爱荷华大学视觉艺术大楼丨美国爱荷华丨Steven Holl Architects

Visual Arts Building, University of Iowa Iowa City, IA, United States.

The new Visual Arts facility for the University of Iowa’s School of Art and Art History provides 126,000 sf of loft- like space for all visual arts media, from ancient metalsmithing techniques to the most advanced virtual reality technologies, including Ceramics, 3D Design, Metal Arts & Jewelry, Sculpture, Printmaking, Painting & Drawing, Graphic Design, Intermedia, Video Art, and Photography. Also housed are galleries, faculty offices, an outdoor rooftop studio, and teaching spaces for Art History.

The Visual Arts Building replaces an original arts building from 1936, which was heavily damaged during a flood of the University of Iowa campus in June 2008. The new building forms an Arts Quad with Art Building West, which was designed by Steven Holl Architects and has drawn students from all over campus to its social spaces and library since opening in 2006. Together they form a visual arts campus for theorizing, teaching and making art.

While the 2006 Arts Building West is horizontally porous and of planar composition, the new building is vertically porous and volumetrically composed. The aim of maximum interaction between all departments of the school takes shape in social circulation spaces.

Visual Arts Building & Art Building West, University of Iowa – A Conversation with Steven Holl

1. Interconnection: Horizontal Programs, Vertical Porosity

In a school of the arts today, interconnection and crossover, made increasingly possible through digital techniques, are of fundamental importance. Interdisciplinary collaboration between the School’s various art departments is facilitated in the vertical carving out of large open floor plates. Students can see activities ongoing across these openings and be encouraged to interact and meet. Further interconnection is facilitated by glass partitions along the studio walls adjacent to internal circulation.

2. Multiple Centers of Light

Natural light and ventilation reach into the core of the building via “centers of light.” The seven vertical cutouts are characterized by a language of shifted layers, where one floor plate slides past another. This geometry creates multiple balconies, providing outdoor meeting spaces and informal exterior working space, further encouraging interaction between the building’s four levels.

3. Stairs as Vertical Social Condensers: Corridors as Horizontal Meeting Spaces

Stairs are shaped to enable informal meeting, interaction and discussion. Some stairs stop at generous landings with tables and chairs, others open onto lounge spaces with sofas, for informal collaborative work.

4. Campus Space Definition/Porosity

The original grid of the campus breaks up at the Iowa River, becoming organic as it hits the limestone bluff. The Arts West building reflects this irregular geometry in fuzzy edges. The new building picks up the campus grid again in its simple plan, defining the new campus space of the “arts meadow.”

5. Material Resonance, Ecological Innovation

Natural ventilation is achieved via operable windows and skylights. A punched concrete frame structure provides thermal mass at the exterior while “bubble” slabs provide radiant cooling and heating. A Rheinzink skin in weathering blue - green is perforated for sun shade on the southwest and southeast.

Client University of Iowa

Location Iowa City, IA, United States.

Years 2009–2016

Size 126,000 sq ft

Status Complete

architect Steven Holl Architects

Steven Holl (design architect, principal)

Chris McVoy (design architect, partner in charge)

Rychiee Espinosa (project architect, associate)

JongSeo Lee, Garrick Ambrose, Filipe Taboada, Christiane Deptolla, Garrett Ricciardi, Christopher Rotman, Christina Yessios, Johanna Muszbek, Yiqing Zhao, Bell Ying Yi Cai (project team)

associate architects, prime consultant BNIM Architects

landscape architect BNIM Architects

structural engineer Buro Happold Structural Engineering Associates

lighting consultant L’Observatoire International

sustainability engineer Transsolar

mechanical engineer Design Engineers

curtain wall consultant WJ Higgins & Co.

civil engineer Shive-Hattery

audio/visual consultant The Sextant Group Inc.

“At the University of Iowa we had the unique opportunity to work with SHA on two very important buildings. Art Building West (2006) and the Visual Arts Building (2016) now anchor a nationally-prominent School of Art & Art History with buildings befitting the programs hosted within. The two buildings honor Iowa’s long-standing strength in the Arts, attend to stringent programmatic needs and, through expansive campus thinking, even create new and popular campus pathways and public gathering places, for students in the Arts and beyond. We chose Holl, and then chose Holl again. We are a better campus for that collaboration.”

—Rod Lehnertz, AIA, AUA

Senior Vice President, Finance & Operations

University Architect

University of Iowa

Visual Arts Building, University of Iowa

IN THE PRESS: “University of Iowa Building Uses Thermally Active “Bubble Deck” Slab July 26, 2020

ON THE COVER: PM Engineer Features the Innovative Mechanical Systems that Benefit SHA’s Iowa Visual Arts Building January 26, 2020

The University of Iowa Visual Arts Building receives 2017 AIANY Design Award Honor March 10, 2017

The University of Iowa Visual Arts Building Wins Interior Design Magazine Best of the Year Award December 5, 2016

The Visual Arts Building at the University of Iowa, Designed by Steven Holl Architects, Opens October 7 October 6, 2016

University of Iowa School of Art and Art History Moving In May 5, 2016

Construction Update: Visual Arts Building at University of Iowa April 5, 2016

University of Iowa Visual Arts Building Rising, Performance Mock-Up Passes All Tests June 16, 2014

Steven Holl Architects Selected to Design New Arts Building for University of Iowa Arts Campus February 16, 2010