EAST LANSING, Mich. — The new Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University will be dedicated Friday, Nov. 9, during an outdoor public ceremony. An open house will be held Saturday, Nov. 10, for those wishing to tour the Zaha Hadid-designed building. Additional details about these and other events to be held that weekend will be announced at a later date.
Committed to exploring international contemporary culture and ideas through art, the Broad/MSU will serve as an educational resource for the university and a cultural hub for the state of Michigan. The museum also will actively engage the international artistic community through a series of partnerships with contemporary art spaces around the world.
“The new Broad Art Museum is a powerful architectural statement, symbolizing the 21stcentury dynamic global position of Michigan State University,” said MSU President Lou Anna K. Simon. “The museum will provide opportunities for students and faculty across disciplines to explore contemporary issues through art and for the university to engage with local, regional, national and international communities.”
Designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Zaha Hadid, the 46,000-square-foot Broad/MSU features a striking façade of pleated stainless steel and glass, distinguishing the new building from the traditional brick Collegiate Gothic north campus and signaling the museum and the university’s forward-looking approach. Seventy percent of the space will be devoted to art display, including areas for special exhibitions, modern and contemporary art, new media, photography and works on paper.
The Broad/MSU’s inaugural exhibitions, curated by director Michael Rush, exemplify the museum’s dual focus on presenting international contemporary art in all media and on thematic exhibitions that investigate contemporary works within a historical context:
- “Global Groove 1973/2012”will use Nam June Paik’s seminal 1973 video “Global Groove”as a jumping-off point to explore current trends in international video art.
- “In Search of Time” will investigate artists’ expressions of time and memory by creating dialogues among works by artists including Josef Albers, Romare Bearden, Damien Hirst, Toba Khedoori, Andy Warhol, Eadweard Muybridge and Sam Jury, among others.
“With its focus on international contemporary art, we are creating an institution unique among university art museums, and Zaha Hadid’s innovative design is a physical manifestation of our mission,” Rush said. “The opening of the new museum will be an important milestone for Michigan State University, and we are eager to move forward with our full spectrum of exhibitions and programs.”
Simultaneous openings at art spaces in Guangzhou, China; Ho Chi Minh City, Viet Nam; Sao Paolo, Brazil; Istanbul, Turkey; and Dubai will launch the museum’s ongoing program of partnerships with arts institutions worldwide. Interactive screens in the museum will connect visitors at the Broad/MSU to the various global venues.
The Broad/MSU has also announced an annual residency program, “The Land Grant: Art, Agriculture, Sustainability,” for artists whose work addresses land use, food and urban development, with a focus on sustainability, informed by MSU’s history as a land-grant university and its strong commitment to education and global engagement in these areas. Other projects and performances are also being planned by Allison Gass, curator of contemporary art and Dan Hirsch, curator of public programs and performance.
The Broad/MSU is named for Eli and Edythe Broad, longtime supporters of the university who provided the lead gift for the museum. The Broads’ gift of $28 million, with $21 million designated for construction of the building and $7 million to be used for acquisitions, exhibitions and operations, was the catalyst for the project. The total fundraising goal for the building is $40 million, of which $36.7 million has been raised to date.
In anticipation of the opening, the Broad/MSU has already presented several exhibitions and programs in nontraditional spaces throughout the community, including last spring’s “The Broad Without Walls,” a series of eight urban interventions and public art installations in downtown East Lansing, “Mike Kelley: Homage,” a tribute to the Michigan-born artist who died earlier this year and “Kristin Cammermeyer: Resituating,” (now through July 22) in a “pop-up” museum created in Lansing’s Old Town neighborhood.
Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University
The Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum, a new Zaha Hadid-designed contemporary art museum at Michigan State University, is dedicated to exploring global contemporary culture and ideas through art. With a collection containing 7,500 objects from the Greek and Roman periods through the Renaissance and Modern, the Broad/MSU is uniquely able to contextualize the wide range of contemporary art practices within an expansive historical context. The museum is named in honor of Eli and Edythe Broad, longtime supporters of the university who provided the lead gift of $28 million.
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