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BSSF panel discussion helps shape next step for Center for Art and Visual Studies

The seed for an exciting project that will help shape the future Center for Art and Visual Studies (CAVS) was planted in discussions with visiting alumni museum directors and curators this spring.  Beginning in the fall of 2006, the Arts Division will launch the “CAVS Museum Without Walls” and begin exploring the kinds of dynamic and diverse programming envisioned for the new Center. The goal of this project is to create anticipation and interest, as well as build a compelling case for a permanent facility.

Gordon Knox and Jeremy Strick participate in the "Why Do Universities Have Museums?" panel discussion during Banana Slug Spring Fair.

To launch this initiative, Acting Dean Leta Miller designated a three-year pledge of start-up funds from the Arts Division. Planners hope to match these funds with additional gifts from donors to launch the project in the fall of 2006.

The Center for Art and Visual Studies is envisioned as an architectural landmark situated in the beautiful natural setting of the Arts area that will serve as a living laboratory where artists and scholars can work together, curators can introduce new display practices, and students can explore culturally and historically diverse images and objects from the visual arts to the sciences. The Center will welcome visitors from the campus community and beyond, as well as providing an essential new resource for discovery and learning at UC Santa Cruz.

BSSF panelists Jeremy Strick, Karen Moss, Gordon Knox, and Philip Brookman.

The CAVS Museum Without Walls concept emerged during a lively Banana Slug Spring Fair panel titled “Why Do Universities Have Museums? The role of the arts in visual learning, cultural literacy and community building.” The conversation, moderated by Jennifer Gonzalez, associate professor of History of Art and Visual Culture, focused on the future of museums in the culture at large, the special role of a museum at a university, and the vision for a new art center at UCSC.

The panelists were:

• Philip Brookman (Porter, Individual Major, 1975), senior curator for photography at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.;
• Gordon Knox (College 8, Anthropology, 1978), director of the Lucas Artists Programs at Montalvo Arts Center in Saratoga, CA;
• Karen Moss (Porter, Art and Art History, 1977), curator at the Orange County Museum of Art in Newport Beach, CA; and
• Jeremy Strick (Cowell, Art History, 1977), director of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles.

For more information about the Center for Art and Visual Studies, visit http://arts.ucsc.edu/artcenter/.

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