New York’s Bard College has announced a new commission from architect Maya Lin that will deliver a performing arts studio building to its 540-acre Annandale-on-Hudson campus.

The Vietnam Veterans Memorial designer will team with Bialosky and acoustic specialists Charcoalblue to deliver a 25,000-square-foot space just west of the school’s Frank Gehry-designed Richard B. Fisher Center.

According to Bard, the sloping green-roofed building will contain five separate “state-of-the-art” studios connected by a series of “gathering hubs” that will host the school’s Fisher Center LAB residency program while doubling as a font for creative exploration for Bard students and faculty.

Lin is in the midst of a banner year following two high-profile commissions for the new Museum of Chinese in America in Manhattan and the Obama Presidential Center in Chicago. The school notes this will be Lin’s second academic building following her renovation of the Neilson Library at Smith College, which was completed in March of 2021. She has also been previously commissioned for two non-building projects at China's Shantou University and the School of Medicine at Washington University in St. Louis. 

“I have long admired the Fisher Center, and to be able to create a new building in close proximity to it allows me to create a quiet and respectful dialogue with Frank Gehry’s magnificent work,” Lin said in a press release. “Frank was my teacher at Yale, and it’s particularly meaningful for me to design this new building in relation to his. I will set the studio building into the landscape, tucking it into a hillside so at first, only its green roof will be visible. Yet the sloping land will allow double-height studios to open fully to the meadow and woodlands, connecting artists, students, and faculty to the landscape while creating a unique and strong architectural presence. We are designing a high-performance, energy-efficient, low-carbon building that will be sensitive to its site, reflecting my aesthetic and my concern for the environment.”

Bard reports the project’s cost at $42 million and says a groundbreaking coming next year to coincide with the Fisher Center’s 20th anniversary.

In a statement, the Center’s Artistic Director Gideon Lester added: “It’s fitting that Maya Lin, herself a peerless artist, is developing this home for artists. Intimately in touch with its natural environment, at once grounded and taking flight, her building will unfurl from the meadow like an aperture between earth and air, to create a welcoming and inspiring laboratory for artists, students, faculty, and the public.”