Botstein: Bard center called for 'architect-artist'

By Rebecca Rothbaum
Poughkeepsie Journal

''We wanted to find the greatest architect-artist,'' said Leon Botstein, president of Bard. ''Frank Gehry is an architect-artist. He is spontaneous, imaginative, curious and whimsical.''

For Botstein, who is the conductor of the American Symphony Orchestra and the driving force behind the Richard B. Fisher Center project, the decision to hire Gehry to create a landmark of a theater was symbolic. The message, in Botstein's words, is: ''We have made the arts into an integral part of the undergraduate studies. It has an equal place here -- it's not a second-class citizen.''

It was also practical. Bard's theater burned down in the early 1970s, and the school struggled over the years to raise enough money to replace it. Dance and theater majors at the 1,300-student college, which was founded in 1860 in association with the Episcopal Church, made do with cramped studios and makeshift theaters. The theater department, for example, has been mounting performances in a converted scene shop.

Botstein and the chairs of the theater and dance programs, Joanne Akalaitis and Jean Churchill, worked closely with Gehry to ensure that the new center meets the school's needs, including ample rehearsal and performance space. The result is a multi-purpose building that can accommodate everything from chamber music to opera.

''The center provides a much higher standard of living,'' said theater chair Akalaitis, who will direct a new performance of Racine's ''Phedre'' for the center's opening weekend Saturday and Sunday. ''Besides, being in a Frank Gehry building inspires one.''

Students anxious to use space

Brian Maloney, a junior dance and theater major, said he and his peers had been anxiously waiting for the center's opening.

''We do well with what we have,'' he said, ''but this is a real performance space.''

As much as the Fisher center is a facility for the college, it also a public one. It is to be the home of the newly-created SummerScape, which expands on the successful and critically acclaimed Bard Music Festival and will offer a mix of opera, theater, dance and music.

And Bard hopes the center will attract performances -- and patrons -- throughout the year, functioning as a kind of upstate Brooklyn Academy of Arts, with a varied and often avant-garde program featuring world-class artists. Many will likely come just to see the building, and no one at Bard is complaining.

Relevant Web link: More coverage of the Fisher Center for Performing Arts is available at http://www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/projects/bard_center