"With the 40 percent more space our new facility will provide, our faculty and students will be able to push themselves to even greater levels of achievement, and we will be able to recruit even more world-class teachers and artists.”
The new building’s proximity to facilities at Temple’s other arts-related schools and colleges — including the Boyer College of Music and Dance’s Presser Hall and School of Communications and Theater’s performance spaces and theater department — will create an arts enclave for Temple and a northern anchor for Philadelphia’s Avenue of the Arts. A soaring glass atrium will connect the new building to Presser Hall.
Award-winning architect Carlos Jimenez, the project’s lead architect, is scheduled to join Morrison and Temple President Ann Weaver Hart as a speaker at the groundbreaking ceremony. Jimenez’s buildings, which are known for their purity of form and use of bold color and light, include the headquarters for the Houston Fine Arts Press, the new Spencer Studio Art Building at Williams College and the Central Administration Building of the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston.
To Jimenez, much of the power of Tyler’s new building is a product of its location.
“An urban context,” Jimenez said, “is a rich territory for any student of art: to be on Main Campus, to be [in] such a vibrant city as Philadelphia, to immerse oneself in the interior life of the building as well as in a widened field for the imagination.”
Philadelphia-based H2L2 is the local architectural firm; the builder will be Hunter Roberts Construction Group.
Funding for the project will be provided by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania ($61.5 million) and Temple University ($7 million). The remainder will come from private supporters. A fund-raising goal of $22 million has been set.
“We are grateful for the generous contributions from the commonwealth,” said President Hart. “Governor Rendell recognizes that universities thrive with strong arts centers. Now Tyler’s loyal alumni and friends as well as Philadelphia’s broader cultural community will join us to help make this wonderful facility possible.”
The move of Tyler’s studio arts facilities to the new building will unite on one campus Tyler’s academic and creative departments. Tyler’s two current locations — with studio arts in Elkins Park and departments such as architecture, art education and art history at the Main Campus — isolates many Tyler students, and presents unique challenges for others.
“For students like me who take courses at Main Campus and in Elkins Park, the current set-up causes a lot of time-management and commuting problems,” said Tyler B.F.A. candidate Andrea R. Caldarise, the student speaker at the groundbreaking ceremony. A sophomore who studies painting and art history, she will be a senior when the project is scheduled to be completed.
“I’m excited about the new building because I know many Tyler students want to collaborate with students studying other subjects, like dance and theater,” Caldarise said. “And it works both ways: Students majoring in other subjects will benefit from Tyler’s presence too.”
Also scheduled to join Hart, Morrison, Jimenez and Caldarise as speakers at the groundbreaking ceremony are Tyler alumna and interior designer Martha McGeary Snider, a trustee of the Philadelphia Museum of Art; Tyler faculty member Martha Madigan, a professor of photography; Dan Polett, chair of Temple’s Board of Trustees; State Sen. Shirley M. Kitchen; and Philadelphia Councilman Darrell L. Clarke.
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