UCLA ARTS UNVEILS NEW MARGO LEAVIN GRADUATE ART STUDIOS
On September 26, the UCLA Margo Leavin Graduate Art Studios officially opened its doors with a private dinner for artists, colleagues, students, and friends of Leavin. Designed by the Los Angeles-based architecture firm Johnston Marklee, the world-class facility is dedicated to supporting emerging artists and strengthening Los Angeles’s position as a world arts capital.
From left to right: Architect Sharon Johnston, Margo Leavin, and UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture Dean Brett Steele. Photo: Andreas Branch/UCLA
The major restoration and expansion creates a new building for the nation’s top-ranked public university to support its leading graduate program as the fall quarter begins. During the project’s development, the architects engaged with students and faculty to best understand their needs and design a highly functional building that engenders a creative community.
Louis Heilbronn '18 (M.F.A., Art)
As UCLA celebrates its Centennial, this project reinforces its standing as one of the leading educational art institutions in the world. This new building underscores the university’s continued commitment to nurturing generations of artistic talent while simultaneously enriching Los Angeles’s vibrant cultural community. It also signals a deepening of support for the renowned artists whose dedication to teaching future generations has been a hallmark of the West Coast arts community for the past century.
In 2016, Margo Leavin made a lead gift of $20 million to fund the renovation and expansion of the UCLA Graduate Art Studios, which have been located in the Hayden Tract in Culver City since 1985. Leavin’s gift is the largest ever made by an alumna to the arts within the UC system.
Louis Heilbronn '18 (M.F.A., Art)
Leavin’s gift demonstrates the importance of philanthropy that supports emerging artists—an essential foundation of culture—and enables UCLA to safeguard and propel a community of creative thought leaders. Faculty including Barbara Kruger, Catherine Opie, and Lari Pittman and distinguished alumni such as Wu Tsang, Bettye Saar, Judy Chicago, and Vija Celmins shift conversations, influence public opinion, and shape the future of our culture. The new campus design supports the needs of the faculty and students alike to propel the creative vibrancy of this program.
“I’m grateful that my career in the Los Angeles art world has afforded me the opportunity to support those at the very heart of this community: artists,” said Margo Leavin. “The students, alumni, and faculty from the art department at UCLA shape the future of the arts in Los Angeles and beyond. It would be my wish that others who are passionate about the future of the arts,– especially other women who have enjoyed professional success – will join me in harnessing their resources to benefit those who are still developing their creative practices. We need to remember that without artists, there would be no art world.”
Louis Heilbronn '18 (M.F.A., Art)
The new 48,000 square foot campus is designed to create a true artist’s neighborhood. Throughout the building, the spaces are not overly deterministic in order to support the diverse and emerging needs of creative practice. Clusters of intimate, private studio spaces abut communal, shared facilities and critique spaces. The design considers the nature of artistic practice today and anticipates change by creating a building that can evolve in the future with new technologies and working methods.
Designed for LEED Gold certification, the structure intelligently integrates systems and sustainable materials throughout the construction. Johnston Marklee considers a well-designed, adaptable building essential to its longevity. Importantly, the pillowed pattern of the exterior tilt-up concrete walls distinguishes the building as it integrates into the vernacular of the neighborhood—physically marking UCLA’s continued commitment to the creative arts and this renowned arts program.
Louis Heilbronn '18 (M.F.A., Art)