Robert Graves, Interim Dean
In 2006, the College of Fine and Applied Arts
marks its 75th Anniversary. We hope that you will join us in celebrating
our past and planning the future of the arts at Illinois.
In 1931 the University of Illinois Board of Trustees accepted the formal proposition
of the U of I Senate to organize the Department of Architecture, the Division
of Landscape Architecture, the School of Music and the Department of Art
and Design into a College of Fine Arts on the Champaign campus. At that time
the College was established for the “cultivation of esthetic taste on the
part of the student body at large . . . and development of a general artistic
appreciation.”
Seventy-five years later, the College includes not only the Department of Landscape
Architecture and the Schools of Architecture, Music, and Art and Design,
but also the departments of Dance, Theatre, and Urban and Regional Planning.
Over the years, the College has also established significant research and
outreach units: the East St. Louis Action Research Project, I space Gallery
in Chicago, Japan House, Krannert Art Museum, Krannert Center for the Performing
Arts, and Sinfonia da Camera, the University’s resident chamber orchestra.
Many of our departments started as programs in other colleges: architecture separated
from engineering, theatre from English and speech communication departments,
dance from physical education, landscape architecture from agriculture. In
time, both by design and good fortune, a rich array of disciplines has come
together to shape this campus’s dedication to the arts. More broadly defined
than most arts colleges, we at Illinois are privileged to include not only
outstanding departments in the visual and performing arts, but also in the
environmental design arts. Collectively, these units play an essential role
in preserving knowledge, teaching critical thinking, and advancing some of
the most vibrant of human experiences. Whereas the College was organized
originally to appeal to and improve the aesthetic sensibilities of those
at the University of Illinois, few could have imagined the far-reaching impact
of the arts at Illinois today.
The purpose of our celebrating the College’s 75th Anniversary is two-fold:
one, to acknowledge the traditions and history of our units, and two, to take
hold of and design our future. This is a time of change within our disciplines
– the technical and technological mastery required in each field of the fine
and applied arts is regularly refined and redefined and the boundaries of
traditional disciplines blur. We in the College are determined to direct
the advancement of our fields into the next decade and beyond.
In honor of those directions, a dynamic calendar has been planned for 2006 to
include a spectrum of programs from performances, to exhibitions, to panel
discussions, to symposia, to events of social engagement. Special events
will be planned for the Fall of 2006, as well, so please watch for future
announcements and join us as we lead the way in defining the arts and arts
practice for the 21st Century.
