A sun-splashed bash to dedicate CU’s big new Visual Arts Complex

Dressy crowd of artists and funders unveil new campus gem

Bob Wells | Sep 24, 2010

Twas a perfect afternoon for the 400-plus people who gathered to dedicate the new Visual Arts Complex on the University of Colorado campus Friday afternoon, Sept. 24.

Highlights: an avant-garde, scantily-clad performance-art piece in the new museum, snacks and speeches under the big tent outside, and a dressed-up crowd of donors and friends celebrating the day.

There’s palpable bonhomie in that CU art crowd, and you could feel it surging through the crowd both inside, as they strolled the open studios and the new museum, and outside, as they formally dedicated the two-building complex.

The two buildings, located just north of the UMC parking structure where the badly outdated old Sybil Wolle Fine Arts Building had stood, is the new home for the arts faculty and more than 900 art and art history students. The museum will support display of major art exhibits both from the university’s collection and beyond.

Here are video and some pictures from the day…

EXPRESSIVE: Students performed a dance work named “Dwelling,” choreographed by Michael Theodore and Michelle Ellsworth, inside the museum. This video features an excerpt of the dance and an interview with Ellsworth regarding the choreographers’ intent.