More than 5,000 alumni of the University of Colorado at Boulder's art and art history department have been invited to a farewell "TOAST" exhibition in the Sibell Wolle Fine Arts Building on Oct. 5-6.
The exhibition is in recognition of the building's impending demolition and is free and open to the public. The exhibition will include a reception on Oct. 5 from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. and public viewing on Oct. 6 from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Several artists have created exhibits in rooms of the now empty building.
A traditional Columbian "passage rite," or mourning ceremony, and Aztec dancers performing a traditional dance will highlight the Oct. 5 reception. An alumni reception and a viewing of the plans for the new Visual Arts Complex will follow at 7 p.m. in Sibell Wolle room C103.
"While this is a farewell toast to the building we've all grown to love, it's also a toast to the building we've always dreamed of," said Professor Garrison Roots, chair of CU-Boulder's art and art history department. "The Visual Arts Complex will surpass all of our expectations, and will enable our students and faculty to interact in a way that will facilitate the teaching process. The Visual Arts Complex also will provide the community with an important resource, so this event really is a celebration of all that is possible for both CU and the community."
Demolition of the 90-year-old building will begin this fall, with construction of the new Visual Arts Complex beginning shortly thereafter. The north end of the Sibell Wolle Fine Arts Building was originally the Engineering Shops Building and was built in 1918. An addition to the building was completed in 1948.
The building was named for Muriel Sibell Wolle (1898-1977), who served 40 years as a professor of fine arts and was nationally known for her sketches of mining camps and ghost towns throughout the West.
Scheduled to open in 2009, the $56 million Visual Arts Complex will be the new home of the CU Art Museum and the art and art history department, a cross-disciplinary program ranked among the finest in the nation. The award-winning architectural firm of Kallmann, McKinnell and Wood, based in Boston, and OZ Architecture and M.A. Mortenson Co., both based in Denver, will design and build the 148,000-square-foot complex.
For more information on the exhibition visit or call (303) 541-1445.