The Contemporary Arts Center (CAC) opens a new Creativity Center on the sixth floor of its landmark Zaha Hadid–designed building. The Center, an environmentally conscious hub for creative learning, will amplify the CAC’s commitment to fostering innovation and curiosity in audiences of all ages.
The project will transform the sixth floor of the Lois & Richard Rosenthal Center for Contemporary Art into a dynamic inter-generational learning space centered around creativity and exploration connected to the art and ideas of our time.
With 10,000 square feet of flexible space, the new Creativity Center will provide a vibrant spatial canvas for visitors to engage with art, connect with others, and use creative experimentation as a means to explore the increasingly complex issues of humanity, including environmental sustainability, global awareness, identity, health and well-being, and innovation.
The Center will allow the CAC to further extend its mission of encouraging artists and visitors alike to tap into the boundless possibilities of their own creativity, placing an even greater emphasis on the creative process as a critical tool for learning, skill development, problem solving, and fostering empathy and understanding for all ages.
Key elements of the Creativity Center:
- A sustainable art lab where recycling, upcycling, and other forms of zero-waste and net-positive waste systems will be explored.
- A large studio hosting intergenerational creative programs that deploy a full suite of analog and digital tools for making and creative experimentation.
- The updated UnMuseum® interactive gallery, with projects by local and national artists that engage visitors in a hands-on exploration of the complexities of our world.
- An archipelago of pod-like pavilions, offering a series of work niches for welcoming creative exploration opportunities and small gathering or comfortable observation of the studio activities.
- An experimental “town square”-type space for art-inspired discourse with city skyline views through CAC- and community-curated programming.
- An ever-changing community gallery with increased visual connection to the urban carpet and galleries below, dedicated to celebrating the creativity of CAC visitors of all ages by inviting them to display their own work.
Masterminds behind the Creativity Center
Centering Cincinnati’s own creative communities, the inaugural exhibition in the revitalized UnMuseum® will feature new interactive installations by local artists Batres Gilvin (Karla Batres and Bradly Gilvin), Michelle D’Cruz and Christopher Glenn, Garrett Goben, Terence Hammonds, Pam Kravetz, Anissa Lewis, Abby Peitsmeyer, and Karen Saunders. Installations in the UnMuseum® will rotate every one to three years to showcase a new slate of work designed to inspire, educate, and engage visitors of all ages.
The CAC partnered with Chicago-based architecture firm Mir Collective to realize this bold new paradigm for learning within the museum space, which will merge interactive galleries, ample making spaces, and community-centric gathering and gallery areas—with a focus on environmental sustainability. Initial construction work on the Creativity Center began in October 2021.
Grand Opening Schedule of Events
Ribbon-cutting, Thursday, Oct. 27, 5:30-8 p.m
Public Opening and Family Day, Saturday, Oct. 29, 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Contemporary Arts Center 44 E 6th Street Cincinnati, 45202
