The University launched the first phase of its Performing Arts Center project Monday by naming the complex’s main building after longtime supporters Mort and Irma Handel.

 

During a festive construction kickoff ceremony attended by more than 200 people, President Walter Harrison announced that the main building will be named the Mort and Irma Handel Performing Arts Center.

 

“Mort and Irma Handel have shared our vision for this project from the beginning. Their $1.5 million commitment – the largest gift from individual donors to the Performing Arts Center – is just the latest chapter in their long history of support for the University of Hartford, The Hartt School, and the Hartford arts community,” Harrison said. Mort Handel, chairman of the board of Marvel Entertainment, has been a trustee of The Hartt School and a regent of the University of Hartford since 1990. Irma Handel is a trustee of the Hartford Art School, Inc.

 

The Performing Arts Center project will transform the former Thomas Cadillac distributorship at the corner of Albany Avenue and Westbourne Parkway in Hartford into a vibrant center for performing arts education. The complex will provide much-needed additional space for The Hartt School, while at the same time serving as an economic catalyst and cultural resource for Hartford’s Upper Albany and Blue Hills neighborhoods. The project will preserve the unique exterior character of the three buildings on the site, which were designed in 1929 by pioneering industrial architect Albert Kahn.

 

With the brick façade of the former Cadillac distributorship as a backdrop, state and local officials, neighborhood residents, and members of the University community gathered under bright, sunny skies for Monday morning’s construction kickoff.

 

Speakers included Connecticut Gov. M. Jodi Rell; U.S. Rep. John B. Larson; Hartford Mayor Eddie Perez; Linda Kelly, president of the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving; Debra A. Palermino, corporate vice president for MassMutual Financial Group; Mort Handel; Board of Regents Chairman Peter Eio; President Harrison; and Hartt School Dean Malcolm Morrison.

 

Gov. Rell said that the Performing Arts Center project is a wonderful example of "responsible growth," in that it will clean up and renovate an existing facility and convert it to a positive use that will benefit the community.

 

Funding for the $21 million first phase of the project has come from federal, state, and city government; individual donors; and corporations and foundations, including MassMutual Financial Group and the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving. In recognition of MassMutual's $610,000 gift, President Harrison announced that the primary passageway within the main building will be called the MassMutual Gallery.
 
A $4 million grant recommended by Gov. Rell and approved by the state Bond Commission in January was awarded through the Urban Action Program.

 

Construction on the first phase of the project will begin in July, and the main building – the 55,000-square-foot Mort and Irma Handel Performing Arts Center – is scheduled to open in the fall of 2008. The building will house The Hartt School’s Theatre and Dance Divisions, as well as some additional community programs. It will include two black box theaters, dance studios, classrooms, faculty offices and space for community functions.

 

"With the new Performing Arts Center, The Hartt School will finally have a home that matches the exceptional quality of its programs," Morrison said.