Good evening and welcome to PrimeTime.

I'm Bruce Haines.

Fort Wayne was a city on the move in the 1950s, a move from downtown to emerging nearby neighborhoods.

The elevation of the nickel plate railroad tracks improved traffic flow from the city to the suburbs.

And meanwhile, construction was underway on the U.S. 30 bypass.

The Allen County War Memorial Coliseum and new area shopping centers.

Fort Wayne's growth beyond its city center was creating a negative impact on downtown businesses.

But there were positive signs of urban developments on other fronts.

As sections of downtown were declining, Fort Wayne community leaders turned their attention toward the arts and cultural organizations that existed in the city at that time.

The idea was to bring these organizations together and turn a struggling area of downtown into a campus for the arts.

When Arts United was originally founded, it was called the Fine Arts Foundation.

The Fine Arts Foundation was created in 1955, and it was created really with the purpose of creating a campus for the arts.

When the Fine Arts Foundation was formed, there were actually only six organized Asians.

It was a very different time.

It was a very different structure.

At the time.

We had a Fort Wayne Philharmonic, we had a civic theater, we had a Fort Wayne Ballet, we had a Fort Wayne art school and we had a community concerts organization, and then we had a history center.

And so those were kind of the core organizations.

When Arts United was founded as the Fine Arts Foundation that this community was building, its legacy of an arts and cultural community.

Are those organizations one of the primary drivers to build an arts campus in downtown was the need for space.

The Civic Theater and other performing organizations were finding it hard to identify venues that were appropriate and not dilapidated to performing.

So at the time, the discussion was around should it be located in downtown or should it be located somewhere else in the community?

And that question was answered in 1959 and the response would initiate a civic citywide journey to the creation of what we now know as the Arts United Center, a home for the arts.

This is the title of a new historical documentary, premieres Thursday, January four at 8 p.m. on PBS.

Fort Wayne will preview that program tonight with Dan Ross, the president and CEO at Arts United.

We thank you for joining us at home.

And Dan, thank you for joining us here.

Well, Bruce, thanks so much for having us here and thank you so much for the work that you and your team have done to put this documentary together.

It's just a fantastic way that your team is telling the story of arts and culture in this community and what a pivotal time that was during the fifties and sixties as art, as our community was growing this.

This really has a back to the future kind of feel to it.

We sort of know how the story ends, or at least where we are in the current story.

But let's talk about that iteration and the city leaders, the Redevelopment commission, they're coming together.

Do we need to do something collectively with the arts downtown?

Do we take it somewhere else?

This was quite a visionary decision.

Hugely visionary, Absolutely.

This community was thinking incredibly boldly at that time.

And it was and it was very creative thinking to look at what had become a blighted area in downtown Fort Wayne.

I was told that there were something like 160 buildings that ended up being raised in order to create space for this arts campus, But at the time they were spaces that needed to be cleared out and and looking to the future, looking to something that this community could hang its hat on and build towards.

And we don't have mountains, we don't have oceans.

But we had even at that time a fledgling but thriving arts community that was something that we could hang our hat on and looking to looking to build towards the future.

It was really it was really bold thinking.

It seemed like it was the concept, in fact, quoted by several members at that time of putting Lincoln Center in Fort Wayne.

Yes, it's a campus idea.

Yeah, exactly.

And so one of the one of the projects that this committee used as its model was, in fact, Lincoln Center.

And at the time that Fort Wayne was contemplating this, they hired Louis Conn in 1960 to begin his work.

Lincoln Center was just beginning to be constructed in New York City.

So the first building, Philharmonic Hall was just under construction.

And so it was again, incredibly bold thinking, I feel like, on our community's leaders part to say, Hey, we can do that in Fort Wayne.

We can take that model that New York City is just starting to put into place.

We can do that here in Fort Wayne.

And from the documentary, let's look about the search for the advent of the architect we now know as Louis Kahn.

Take a look at the Fort Wayne Fine Arts Foundation building committee went through a large selection process for the architect for the Future Arts campus.

They wanted to make sure that we hired someone who was prominent, who would do something that was new and bold for Fort Wayne.

Our community looked at I.M.

Pei and Eero Saarinen and Mies van der Rohe, but they also looked at Louis Kahn.

And Louis Kahn ended up being probably the preeminent architect of the second half of the 20th century following the death of Frank Lloyd Wright, who was such a powerful influence early in the century on the latter half of the century.

Louis Kahn really became the preeminent architect and was so influential over many other architects.

Our group of community leaders who were exposed shoring who was the right architect for this community after interviewing all of these organizations, made the decision that Louis Kahn was the right person for our community.

One.

An excerpt from a Home for the Arts premiering next Thursday evening at 8:00 here on PBS Fort Wayne.

What made Louis Kahn right for the job?

Well, I think there were many great architects that our committee interviewed and there were some great people, community leaders, Helene Folding or Bud Ladd's John Dee Shoaf.

There were great community leaders at the time who were on that committee and they took a hard look at a variety of of the great architects at the time.

I think there was something about Louis Kahn's philosophical approach to how the arts come together to create something greater than the sum of the parts.

And I think that philosophy of his really impacted the committee.

And also I think there were just personal connections.

I know Bud Latz was on that committee and Bud had a real personal connection to Louis Kahn through that process.

We have an image that shows the arts campus design that Louis Kahn created, and it's a study in geometric shapes.

There is a variety of interactions, and I think that was for him the point.

Yes.

And so one of the things about Kahn that is very much in contrast to somebody like BS van der Rohe, right?

When you look at the glass and steel buildings that were being constructed in New York and Chicago at the time, Kahn really loved monumental structures.

He loved to build these massive kinds of structures with a lot of masonry, with brick, with concrete.

He loved concrete.

He referred to concrete as the perfect construction material because he called it molten stone.

It could be molded and shaped, which I absolutely love that.

But yeah, so his style was that monumental or kind of structures.

And you're absolutely right.

He, he played with those shapes.

So we have several different iterations of drawings that he did over the decade through the sixties before we started construction in 1970.

And when you look at them, the various versions, the version that you showed there was the first one that we saw from him in 1961.

But the various versions, you see him playing with those shapes in different kinds of ways.

But again, it's very it's very geometric.

The notion of the arts campus was never denied, but it became deferred, I guess is a good way to put it to what we now know.

So we will renaissance that back into our dialog here.

But yeah, this is where architect and community said we need to reason together.

Yeah, well, and that's such a great point.

So the project that Kahn initially designed, again modeled after Lincoln Center, it was a very large scale project.

And when when the committee who was working with him started talking about budget and saying, well, what do you think that project is going to cost what you just designed?

And he said, well, about $20 million.

And they said, Oh, we were thinking more like two.

And so so there was a little disagreement.

There were a few disagreements along the way.

The Museum of Art did a fantastic exhibit use utilizing some of the materials that we had from our archives a few years ago.

And there was a letter in there that the building committee chair at the time wrote to Mr. Khan.

And the letter starts with, I am aghast and I don't recall what the next sentence is, but just reading that far tells you as much as you need to know about the conversation.

And that was, of course, before the days of email communications and where they actually had to write letters back and forth to Mr. Kahn in Philadelphia.

So, yeah, a very a very different kind of time.

And yes, interesting conversations between architect and and community.

But you're right that at the time the project that kind of envisioned was too large for the community.

However, we have over these subsequent 50 years followed through on that vision by continuing to build that arts campus, by the by the of buildings that have been added to it, adding the Museum of Art in 1984 and adding the history Center in 1980, adding the whole community art center in 1990, adding the Auer Center in 2010 and the Arts Lab Black Box in 2014.

You know, we continued to build on that concept where today we do have a campus for the arts, right?

And when the focus came to the building of the building, the best way to express this perhaps might be with Louis Kahn's own words.

Here he is from our documentary, A Home for the Arts, the Theater which I am building in Fort Wayne, Indiana, working excuse a conclusion that one must distinguish the auditorium and the stage as a bio in a sensitive instrument.

But I want us to hear that a whisper could be heard without any amplification, and that the lobbies and all other adjunct spaces are merely that which composes the dividing case.

That distinction, the violin and the violin case to look completely different from each other.

Louis Kahn had a concept for what a performing arts space should be and could be.

He wanted the experience for the audience to be something that was magical.

He wanted that experience to be something that really allowed them to get into this space.

So he created this building where the theater itself is actually a building inside the outer shell of the building.

He wanted to shelter the interior space from whatever was going on externally at the building in Fort Wayne.

That means that the elevated rail behind the building, which creates a lot of noise and vibration, would have been disruptive to the auditorium and the stage.

So here he insulated the auditorium and the stage through what he called a violin inside a violin case.

A lot of people would call it just a box inside a box, but essentially the auditorium chamber and its catwalks all the way up to the proscenium opening are encased in concrete, completely separate from the exterior building that wraps around it.

We're taking a celebratory look at a home for the arts.

This is PBS Fort Wayne's new local documentary.

It airs next Thursday night at 8:00.

And it is all about in the honoring of 50 years of service and of, boy, those walls could talk.

Dan, Russ, so many musical theatrical performance is community and civic events from 73 to 2023.

It's a fast way of trying to say, Here's how we got to know.

But now how do we get to next?

Because stewarding a structure for half a century, it's going to it happens around the house and it happens around the town, too.

It does.

There is work to be done, certainly.

But I appreciate you mentioning the 50 years, because we did take a moment this fall to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Art United Center.

You know, that's a that's a pivotal point.

And this October, we did an open house.

We invited the community to come in and see the space in different ways, see the backstage and see the various things.

And and we told stories of just exactly what you were saying, stories from musicians who performed in the building in the seventies or the eighties or the nineties and actors.

And it was it was nice to be able to celebrate that history with the community.

But now we are looking forward and we're at a very exciting point right now, thinking about breaking ground on the renovations, on the expansion and modernization of this building.

So we have been working for several years knowing that the building approaching 50 years old, that it had challenges, technology that was outdated, but more importantly, it was not equipped for modern theatrical needs and modern patrons.

So it was built pre ADA of vertical accessibility challenges.

There are just a lot of things.

It's a brilliant work of art, but at the same time as a functional theater and as a functional public space, there are just things it needs to to ensure that it will serve our community well for the next couple of generations.

So we set about working with a variety of stakeholders to make sure that we were addressing the needs and the priorities of how that building serves our community and we are excited to say that we are at a place now where we anticipate breaking ground in June of 2024.

On the expansion and modernization of the facility.

We will be building a new entrance on the West side of the building, facing out into frame and square.

The there will be a new lobby inside that expanded wing that will enable us to have elevator access up to the second floor rehearsal halls.

That gives us room for a family restroom.

It gives us the ability to access the front of the house to the auditorium where the patrons are, to the backstage, where the performers and the volunteers working backstage are.

It allows us to be able to have a drop off space for individuals who have mobility challenges that they can go through that accessibility corridor directly to the front row seats in the auditorium, which are going to be modernized in a way that will now have accessible seating with companion seating next to it, which again, just wasn't part of the original plan for the building.

And so we want to make sure that this becomes a space that is functional and accessible for all people in our community, and not just for the patrons, but backstage on stage, you know, so that performers of all abilities can utilize this facility.

This this is a community theater.

This is a theater where the productions are built from the ground up, where costumes are sewn in the costume shop and sets are built in the scenic shop and backdrops are painted, and then shows are rehearsed upstairs in the rehearsal halls for six weeks before they make it to the stage.

So productions are built from the ground up in this theater, and it's a community theater.

It's a community space.

And we're the performers, the volunteers backstage.

They know the people in the audience and the people in the audience know the people on stage.

And we want to make sure that this space can be utilized and is accessible for all people.

Both performers, volunteers, backstage employees of the arts organizations who work there.

And then certainly for the patrons, so many of the changes that we'll be making to the building will upgrade the technology, the theatrical technology to ensure that we are able to serve the theatrical needs of our community for the next two generations.

We're working with a great theatrical consultant team out of Cleveland, the DLR Group.

We're thrilled to be working with MKM as our architect and HAGAMAN Construction.

You know, we feel like we just have great partners that we're working with on this project, but the teams that we're working with are going to ensure that this building will serve this community in the ways that it needs to for the next couple of generations.

Yeah, it is such a unique asset.

And as I understand it, for Louis Kahn, this was his one and only art center performing arts Center project that he took on his career.

Yeah, absolutely.

And Louis Kahn, during the time he was working here in Fort Wayne, he designed buildings in in Bangladesh, in India, in Lahore, California.

You know, he he was truly internationally recognized and respected during the time he was building these masterpieces around the world.

He was working here in Fort Wayne as well.

But you're right, This is the only performing arts center that he has anywhere in the world.

And again, it is it is widely respected by architects and and fans of architecture who come here to Fort Wayne just to see this particular building.

And the other thing is that in addition to what the building is and what the building represents, it's also what the building does.

It's the connection of individuals to their community, individuals to culture.

So it is certainly an epicenter of sorts because it's a multi-functional facility that serves a variety of arts organizations.

So there's the synergy, as they say, is off the charts.

Yeah, you're absolutely right.

It serves a wide range of arts organizations and different arts forms.

It was designed to be able to do that, but it also is the backdrop for other kinds of community events.

The inauguration for the mayor and city council happens every January.

Inside this building.

There are there are many sort of community related events that happen inside this building.

It is very much of a of a community center that also is a home for performing arts.

But, you know, one of the things about this building, you know, we talked about the fact that this this is the epicenter of this arts campus.

But we have over these past 50 years, built on Louis Kahn's vision, built on what this is to where we now have seven different buildings on this arts campus.

We have 17 organizations who either reside here or who regularly perform here.

It it truly is a hub, a campus for arts and culture.

We were designated a couple of years ago by the state of Indiana as a cultural district.

We're one of 12 statewide cultural districts that have that recognition.

We were told by the folks from the state that there is no other place in the state of Indiana that has the density of arts and cultural amenities that we have in downtown Fort Wayne on this arts campus.

You know, there are other great places of the state, certainly, but there is no other community that has this density, this collection of arts and cultural amenities, the museums, the performing arts facilities.

There's no other place in the state that has that, and it's a differentiator for us and it's a significant component cog in the wheel of economic development too.

And studies, it seems every one you pick up current or in the last ten years speak a moment, if you could, about that idea that this is as integral as it is for other aspects of urban and regional development.

Yeah, absolutely.

And that's one of the things that you mentioned over the past ten years.

You've seen this more and more, you know, and you're absolutely right, 15 years ago, I think people appreciated the arts.

They didn't necessarily value the arts.

And today, when you look at our economic development leaders, when you look at our elected officials, they value what arts culture brings to our community because you see it you see the importance of this as one of the economic drivers of downtown.

Greater Fort Wayne did a study a couple of years ago where they interviewed businesses and what attracts them to a community.

Almost 90% said that a vibrant downtown was an essential part of that.

And about 80% of those people said and arts and culture is an essential component of a vibrant downtown.

You know, it is a critical component of attracting the talent we need and attracting the individuals we need.

So there is a strong economic driver to that.

We recently participated in the American for the Arts and after survey and we found that there's over $40 million of economic activity that's driven through the arts campus alone.

So it is a it is a driver.

We're talking about jobs and we're talking about not just jobs in the arts, but the jobs that come from all those patrons who come to these events, because patrons who come to events, they spend almost $40 per person per ticket on other things, on restaurants downtown and parking and babysitters and on and on and on.

You know, it's an economic multiplier.

And there is such a multi-use dynamic about it for the organizations that are using the facility for the ripple effect the facility creates.

Very quickly, if you could, what's next up as we move into 2024 and working folks get more information about the campaign?

Well, we are excited.

2024 is when we're going to be breaking ground on the expansion and modernization of the building.

And we're anticipating construction running for about 15 months.

So the building will be shut down for those 15 months and then reopen in the fall of 2025.

But people are welcome to come to our website, Art United dot org and we have a lot of information on our a soaring Vision campaign to expand and modernize this facility.

And we hope you will do just that.

Dan Ross is the president and CEO of Arts United.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you for having me.

You bet.

And a reminder again, Thursday night, 8:00, A Home for the Arts on PBS, Fort Wayne, as we celebrate that 50 years of public service for your art united center for all of us with prime time, I'm Bruce Haynes.

Thank you for watching.

Take care and happy New Year.

We'll see you, sir.

Good day.