VCU’s Institute for Contemporary Art will attract new people and new businesses to Richmond, Joseph Seipel said.
And it will have great coffee, too.
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“The Institute for Contemporary Art will be an incredible contributor to the momentum moving the city to be a creative and innovative place for businesses to move to and people to live in,” said Seipel, dean of Virginia Commonwealth University’s School of the Arts.
Seipel will talk about the university’s Institute for Contemporary Art at the Richmond First Club on Wednesday.
Showcasing “the newest, freshest and most creative art, design and performances from around the globe,” Seipel said, the center planned for the southwest corner of Broad and Belvidere streets “will add a component to the cultural landscape that’s really not in Richmond now.”
VCU wants its institute to form a gateway for the university and the city, while advancing contemporary art on campus and in the community.
With a coffee shop, bookstore and sculpture garden, “it will be a gathering place,” Seipel said. “We’re going to have the best coffee in town.”
VCU has raised more than 60 percent of the institute’s estimated $35 million cost, and Seipel hopes to complete fundraising for the building this year.
The university hopes to open the 38,000-square-foot institute, which will be paid for with private donations, in 2015. Contributions have come from corporations, foundations and individuals across the country.
The Richmond First Club luncheon meeting will be held from noon to 1:30 p.m. Wednesday at Willow Oaks Country Club, 6228 Forest Hill Ave.
For nonmembers, the luncheon’s cost is $20.
Peter Bacqué
