduate and undergraduate scholarships, fellowships, and assistantships, and, artistic production. It can be produced as late as spring, 2001 or as early as spring, 2000. A final date for this case statement needs to be set.

Respectfully submitted by Robert Chapel, Chair, Fine and Performing Arts Commission, December 6, 1999.

Addendum

Bayly Art Museum

Prepared for the Arts Commission, January 1999

Mission

The University of Virginia Art Museum {known as the Bayly Art Museum } is dedicated to creating an environment in which the largest possible share of its diverse constituencies, including members of the University and the general public, can study and learn from the direct experience of works of art. The Museum promotes visual literacy as part of a broader, comprehensive education for all and seeks to enhance its visitors' perceptions and understanding of world cultures through history and of art as an enduring human endeavor. To this end, the Museum shall acquire, preserve, study, exhibit, and interpret works of art of the highest quality in a variety of media that represent the world's cultures from the earliest times to the present.

History, Collections, Programs, and Facility

The Thomas H. Bayly Building, which houses the Museum, opened its doors in March 1935. Designed by then-Dean of Architecture Edmund S. Campbell, the building was financed by a bequest from Evelyn May Bayly Tiffany in honor of her father, a University graduate. In its early years, the Museum received several important works of art, including 17^th century French and Flemish tapestries, two Rodin sculptures, and Frederic Church's painting Natural Bridge, Virginia. The Museum was closed for the duration of the war years and reopened in 1946, renewing a schedule of temporary exhibitions. From the early 1960s until 1972, faced with academic space shortages, the University changed the building's function to house art and architecture classrooms. In 1973, with completion of the new architecture school, the University extensively refurbished the Museum, reactivated its programs and appointed both a director and a curator. The Museum became an independent unit of the University, reporting to the Office of the Provost.

Since its reopening in 1974, the Museum has hired a core professional staff and built a broad collection with a number of special strengths, through gift and purchase, including "Age of Jefferson" American and European paintings, Old Master prints, contemporary art, Japanese woodblock prints, and Indian painting. Exhibitions from its large ethnographic collections-- Native American, African, Oceanic, and pre-Columbian--are organized on a rotating basis. A temporary exhibition program complements the collection, enriches art and interdisciplinary iniatiatives at the University and in the community, and offers students opportunities to work with innovative artists. Public lectures, symposia, and other special events relate exhibitions and the collection to a wide range of audiences. Docents design and present hundreds of individually tailored tours to school and University students, seniors, community groups, and special needs populations. Representatives of the Museum's different visitor sectors perform advisory services as members of ad-hoc committees and advisory boards. A lively membership program includes a Young Friends fund-raising group and over 1,000 student members. The long-serving Museum Volunteer Board provides essential service functions, including visitor hospitality. A recently established Advisory Board assists with the planning and implementation of the Museum's campaign for a new 70,000 square foot facility, endowments, gifts of art, and annual support. This campaign is part of a University presidential initiative to strengthen the programs an facilities for all the arts, resulting in an "arts precinct" that would dramatically improve the cultural life of the area and enable the Museum to truly fulfill its mission.

BAYLY ART MUSEUM GOALS

February 1999

Become nationally accredited

In recognition of the professional level of Museum's operations, we hope to receive national accreditation in 2000.

Establish University-wide policy for acceptance of gifts of art (and decorative art) and their care

Although the Museum has written policies for acquisitions and deaccessioning, care and management of artwork, the University does not have such policies. Could/should the Museum serve as the central authority for such policies as well as the oversight of artwork in the University's collections?

Present stronger exhibitions program

We would like to organize more in-house exhibitions that will tour nationally and internationally and will be accompanied by substantial catalogs.

We would also like to bring more major exhibitions here to raise the visibility and the role of the Museum.

Acquire major works and collections

Our collections continue to grow stronger, but we are still lacking examples in many significant areas, which would be of interest to the community and of academic use to the University.

Make collections more accessible

We would like to increase access to the collections, through a different method/location of off-site storage.

We would like to work more closely with faculty and students to find ways they can use the collections and exhibitions) in their courses across disciplines.

Strengthen and diversify education program

We would like to increase the number and variety of tours and other services offered to schools, university, community organizations, after-school programs, senior groups, etc.

Develop more interdisciplinary programs

Through exhibitions, symposia and other programs, we would use the visual arts as the focus for explorations of varied topics. This would also provide an opportunity to collaborate more closely with faculty. An exhibition of the Astor Collection of Native American art, for example, might involve faculty and students in many areas.

Increase scholarship and publications

Research collections and produce journal/publications on regular basis sharing information with public and art historians

Sponsor internships/courses for academic credit

We would like to build on the museum studies course offered by our curator and the docent education program to design museum internships, U-sems, and other courses, including ones focused on visual learning using actual objects (originating in Museum, art history, anthropology, possibly team-taught) that would use the collections and the museum building.

We would like to form relationships with national/international internship programs, such as those at the Getty and the Guggenheim.

Initiate conservation internship program

We would like to explore, possibly in collaboration with the Chemistry Dept., Libraries (Special Collections for paper conservation), other areas of the University, and grant funding, the contracting of a conservator, who would work on Grounds and at his /her lab to conserve works in the Museum and University collections.

Build relationships with corporations, foundations, and other grants making agencies

We would like to build on our increasing success with grant applications, identifying and cultivating more foundations, federal and state agencies.

Explore international focus

In light of President Casteen's four initiatives, we would like to develop relationships with groups in countries with which the University is involved and arrange exchange exhibitions or loans from their cultural holdings.

Strengthen community involvement

We would like to both strengthen and broaden our activities with the community in the areas of tourism, business and arts partnerships, and exhibitions.

Develop community and multi-arts space in new Museum facility

As part of the planning for the new museum building, we would like to work with community members and University representatives to allocate and design space in the new facility to meet student and community needs for interdisciplinary, multi-arts collaborations, performances, etc. This would include musical performances in the cafe, sculpture garden, galleries, performance art, film, and lectures in the auditorium, etc.

WHAT IS NEEDED FOR THE MUSEUM TO ACCOMPLISH THESE GOALS

TO BECOME NATIONALLY ACCREDITED

1) Include plans for new facility in accreditation application. Facility needs to meet climate control, security, and space needs.

2) Construction and move of collections and operations to new facility must happen within a few years, or present museum must be refitted with climate control technology.

TO ESTABLISH UNIVERSITY-WIDE POLICY FOR ACCEPTANCE OF GIFTS OF ART (AND DECORATIVE ART) AND THEIR CARE

1) Recognition from University administration that there needs to be a centralized policy for acceptance and deaccessioning of gifts of fine and decorative arts

2) Recognition of the Museum's expertise in this area.

3) Delegation of responsibility for oversight and policy development to Museum (in conjunction with Madison Hall, Risk Management, etc.)

4) Storage space to care for University collections

5) Staff to assist registrar with management of collections

Note: Discrepancies in current procedures could affect Museum's accreditation.

TO ACQUIRE MAJOR WORKS AND COLLECTIONS

1) Accredited museum

2) New facility with major architect

3) Travel and cultivation funds

4) Larger development and curatorial staff

TO PRESENT STRONGER EXHIBITIONS PROGRAM

1) Increased budget

2) More staff and more staff time devoted to exhibitions

3) Compensation (salary/leave time) for faculty interested in curating exhibitions

4) Accredited museum

TO MAKE COLLECTIONS MORE ACCESSIBLE

1) New facility with additional galleries and possibly open storage space

2) Truck or van to pick-up and return objects.

3) Hire academic resources coordinator -- staff member who would work closely with faculty to increase use of collections

TO STRENGTHEN AND DIVERSIFY EDUCATION PROGRAM

1) Hire additional staff to meet needs of schools, universities, and other targeted groups.

2) Find temporary workshop space until new facility can accommodate hands-on activities.

3) Establish community advisory group to identity goals of outreach program and explore possibility of a charter school for the arts.

TO DEVELOP MORE INTERDISCIPLINARY PROGRAMS

1) Hire academic resources coordinator, who would work with faculty to identify areas of interdisciplinary interest

2) Compensation/leave time for faculty interested in working on collaborative projects.

3) Create focus groups with faculty in various disciplines to discuss possibilities.

TO INCREASE SCHOLARSHIP AND PUBLICATIONS

1) More staff to enable curators to concentrate on research and publishing

2) More graduate student art history/anthropology fellowships to encourage graduate students to research and write on collections

3) Funds to contract guest curators/scholars to research and publish on collections

4) Funds/leave time for faculty interested in researching and publishing on collections

5) Funds/endowment for publications program

6) Space for additional staff/faculty to work

TO SPONSOR INTERNSHIPS/COURSES FOR ACADEMIC CREDIT

1) More support curatorial/education staff to relieve other staff to plan and participate in courses

2) Interest in other areas of University (faculty/administration/students)

3) Funding

4) Space to hold classes and work with objects

TO INITIATE CONSERVATION INTERNSHIP PROGRAM

1) Discuss and develop proposal with interested areas of University

2) Funds, through grants, University, etc., to hire conservator

3) Space and equipment for conservator on Grounds

TO BUILD RELATIONSHIPS WITH CORPORATIONS, FOUNDATIONS, AND OTHER GRANTS MAKING AGENCIES

1) More staff time devoted to this fund-raising area.

2) Travel funds to visit representatives from agencies.

3) Accredited museum and new building as clear indications of program worthy of support

TO EXPLORE INTERNATIONAL FOCUS

1) Identify countries in which University is already involved and determine if opportunities exist for visual arts collaborations

2) Funding to pursue initiatives

3) Accredited museum and new facility to encourage collaborations and assure finest work is loaned

TO STRENGTHEN COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT

1) Create advisory groups on exhibitions, outreach, and collections that involve community

2) Appoint more community members to Advisory board

3) Hire marketing director to liaison with tourism board, Chamber of Commerce, etc.

4) Plan community-wide arts festivals/exhibitions

5) Find and utilize community site for exhibitions and public programs

TO DEVELOP COMMUNITY AND MULTI-ARTS SPACE IN NEW MUSEUM FACILITY

1) Create community advisory group for new facility to define community visual arts needs, which museum may help meet.

2) create University (faculty, student, administration, staff) advisory group for new facility to define needs of these groups related to galleries, outreach, support and auxiliary spaces (auditorium, etc.)

1. Academic resources coordinator

2. Director of marketing and publicity

3. Curator of exhibitions

4. Curatorial/registrar assistants

5. Membership/development assistant

6. Secretarial support for director and others

7. Preparator's Assistant

8. Photographer

9. Paid afternoon receptionists

10. Contracted conservator

1. New off-site storage location (of 6,000-10,000 sf), with possible additional space for exhibition and outreach programs. (We have been informed that our current space must be vacated in summer 1999.)

2. 4 computer upgrades

3. Office and on-site storage space. Note: recovery of office and slide room used by Art Department would resolve these problems.

 CURRENT GOALS FOR BAYLY ART MUSEUM

Capital Campaign goal of $4.2 million (40% to go)

*Attract significant works of art

*Create endowments for positions, programs, conservation, and acquisitions

* Renovate current facility to provide humidity control

* Improve storage facilities off-site

* Build wing or new museum to accommodate substantial space needs for exhibition, storage, programs, services (including shop, cafe), staffing, lecture and media presentations (auditorium)

* Apply for accreditation: complete survey, refine strategic plan, prepare for on-site evaluation

(Accreditation will attract better loans, gifts, and other support.)

* Review and refine collections management policies, collection development priorities, conservation and care priorities, raise needed funds and implement

* Create advisory groups according to interest areas to advise on collection, exhibitions, and related programs

* Develop exhibitions drawn from collections and investigate touring possibilities

* Enhance publications program to disseminate research to field

*Secure funding for staff paid, or partially paid, through private funds: Development Director (all); Registrar (1/4), Preparator (all), Director of Education (1/4), Tour Coordinator (all)

*Attract funding for Director of Marketing; Development/ Director's Assistant; Receptionist

*Formalize relationship with Adjunct Curators (faculty) providing some kind of compensation

*Attract funding for staff development opportunities

*Develop plan for upgrading computer resources and implement

*Provide public computer access to collection on site and develop school programs through Web.

*Secure funds for library of CD-ROMs by noted visual artists

* Work closely with faculty across Grounds to develop interdisciplinary exhibitions and research projects and refine collection priorities

*Enhance educational offerings to University students

*Develop relationships with schools and other community agencies to enhance learning opportunities

* Develop closer relationships with visual arts programs, galleries, and artists in area

*Significantly increase annual giving for unrestricted purposes

*Assist Advisory Board with fund raising; identify new members

*Create and implement membership campaign

November 11, 1999

MEMORANDUM

To: Bob Chapel

From: Jill Hartz

Re: Benchmarked Museums for Arts Commission Report

As part of the University Arts Commission benchmarking project, the Bayly Art Museum selected five university museums against which we would like to be compared. These are the Georgia Museum of Art, Athens; the Ackland Art Museum, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill; Williams College Museum of Art, Willismtown, MA; Yale University Art Gallery; and the Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University. All are among the top university museums in the country with fine collections and excellent exhibitions and public programs. Some of these have new or renovated buildings.

We were particularly interested in the following information:

1. Physical Plant

* What is the square footage of the facility?

* How much is devoted to gallery space?

* How does the institution address visitor parking?

* Does the facility incorporate earned income centers (restaurant, auditorium, shop)?

2. Collections and Exhibitions

* How many works are in the permanent collection?

* What is the permanent collection?

* How many exhibitions are held annually?

3. Staffing

* What is the size of the staff?

4. Budget

* What is the annual budget?

* What are the sources of annual revenue?

5. Membership

* How large is the membership?

Attached is an overview of the information we received. More detailed information is available.

Ackland Art Museum 38,650 sf with 11,470 sf gallery space; no shop or cafe; parking on street

Bayly Art Museum 16,304 with. 6,724 sf gallery space

No restaurant, shop, auditorium; receptions in galleries

Cantor Art Center at Stanford 117,000 sf in new and renovated buildings designed by Polshek and Partners. Modern security, lighting and climate control; cafe, shop, conservation studio, auditorium, sculpture garden; 60 metered parking spaces (they want it free)

Georgia Museum of Art 52,000 sf, with 9,000 sf for galleries in Phase I of new building, designed by Thompson, Ventulett, Stainback, and Associates. Recommends not phasing construction due to substantial increased costs. Spaces include Teacher Resourece Center, two auditoriums (one for audio/video), educational classroom, cafe, shop, large reception hall. Phase II of approx. 70,000 sf. will bring classrooms, photo studio, conservation lab, more galleries and storage and sculpture court. Sufficient free parking adjacent to building (Visitors must have token from Museum or pay fee on existing.)

Williams College Museum of Art 35,000 sf with 17,000 sf gallery space; renovations and additions in 1983 and 1986 by Charles Moore

Yale University Art Gallery 84,436 sf with 45,052 gallery space; shop, 400-seat auditorium; parking is metered on street and parking garage nearby.

Bayly Art Museum: Benchmarking Museums/page 3

Ackland Art Museum 14,000 objects, with strengths in Old Master painting and sculpture, Indian miniatures, Japanese painting, North Carolina folk art, works on paper

Bayly Art Museum: 9,000+ objects, eclectic, strengths in Age of Jefferson, works on paper, 20^th century American, Native American and Pre-columbian

Cantor Arts Center at Stanford 20,000 objects, eclectic, with strengths in ancient art, ethnographic art, European and American

Ancient Mediterranean, Africa, Asia, Oceania

Georgia Museum of Art 7,000 objects, primarily American paintings and works on paper; extended loans of major American, European collections, including Italian Renaissance paintings.

Williams College Museum of Art 11,000 works spanning history of art

Yale University Art gallery 80,000 works of art from all periods

Exhibitions Annually

Ackland Art Museum 4-6 temporary loan exhibitions

Bayly Art Museum 8 temporary loan exhibitions

Cantor Arts Center at Stanford 4 major shows, 4 smaller shows, 4 project-based shows

Georgia Museum of Art 6-8 temporary loan exhibitions

Williams College Museum of Art 15-20 small and focused exhibitions annually

Yale University Art Gallery 12 temporary exhibitions

Full-time Staffing, excluding security

Ackland Art Museum 15; 2 part-time

Bayly Art Museum 9; 1 part-time

Cantor Art Center at Stanford 33

Georgia Museum of Art 26

Williams College Museum of Art 13 full-time, 13 part-time

Yale University Art Gallery 25 full-time, 29 part-time

Annual Visitors/Hours/Admission

Ackland Art Museum 32,400; Wed.-Sat. 10am-5pm, Sun. 1-5pm; free

Bayly Art Museum 30,000; Tues.-Sun., 1-5pm; free

Cantor Art Center at Stanford 32,000; Wed.-Sun., 11am-5pm, Thurs. 11am-8pm; free

Georgia Museum of Art 75,000; Tues., Thurs.-Sat., 10am-5pm, Wed. 10am-9pm.

Sun. 1-5pm; free

Williams College Museum of Art 36,200; Tues.-Sat. 10am-5pm; Sun. 1-5 pm

Yale University Art Gallery 102,000; Tues.-Sat. 10am-5pm; Sun. 1-6pm; free

Ackland Art Museum Approx. $1 million; approx. $800,000 from University; additional from corporate support, membership ($76,115), grants and gifts

Bayly Art Museum Approx. $1 million; approx. $700,000 from University.

Cantor Art Center at Stanford $1.8 million from University for staff and operating; $550,000 from University for maintenance and utilities; $18 million endowments; $400,000 membership; $300-500,000 grants and gifts. Note: Director of Development salary paid by Office of Development

Georgia Museum of Art $1,525,852 of which $1,187,751 comes from University, $13,100 from corporations; $84,665 from membership. Note: University pays 60% of Director of Development salary.

Williams College Museum of Art $1,501,984 of which $700,000+ comes from the University.

Yale University Art Museum $4,852,650 of which $3 million+ comes from the University. Note: Director of Development salary paid by University

Ackland Art Museum 700+

Bayly Art Museum 850 paid members; 200 student members

Cantor Art Center at Stanford 2,000

Georgia Museum of Art 500

Yale University Art Gallery 1,520

The McIntire Department of Art: Achievements, Strengths, Goals

The programs of the McIntire Department of Art provide students at the University of Virginia with the opportunity to explore the visual arts as media of human expression and creativity. The Department comprises two main faculties, one in Studio Art, the other in the History of Art. In Studio Art students experience the making of images as a creative intellectual activity; in the History of Art students explore human creative expression in the visual arts in diverse times and cultures. The comments that follow differentiate between these wings of the department because we teach quite differently and at different levels and we have distinct goals, as well as differing needs that we must meet in order to realize our ambitions. Both wings of the Department report to one Chair, who is an Art Historian; but there is as well an Associate Chair for Studio, and the two programs operate for practical purposes as autonomously as possible within the larger Department.

Studio Art at the University of Virginia is a rigorous pre-professional program leading to the Bachelor of Arts degree. The Studio faculty are nationally recognized artists who are committed to teaching the practice of art as a disciplined effort in creative thinking. Many Studio Art majors go on to graduate school in Fine Arts; many others use their Studio training in a wide variety of fields after graduation. All who pursue this major through their fourth year emerge with a rich experience in the challenges of fine art, and each has accomplished a serious body of work.

For Studio students, both majors and non-majors alike, the making of art provides the kind of benefits that investment banker Tom Osborne, Class of 1987, described in a letter of appreciation:

First and foremost, Studio Art fosters creative thinking, the kind of thinking that informs intelligent decision-making. Students of Studio Art learn to think not only creatively, but analytically. They develop a critical eye for detail. They learn visually about addition and subtraction, harmony and dissonance - a whole range of expressive tools that cannot help but enhance their abilities to convey ideas and solve problems. How many times have I found a solution not in what is committed to the page, but in those spaces in between? Where better than the studio to learn that the most unlikely occurrences may inspire the most brilliant solutions?

All Studio classes are taught in the atelier tradition, with constant interchange between students and teacher. No course is off-limits to non-majors; advanced courses are open to all who have fulfilled the prerequisites. The process of critique and dialogue encourages progress and fosters self-reliance. All Studio Art professors teach basic as well as advanced courses; and we are one of the very few programs at Virginia in which professors know every student in every course by name.

As part of the College of Arts & Sciences, Studio Art adds its discipline to and enriches the traditional core and strength of liberal arts undergraduate education at the University of Virginia. Art in this program is the study and production of creative work; it is visual research. Many students arrive at this University with an intense desire to study art, despite the fact that there is nothing like the coherent study of visual art anywhere in the primary or secondary educational system of our society. The extent of this demand from students is evident in the fact that the introductory drawing classes, the foundation year of study in Studio Art, are always filled and overflowing, no matter how many drawing sections we offer. Besides providing the point of entry for the future Studio Art major, drawing classes are the primary Studio Art service to the College as a whole, and indeed 50% of Studio Art enrollments are in drawing classes. Most other Studio classes are likewise over-enrolled, in particular classes in painting and photography. What seem low enrollments for Studio courses result from the fact that Studio Art must be taught in small seminar-type classes and that the number of Studio faculty is small relative to the desire of students to register for their courses. These apparently low enrollments obscure the unmet demand for Studio courses.

Studying art in a liberal arts context is a good way to find out what being a serious artist means, and Studio Art also serves those undergraduates with professional artistic aspirations. We believe the best way to continue to help our most serious students is to continue our present BA program and in this way work from within the strength of the traditional liberal arts degree. Our most able students have proven capable of getting into the best graduate programs after leaving the University. This is the best evidence that what we are doing is working. The intensive individualized instruction and studio critiques that our students receive as they work toward their fourth-year thesis exhibition provide a solid background to later professional training. An important additional component for these students is our post-baccalaureate program, which uses Aunspaugh Fellowship funds to enable one or two of our very best students to stay for a fifth year of study in their chosen studio field. This is an innovative program, offered in a few professional schools like the Maryland Art Institute and the Chicago Art Institute, but rarely offered in a university art department setting. We would like to be able to expand this fifth-year program into every subdivision of the Studio department, as this program has proven singularly effective in developing our students’ portfolios for graduate admission.

The Fayerweather Gallery and its program of exhibitions and visiting artists are very close to the center of the Studio Art experience. Every spring this gallery is the site of the Senior Exhibitions, the common goal towards which all of a Studio major’s work aims. These exhibitions at once celebrate the successful completion of the major and provide the most pointed critical interplay of visual ideas and discussion. To mount an exhibition is to adopt a critical position, and to coherently defend that position both formally and conceptually is certainly part of what it takes to put together a show. The Fayerweather Gallery also serves as the most important showcase of contemporary art at the University through its exhibitions of nationally and internationally known artists during the rest of the school year. Students are involved with the production and installation of these exhibitions and gain valuable experience in the handling and hanging of works in all media.

The University of Virginia considers itself among the elite institutions of higher learning in this country, certainly among the very best in providing its students a strong liberal arts education. In view of this self-conception, however, the lack of support for the Studio Art program is quite puzzling. The Studio program is prevented from the fullest realization of its mission by the terrible inadequacy of the physical facilities, by the lack of proper equipment, by a faculty too few in number to meet student demand, and by the modest support for its innovative programs such as the Aunspaugh Fifth-Year Fellowships, the exhibitions schedule of the Fayerweather Gallery, and the related Visiting Artists Program. Taken together, these problems create a situation where many students are turned away from courses and the remaining students work in cramped studios with broken and otherwise inadequate equipment, often in unsafe and hazardous conditions. The inadequate facilities also create conflicts among Studio Art and Art History, making for a tense relationship between what ought to be two sympathetic components of one department. Each of the studios in the Studio Art program has the complexities of a small business, and each is some combination of atelier, machine shop, and chemistry lab. The faculty must supervise these teaching studios and workshops, even to the extent of providing some housekeeping and maintenance services; and at the same time they must fulfill their own creative research programs as required by the standards of a research university and as their own professional aspirations impel them. That the Studio program is also running a professional gallery with no administrative staff, adds to the burden under which the faculty work.

The History of Art is a humanistic discipline that seeks to order and understand works of art and, indeed, all images, as creative expressions of human values, needs, and desires. This involves art historians in studying works of art as objects of intense interest in themselves; but art historians also seek to locate works of art within the historical human cultures that shaped them and that were, in turn, shaped by them. As one of my colleagues observes, the fundamental goal of the History of Art is to understand why images look the way they do.

The program in Art History has developed remarkably in size and reputation since its beginnings in 1968 when the distinguished scholar Frederick Hartt was hired to build a graduate program. In the thirty years since, the faculty has grown to thirteen full-time art historians in fields covering the history of Western and Asian art, and it has gained prominence nationally and internationally as the work of individual faculty members has become increasingly well known in their fields. Art History faculty publish widely, participate actively in scholarly conferences, and serve on the boards of numerous American and international professional organizations and journals. They have received impressive grants and awards and have been invited to highly visible visiting appointments both in America and abroad. David Summers, for instance, was recently elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and is now a Visiting Senior Fellow at the newly opened Getty Center for the Arts and Humanities in Los Angeles. Malcolm Bell recently completed a three-year stint as Mellon Professor at the American School for Classical Studies in Rome and will shortly take up the position of Mellon Professor at the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts at the National Gallery in Washington. John Dobbins received an NEH matching grant for his Pompeii Forum Project, and he has garnered attention in Europe and America for his innovative use of computing technology in his archaeological work. The list of senior faculty achievement could be readily amplified, but it is also important to note the addition to the Department in the last two years of two junior faculty, Howard Singerman in Contemporary Art and Dorothy Wong in East Asian Art. The hiring of these strong and already prominent younger scholars and the hirings we plan to make this spring at the junior level in American Art and in Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth-Century Art are, in effect, rejuvenating the faculty and the curriculum of the Department. These four appointments are critical to the future development of the Art History program and the realization of our goals.

The graduate program in Art History, awarding the degrees of Master of Arts and Doctor of Philosophy, has, like the faculty, matured and gained substantial national fame. Our Ph.D.s are on the faculties of numerous universities like Wake Forest University, the University of Colorado at Boulder, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and the University of Georgia, and on the faculties of many smaller schools like Calvin College and Washington College in Maryland. The many dozens of M.A.s we have graduated now staff the museums of America, including the director of education at the Cloisters in New York City and the director of public relations at the J. Paul Getty Museum. Our graduate students compete for and win prestigious fellowships, and they participate widely in conferences and symposia. We are confident that we can, with proper funding, have a small, selective graduate program that will be able to attract top-quality students from around the nation and increasingly from abroad. We especially hope that with two faculty in Asian art, we will see an increase in students in these fields, some of whom we expect will come from Asia itself.

The undergraduate program in Art History is flourishing, numbering 90 to 100 majors. A small number of our majors proceed to graduate school in the History of Art; and an equal number pursue careers in the art market or in the museum world, often undertaking graduate study after some years in these fields. Most of our majors, however, do not pursue careers in arts-related fields, but use their work in Art History in the way students use any liberal arts major, that is, as training in critical thinking and in research and writing skills. Our B.A.s can be found in almost any field from medicine to law to finance to computing technology.

For the Art History program a major goal is the pursuit of policies that will place Virginia’s graduate program within the top ten Art History programs nationally in the next National Research Council listings. We are nearly there, having placed sixteenth nationally in the most recent NRC study. Our plan for achieving this goal involves the pursuit of excellence in three main areas, faculty, graduate students, and teaching and research facilities. Regarding faculty development, the Department plans to continue its successful policy of making strong hires at the junior level to replace retiring senior faculty. While it is tempting to try to make senior-level appointments, excellent appointments at the junior level will ensure the long-term vigor and visibility of the program. It will be important for the Department to be as supportive as possible of faculty research projects and teaching initiatives, as well as to encourage faculty participation in national venues for the presentation of their research. Regarding graduate students, our policy is to continue to admit a relatively small entering group of eight to ten new students annually and to allow into the Ph.D. program only excellent students who have a real prospect for professional advancement in the field. Increased graduate financial aid is critical for both recruitment and retention of top-quality students. With regard to facilities, different aspects of the current situation favor and detract from the Department’s pursuit of its mission and goals. We are fortunate in having an excellent research library, the Fiske Kimball Fine Arts Library, with an experienced and capable professional staff. We have as well an excellent Visual Resources Collection, which includes some 225,000 slides and an active program of digitizing our visual materials and developing a computerized data base. Again, a dedicated staff is proving essential in allowing the Department to harness the promise of computing technology for teaching and research in the History of Art. Facilities, however, also seriously compromise the Department’s striving for excellence. The Department is currently housed in three buildings, Fayerweather Hall, Brooks Hall, and the Bayly Museum, and in all three the spaces we have are desperately inadequate. Nine of thirteen art historians, including chaired faculty and faculty members of national and international repute, must share offices, a situation that will soon seriously affect our ability to hire and retain excellent faculty. There is no space for T.A.s to meet their students. There is no dedicated space for a student computing facility or for a graduate student study space and lounge. The Visual Resources Collection is housed in terribly cramped quarters in the Bayly Art Museum, which makes it difficult to process both slides and digital images and hinders faculty members attempting to prepare classes.

By far the most serious impediments confronting the Art History program are the need for adequate space and the need for graduate student financial aid. Without a proper building and funding for graduate recruitment and retention, we will have difficulty maintaining our current high level of achievement. With them, we can capitalize on the investment of the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s in faculty, books, and slides, and achieve an excellence of faculty and instruction and a corresponding degree of national recognition that is now just beyond our reach.

Both the Studio program and the Art History program are poised to excel. Both are hobbled by the utterly inadequate spaces we must work and teach in. New facilities and increased fellowship funds are critical needs that will allow this vigorous, talented faculty to realize its potential

The Department of Drama