Several projects at the IU Musical Arts Center are wrapping up after a busy year of renovation and improvements. Denver Wrightsman, director of facilities for the Jacobs School of Music, talked about the new features.
“For years, all campuses across the country have struggled to make ends meet, especially state institutions and things and we are being able to go back and fix a lot of the things we had to defer at one time for lack of funding, Wrightsman said. "As funding increases and donations increase, we’re able to do a lot of different things.”
The seating in the state-of-the-art music hall was replaced for the first time since the building was bult nearly 50 years ago. Wrightsman said seating usually has a 20 to 25-year life. The renovations also quadrupled the amount of seating for wheelchair-bound audience members and made it possible for people in wheelchairs to access the stage from the audience seating.
Other accessibility improvements were made, including the installation of automatic door openers and motion-activated sinks and toilets in the auditorium’s bathrooms. Wrightsman said the next project will be the expansion of the elevator so that it can carry a gurney in moments of emergency.
Improving the safety was another main goal of the renovations. More fire alarms and emergency lights were installed all around the building and a newly-made fire-retardant curtain was installed on the 90 by 60 feet stage that is only slightly smaller than the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City.
Wrightsman said the timing of the project was not purposefully lined up with the cancelation of all in-person shows because of COVID-19 but it has made it easier to schedule the work. IU’s capital planning department made the call that the MAC’s renovations needed to be a priority.
“They, like I said, they have to prioritize where the most benefit goes for the money at the time and who needs it the most and so it just happened that some of these happened to us this year,” he said.
The Well House Society, a group of donors that are a part of the IU Foundation, funded the renovations.
As the man who has done everything from changing lightbulbs to overseeing the construction of new buildings for the music school over the past 16 years, Wrightsman is proud of the students and faculty who work within the walls of the buildings he manages. He thinks of the MAC as the jewel of IU’s campus, a building that deserves the renovations it received.
“They can see, any person who comes here and this is their first time; the seating experience will be great, the lighting will be great, the sets are beautiful, the performances, it’s just phenomenal the talent our students have and our faculty have,” Wrightsman said.
Wrightsman will sleep better knowing the faculty, students and patrons who work in and visit the MAC will be safer, more comfortable and more able to access all of the music that will once again ring through the hall when COVID precautions end.
