Old Globe, Museum Win Grants

SAN DIEGO —  The San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art has been awarded $75,000 and the Old Globe Theatre $85,000 in Challenge Grants from the California Arts Commission; both are among the largest granted in the 1991-1992 program, which awarded a total of $818,000.

Both grants must be matched on a 3 to 1 basis.

The Old Globe’s grant will help develop a new Latino musical from the award-winning Uruguayan play “Death and the Blacksmith,” co-authored by Jorge Curi and Mercedes Rein. Lyrics for the musical are being written by Globe Multicultural Program Associate Raul Moncada to accompany music composed by Nicolas Reveles. The play was first produced by the Globe in 1989 in an English translation directed by Craig Noel as part of a Latino Discovery Series in the Teatro Meta program.

Moncada said he does not know when the new musical will be produced by the Globe, but said it probably will be done no later than 1993, since the grant has a two-year limit.

The San Diego museum’s award will help pay for the design of the museum’s new downtown space, to be located on the America Plaza (formerly Great American Plaza) in a triangular space next to the trolley tracks and Kettner Boulevard.

The museum has been working since November with artists Robert Irwin, Richard Fleischner and architect David Raphael Singer to develop a plan for the interior and exterior spaces of the free-standing building, which originally was built for retail use, San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art director Hugh Davies said Wednesday.

Although Davies said that he hopes to see the new space open next spring, the museum has yet to make an official announcement about the space because “we’re still going through the permitting now, and it’s a long process.”

The new space is one component of the museum’s 50th-anniversary, $9-million fund-raising campaign, which also will cover expansion of the museum’s La Jolla space at 700 Prospect St. with a redesign by Philadelphia architect Robert Venturi, as well as expand the museum’s endowment fund. The California Arts Council grant is part of the $6.5 million already pledged toward the goal.

The artist-architect team’s design for the downtown space is virtually complete, Davies said, although many details will be resolved by the design team during the construction process.

“As we get into the fine tuning, we can work with the team on certain elements, such as benches, on site, “ Davies said.

“I won’t consider the process finished until we open the building next spring.”

Davies said the new space will be well-suited to accommodate large contemporary works as well as video and installation works: The two-story museum will have four main galleries--two on each floor--as well as a bookstore, entry and orientation space and a modest office. The high ceilings, which range from 14 feet to 16 feet, are significantly higher than the highest ceilings in the museum’s La Jolla space, which are 13 feet.

“I gave them the charge of creating a space that will be as good as possible for displaying art,” Davies said. “I think its going to be a success.”