Hardesty Arts Center breaks ground
5.25.2011The former Visual Arts Center renamed in recognition of $2.65 million gift from Hardesty Family Foundation
The Arts & Humanities Council of Tulsa (AHCT) today celebrated breaking ground on the new Hardesty Arts Center in the heart of the Brady Arts District, surprising guests with an eleventh-hour name change. Formerly known as the Visual Arts Center, the Hardesty Arts Center, to be located at the corner of Archer and Boston, has been renamed in recognition of a $2.65 million gift from the Hardesty Family Foundation. To date, more than $13 million in gifts have been pledged toward the project.
Budgeted at an estimated $18.3 million (with $11 million in construction costs), the Hardesty Arts Center is part of the transformation currently taking place in the city-block area between Cincinnati and Boston, bordered by Archer Avenue and Brady Street, in the heart of Tulsa’s historic Brady Arts District. Designers of the project are Bob Schaefer and Bret Pfeifer of Selser Schaefer Architects, with Flintco serving as the construction manager.
The Visual Arts Center will contain multi-use exhibition spaces, studio spaces for artists, classrooms, offices and a catering kitchen. The facility will adjoin the neighboring Mathews Warehouse tenants that will include Philbrook and Gilcrease and will share green space between the two buildings for open-air performances, outdoor exhibitions and other events. The Hardesty Arts Center is scheduled to open in fall 2012.
“We are so grateful to Roger and Donna Hardesty and The Hardesty Family Foundation for this extremely generous gift,” said Ken Busby, executive director and CEO of the Arts & Humanities Council of Tulsa. “They join our other lead donors in having the foresight to recognize the great potential this new facility has not just to elevate, but to celebrate, the arts in downtown Tulsa.”
Joining Busby and Hardesty Arts Center Director Kathy McRuiz at the groundbreaking celebration were Board President Jean Ann Fausser; Billie Barnett, capital campaign chair; Honorary Campaign Chairs E. Ann Graves and Kreg Kallenberger; Greg Gray, vice president of the Hardesty Arts Center; the Honorable Mayor Dewey Bartlett; and Robin Ballenger of Flintco. Honorary Campaign Chair Patrick S. Gordon was unable to attend the event. They were joined by local artists, educators and children who are participants in the council’s arts education programs as the center’s new name and logo were unveiled.
“We have affectionately nicknamed it ‘AHHA,’” said Kathy McRuiz, director of the Hardesty Arts Center. “The ‘AH’ represents the Arts & Humanities Council, and ‘HA’ represents Hardesty Arts. We think AHHA will make a fun shorthand name for the Hardesty Arts Center that will be memorable for our guests.”
Since 1961, AHCT has been the champion for arts and culture in the Tulsa area, with diverse education programs that advance the organization’s mission to inspire creativity, foster appreciation, promote lifelong learning, enhance the quality of individual lives and contribute economic vitality to the greater community. With the Hardesty Arts Center, AHCT will be able to augment current programs like the Harwelden Institute, Artists in the Schools, Community Arts Partnerships and to bring back Summer Arts and other programs. It will also develop new programs with local artists at the core and expand partnerships with other arts organizations through a visiting artists program.
“It is so appropriate that we launch the Hardesty Arts Center in this, the 50th year of the Arts & Humanities Council in Tulsa,” said Jean Ann Fausser, president of the AHCT board of directors. “Having a ‘visual arts center’ has long been a dream of artists in the Tulsa community. While we are embracing a bold new future downtown, we will continue to honor our heritage and offer programming at our historic Harwelden home. We will now have two amazing venues – one representing our historic past, and the other a future that is truly wide open.”
Providing $11.6 million in lead gift commitments are: The Hardesty Family Foundation;
E. Ann E. Graves; The J.E. and L.E. Mabee Foundation, Inc.; Jean Ann and Tom Fausser; George Kaiser Family Foundation; Raymond and Bessie Kravis Foundation; The Mary K. Chapman Foundation; City of Tulsa; Hille Foundation; and the Anne and Henry Zarrow Foundation.
Major gift donors pledging $1.54 million in contributions include: AEP Foundation; Barnett Family Foundation; James D. and Cathryn Moore Foundation; Maxine and Jack Zarrow Family Foundation; The Williams Foundation; The Oxley Foundation; Bank of Oklahoma; Myra Block Kaiser, the Stuart Family Foundation and Randi and Fred Wightman.
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