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Walker and Guthrie buildings making headway
by Marianne Combs, Minnesota Public Radio
October 29, 2004

The design for the new Walker Art Center space was inspired by a paper snowflake. The odd corners and holes evoke a paper snowflake as it unfolds. (Photo Courtesy of Heurzog and de Meuron)

Two huge concrete edifices are springing up in Minneapolis; new buildings for both the Guthrie Theater and the Walker Art Center. Their past - and future - are closely linked.

Minneapolis, Minn. — Project Manager Howard Oransky walks briskly through the new half of the Walker Art Center, holding his arms against his chest to keep warm. He leads a tour group down sloped white corridors with slanted walls and oddly shaped windows.

"Just the way contemporary art is challenging and it might disrupt your expectations about what beauty is, or what art is supposed to be about, we didn't want a building that would be traditional and then put all that contemporary art into it," says Orlansky. "We wanted a building that would have an unexpected surprising playful design to it."

	The Walker construction site

Minnesota winters inspired the Walker Art Center expansion design. The architects imagined a child folding up a piece of white paper and cutting it to make a snowflake. The buildings creases and angular holes evoke the paper snowflake as it opens.

And indeed the Walker Art Center is getting closer to opening up. At just halfway to completion, and currently a couple of weeks behind schedule, director Kathy Holbreich still feels confident in the date for the inaugural festivities - Sunday April 17th, 2005. She says composers Phillip Glass, Meredith Monk and Bill Frazell as well as local artists will perform.

"If we're not on schedule, we'll have a great party someplace!" she laughs.

	Walker of the future

The Walker still needs to raise some more money too. The expansion costs $67.5 million plus another $24.5 million to increase the Walkers endowment in order to pay for expanded programming. Holbreich says private foundations and donors have already funded the majority of the project.

"So we have about another $7 or 8 million to raise, but as our president Roger Hail says we can see light at the end of the tunnel and we don't think it's a locomotive," says Holbreich.

In order to make up the difference the Walker Art Center is publicly soliciting donations from its members for the first time in its history. While Holbreich is confident the Walker will reach its goal, she says for her the biggest concern is that she and the Walker deliver on their promises.

	Paisley design

"I want to make certain that this building is extraordinary and that it serves a very important role in this community and permits artists to make work that we may not even have names for yet," says Holbreich.

The Walker Art Center is set to open this coming spring, but the transformation wont be truly complete until the spring of 2006, when the Guthrie Theater moves out of its home on the Walker campus and into it's new theater complex on the riverfront. Guthrie Theater Project Manager Mary Ann Ehlshlager says while the construction is on budget and on schedule so far, the winter weather will slow things down a bit.

"The team's working right now to get the building enclosed before the snow flies," says Ehlshlager. "They're working on the blue cladding, the Guthrie blue skin that will enclose the entire building and some temporary enclosure to get through the winter so the workers can move inside."

	The New Guthrie

The Guthrie Theater is currently in a skeletal phase of construction. Steel beams have just been sprayed with a grey fire retardant, making the building eerily ashen. But upon completion, thanks to the work of architect Jean Nouvel, the building will become a bold modern structure that pays tribute both to the Mississippi River and its historic flour mills. For Guthrie Artistic Director Joe Dowling, overseeing this type of project has been an amazing experience, but not wholly unfamiliar.

"A director of production in the theater will work with the designer on evolving the stage set and costume and all the other details involved in a production," says Dowling. "Well, this is a rather expensive production, and a rather large set, but it has that same feel."

The new Guthrie complex is a $125 million project, $85 million of which is budgeted to come from donations. Dowling says so far, the Guthrie has raised $76 million.

	Joe Dowling

"We really do expect that we'll be able to reach that goal of $85 (million) over the next couple of years, but its going to be hard," says Dowling. "They always say that the last five to seven million are the most difficult to get because you've tapped all your major donors, which indeed we have. We've had extraordinary generosity and philanthropic support, but now we're down to the wire and we're going to be asking everybody to help."

Several other cultural institutions in Minneapolis are getting a makeover.

Construction is underway for a new library, as well as expansions to the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, and the Children's Theatre Company.

With so many simultaneous projects, some wonder whether it indicates a cultural renaissance in the city. Both Holbreich and Dowling don't think so. They say this is the natural evolution of a healthy arts community, spurred on by a booming economy in the late 1990s. What's remarkable about these projects is that they continued to receive strong financial support despite the recent economic downturn. They say it shows Minnesotans are ready for more art and more theater.

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