VAC brings together form, function, lots of glass

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Inner Space

VAC brings together form, function, lots of glass

This piece represents the opinion of the author:

Sadie Nott

Columnist

September 30, 2011

Photos: Matthew Rasmussen, Brian Jacobel, Design: Kate Featherston

**SPLIT SCREEN:** Certain features of the Visual Arts Center (VAC) (left) were designed in homage to the Walker Art Building (right). For example, the negative space at the VAC’s core evokes the same qualities of the central recess of the Walker Art Building.

To be honest, I was initially uneasy about my choice of the Visual Arts Center (VAC) for this week's column. I fear that it has already imprinted a fairly concrete impression in the minds of the members of the community. In the spirit of being upfront, I should also add that as a senior visual arts major, it's a building that I've come to have a fairly complex relationship with: it's been the home of some major discoveries, struggles, and naps in the Beam Classroom.

Over the last three years, I've become highly aware of the fact that the majority of Bowdoin has very strong feelings about the VAC. It seems that some would love to eradicate it from the campus, while others find it a memorable and important part of Bowdoin. Finally, I would imagine that for a slightly smaller percentage of you, it's not a building that occupies a lot of time in your lives in one way or another.

Prepare yourselves, readers: I'm about to argue that this is one of the funkiest, most interesting and most important (gasp!) parts of campus. My hope is not to convince you to love the building if you hate it. Rather, I hope that this week's column will give you one more way to think about its role.

In order to give the building the thought it deserves, it's important to address its history. Though the VAC (completed in 1975) and its neighbor, the beautiful Walker Art Building (otherwise known as the Bowdoin College Museum of Art), are quite distinct in appearance, the VAC was designed with its predecessor in mind.

Architect Edward Larrabee Barnes described his creation as a modern-day interpretation of McKim, Mead and White's museum, completed in 1894 (I already hear your scoffs).

Analytically speaking, I don't find this explanation to be that far off-base. The museum's dome is echoed in the angular rising form on the top of the VAC and both buildings have clearly-differentiated top and bottom portions.

Finally, the brilliant use of negative space in the opening of the VAC is a direct homage to the portico of the art museum. Barnes' conscious references to the Walker Art Building are proof of what I've been hearing from my art professors all these years: making art takes innovation, but there's no rule that says we can't (and shouldn't) acknowledge influences.

I would argue, however, that Barnes' attempt to draw a connection between the VAC and its predecessor is not the most significant facet of the center.

As a structure so highly visible on the Quad, the building's success can be located in what the exterior of the building conveys and what it's telling you about what's going on inside of it. In particular, all that glass reveals what occurs within the VAC's walls to the typical passerby. This transparency figures into several parts of the building: the Fishbowl Gallery, the view into the second floor, and the large vertical window in the back of the building, which would, were its shades not constantly drawn, would allow yet another point of visual access into the VAC's interior and the art department magic it houses.

Now, I'm perfectly willing to concede to a few weaknesses of the building. I will grant that the circulation in the interior is far from perfect and prohibits anything besides strictly horizontal and vertical movement.

Along the same lines, I've heard others criticize the structure of the VAC as inflexible. Would it be possible to fit in a few more studios if the shape of the building were different? Certainly. More space would be a welcome change for anyone who has ever had a studio class in Fort Andross in January.

Despite its flaws, the VAC successfully draws people to it.

For one thing, consider how the unconventional shape of the building encourages us to pause and be utterly amazed or confused (or both) by the current exhibition in the Fishbowl as we walk by.

For another, consider how the structure and organization of the entrances creates a space (safe from the rain) to convene after an Improvabilities show and figure out our next move for the night.

In this way, the building's visual influence extends into the routine of our real-life experience as Bowdoin students. As I have observed how the different functions of the VAC come to intersect one another, I have grown to love it more and more.

Here's where it becomes tricky: when an institution is in need of a new formation of space, how much weight do we give to functionary needs, and how much ought we to consider what its physical role on campus will be? I'm not convinced that there's a simple answer.

Still, next time you're sitting on the Quad, watch a tour walk by and count how many heads turn as the group approaches the VAC.

Think about what it means for a building to literally frame an area; we can walk the path of a straight trajectory from Maine Street to the Chapel, and in this sense, the VAC is just another member in the extended family of gateways we see around campus.

What truly makes the VAC one-of-a-kind is how it attempts—and I believe, succeeds—to affect the lives of many more students than those solely involved in the arts. A more functional, typical structure might fail to do the same.

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