It seems like only yesterday that MASS MoCA opened, but it was 1999. And today, MASS MoCA announced that was moving into its “Phase III renovation.”
The Massachusetts House of Representatives has just passed an omnibus capital improvement act that allots a $25.4 million grant to MASS MoCA for the project, and the bill now goes to the State Senate for consideration. Let’s hope.
The money will fund the museum’s “final phase of its multi-decade effort to renovate its 26-building, 600,000 square foot, 16-acre factory campus….Phase III development will include the addition of some 130,000 square feet of gallery space, ultimately doubling the space currently available for exhibitions, plus significant work on its performing arts courtyards and other exterior venues.”
MASS MoCA opened with “200,000 square feet of space renovated for galleries, stages, rehearsal studios, and art fabrication facilities.” Then, in its Phase II expansion, from 2002-2008, it added another 200,000 square feet of space for more “galleries, performing arts facilities, outdoor festival fields and courtyards, and 125,000 square feet of commercial lease space.” At the end of this project, the 19th century factory space MASS MoCA began with will be completely transformed (see the pix below).
MASS MoCA is unique, I think — not just for reclaiming so much factory space for art but that plus its public-private partnership (along with state-provided money, the museum has raised $110 million in private funds) and because it has kept alive North Adams, attracting overnight tourists.
Here’s a passage from the release on the point:
MASS MoCA projects a net gain in annual attendance of 65,000 patrons associated with the Phase III project. According to the C3D study, under current visitation patterns to the Berkshires every new 10,000 patrons to MASS MoCA translates to new region-wide economic activity of approximately $1.8 million, generating $160,000 in additional local and state tax revenues, such that the total impact of Phase III development could reach over $11,000,000 per year, and over $1,000,000 per year in new tax revenues.
Art has critical mass in that part of Massachusetts, with the Williams College museum and the expanding Clark Art Institute. Together, the three make a great draw — if only they could get tourists during the winter.
Photo credit: Courtesy of MASS MoCA