Vancouver Art Gallery gets almost $30 million from feds for new downtown gallery

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      The Vancouver Art Gallery has  received almost $30 million from the federal government to make sure its proposed new downtown gallery complex is up to the world's toughest energy-efficiency standards.

      The funding is tied to complying with international so-called Passive House standards for such efficiency and will help pay for solar heating, heat pumps, and triple-glazed windows, among other features.

      Liberal MP Hedy Fry (Vancouver Centre) called the Passive House guidelines the "green ideal" in a statement included in a June 26 release announcing the funding.

      “The new Chan Centre for Visual Arts will be a state-of-the-art cultural facility that will exemplify the best of socially inclusive and eco-friendly projects, encouraging community connections in a sustainable environment," Fry said, speaking for Dominic LeBlanc, minister of intergovernmental affairs, infrastructure, and communities.

      "Community-focused and accessible," Fry continued, "the centre will promote cultural and artistic engagement while meeting Passive House standards—the green ideal for clean, energy-efficient building design.” 

      The new centre will feature a 10-storey main building with 301,000 square feet, of which 82,000 square feet will be available for gallery display, more than double what is available in the VAG's current home in the former Vancouver Law Courts building at 750 Hornby Street, next to Robson Square.

      Area under the new gallery building is beside an open courtyard with multiple features, including a large restaurant.

      The new Vancouver art gallery site—to be located on a downtown block that is currently a parking lot known as Larwill Park—will be "fuly accessible" and feature an Indigenous community house and a theatre as well as public art spaces and an outside public courtyard. There will also be a 5,000-square-foot library and a childcare space. The block is bounded by Cambie, Dunsmuir, Beatty, and Georgia streets. The city plans to develop two office towers on the north side of the block.

      A 7,000-square-foot combination bookstore, gift shop, and cafe is also planned, as is a 6,000-square-foot restaurant in the courtyard's southeast corner.

      The future community space and multifunctional art centre, with a unique "stacked boxes" look and a wood exterior. has undergone extensive consultation with local First Nations.

      “The funding from Infrastructure Canada and the Department of Canadian Heritage contributes to the resources necessary to make the new Vancouver Art Gallery an international leader in environmental sustainability," VAG director and CEO Anthony Kiendl said in the release. "The new gallery is poised to be a reflection of the voices of local and international Indigenous communities, and will be a place for people of all ages, cultures, and backgrounds to meet and share ideas.”

      Most of the announced funding, $25 million, comes from Infrastructure Canada's Green and Inclusive Community Buildings Program and is earmarked for implementing the Passive House building-performance standards. Another $4.3 million will come from the Department of Canadian Heritage.

      The municipal government's gift of the 1.2-hectare space in a 99-year lease is said to be worth $100 million.

      After a "transformational" gift of $100 million for the new centre from the Audain Foundation was announced in November 2021, said to be the largest such gift ever to a Canadian gallery, VAG director Kiendl said he hoped to still raise $160 million more from the private and public sectors.

      An initial $40 million gift from the Chan family of Vancouver, announced in early 2019, led to the naming of the future space as the Chan Centre for the Visual Arts. The name of the gallery itself will remain the Vancouver Art Gallery. (The Chan family is the main donor behind UBC's Chan Centre for the Performing Arts.)

      The latest funding pledge pushes the VAG closer to the project's estimated total $400 million cost.

      Construction on the new building is expected to commence soon, with a tentative opening date set for 2027. The original 2017 plans were revised in 2021. The project is designed by Swiss architecture firm Herzog & de Meuron with local architects Perkins & Will.

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