Page 18 - College Planning & Management, September 2017

DESIGNED FOR PERFORMANCE
the part of HWS to the liberal arts in gen- eral and the performing arts in particular. It has galvanized interest in the perform- ing arts among students far and wide. Example: more students than ever are interested in majoring in performing arts and competing for HWS’ performing arts scholarships, and students are graduating with more employable skills.
“We’re starting to see more students come to HWS to study theater,” says Woodworth.
“Students are coming out of here,” she continues, “with a host of skills. Our graduates have found very prominent positions in the theater. The building has engendered confidence.”
The Gearan Center for the Performing Arts, named after Mark Gearan and his wife Mary Herlihy Gearan, celebrates the diverse architecture of the HWS campus. It has a large, light-filled central lobby, around which are arrayed spaces for each of the performing arts disciplines — music, dance, theater and film. The lobby was designed to bond the disciplines as an equivalent of the community living room that accommodates impromptu student/ faculty interaction and even spontaneous performances.
BUILT FOR PERFORMANCE
The building’s location puts it at the campus’ crossroads. On the exterior, the steeply angled roofs acknowledge the upstate New York winters. A cupola and 80- foot glass-topped tower, which marks the entrance, flood the interior with natural light and provide inspired interior spaces for teaching. The Flemish bond brick pat- tern celebrates the Flemish revival build- ings on the campus.
Assistant Professor of Music Katherine
Walker credits the impeccable acoustics of the center’s spaces and rehearsal rooms for higher student achievement. “You can only ask a student to perform what they hear. The acoustics mean students will reach a higher level.”
Walker credits the building for being “a big part of what attracted me to this job.” In addition to fostering student excel-
lence, the Gearan Center has made it pos- sible for more student/student and student/ faculty engagement.
“There are more collaborative efforts between students,” Walker says. “We get dancers wanting to study music, musicians who want to try theater, and so on.” Dance professor Whittier concurs: “Before, my students rarely sought out their theater and music peers.”
“The everyday camaraderie has fostered collaborations among faculty,” Woodworth says.
Faculty offices are deliberately placed together on the building’s second and third floors, precisely to engender this kind of interaction. “Before, because we were sepa- rated on campus, we had to seek each other out,” says Whittier.
OFFERING WELCOME TO ALL
Gearan Center is designed to be inclu- sive, welcoming all students to enter and learn and be engaged.
“We do a disability arts festival,” Whit- tier says. “We have a gender-neutral bath- room.” She adds that major performance spaces were initially going to be located on upper floors. “We told the architects that would not be inclusive, and they listened and made the appropriate design changes.”
Because of the nature of the perform- ing arts, the Gearan Center attracts people from the wider Geneva community who
come and partake of what the building offers.
“We have a deep and personal connec- tion to the community,” says Woodworth. “I grew up in Geneva. I see citizens come in to watch rehearsals or live performances. We also welcome visiting artists from New York City and other places. People come here and say, ‘I can’t believe you have this space in Geneva.’”
The design of the building enhances the occupants’ experience, be they students, faculty, visitors or Geneva citizens. The main performance spaces are acoustically isolated from each other, assuring classes and performances can go on simultane- ously without disturbance. Tall windows are not just an architectural signature,
but allow views to the outside and beckon passersby to enter.
President Mark Gearan wrapped up an 18-year tenure as head of the colleges over the summer, making him the longest- serving president in the colleges’ history. A former director of the Peace Corps and director of communications during the Clinton administration, Gearan says he was grateful to have his and his wife’s name over the door at the Gearan Center.
“This is the honor of a lifetime,” he says. This fall Gearan begins a stint as president in residence at the Harvard University Graduate School of Education. But the legacy of Gearan Center will continue.
“The performing arts are at the heart of a liberal arts education,” Gearan says. “The center raises the bar for student achievement.” CPM
Meng Howe Lim, AIA, LEED-AP BD+C,
is a senior associate for GUND Partnership (www.gundpartnership.com) in Cam- bridge, MA.
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