Feedback just got an e-mail from UVA, announcing that the school’s Arts Grounds project will be named for President John Casteen, who will retire in August to focus on selling cigarettes, and his wife, Betsy. According to the release, "The University is seeking to support and honor John, who in 1998 launched an intiative to ensure that the arts hold a central place in the university experience."
Arts Grounds was conceived as part of the Virginia 2020 plan, which broadly aims to raise the university’s status in the sciences, international activities, public service and, most germane to this blog’s purposes, fine and performing arts. Noting that most of the country’s top arts programs have their own campus, UVA embarked on an ambitious—and expensive—plan to create the same.
The first phase of $118 million worth of construction projects on the Arts Grounds is nearing completion. Recently completed projects include the nearly $26 million Ruffin Hall studio art building and the lovely Culbreth Road Garage. But work is far from complete. The UVA Art Museum, which was also renovated last year in the first phase, is looking to expand with a four-level, 20,000 sq. ft. addition extending westward, toward the architecture building, which will anchor the Grounds.
Lawrence Goedde, who chairs the art department, said, "Students and faculty are planning more shared social events, but we’ve also begun to plan new academic programs involving collaborations among the arts departments housed or soon to be housed on Carr’s Hill."
Whatever it looks like in the end, it’ll have the Casteens’ name on it.
Knowledge is power is John Casteen.
