Santa Fe is an obvious art center, however there's not necessarily enough venues to perform and practice at.
This should be changing as the community is working to reopen the Greer Garson Theater in midtown at the old Santa Fe University of Art and design campus.
The city of Santa Fe Has recently made a 500,000 dollar commitment to the renovation and reopening of the theater in conjunction with LiveArts Santa Fe.
Live Arts Santa Fe is going to work on raising an additional million dollars to complete this project.
Executive director of Live Arts Santa fe Vaughn Irving said it was a communal loss when the theater closed.
“It has been a slow decline. The College of Santa Fe, when it was operating on the campus here, was really a hub for the performing arts and people were coming here all the time. Locals would come to see shows produced by the college and things that they were bringing in and it was a hub.”
Irving said that there may be confusion for those who aren't familiar with the building.
“I call it the Greer Garson Theater Center because that's what is written on the side of the building. I always like to emphasize that when i'm talking to folks that aren't familiar with that it is a 500 seat theater but it also has a black box theater, it has rehearsal space, it has classrooms, it has a theme shop and costume shop a dance studio, it is way more than what you think of when you think of a theater.”
Irving said this is going to be a great opportunity for artists in Santa Fe.
“It's going to be an amazing opportunity for Santa Fe to have Live Arts operating in this building. What we hope to do is launch a professional conservatory program, training people to be actors and technicians and designers in theater and in film. This space opening up to the community will be a game changer for all the performing arts in Santa Fe.”
