ImprovLab Groundbreaking with photos
Constructed in 1967, the University of Guelph’s MacKinnon Building is about to undergo a major upgrade. Home to the College of Arts and the IICSI, the renovations will include the construction of the CFI-funded ImprovLab. IICSI is increasingly known internationally for the critical study of improvised creative practices, and the ImprovLab space aims to further this research. The ImprovLab will be a publicly accessible multi-use research lab for the presentation, broadcast, archiving, and analysis of improvised performance, community workshops, and audience reception studies across a variety of media.
The new facility will provide a space for researchers to collaborate with each other, the university population, and the broader community. Renovations will also involve the building of a new main entrance, creation of student spaces, reconfiguring and returning the Luscombe Theatre to a black-box performance space, and new practice spaces for music, as well as aesthetic updates and changes to address issues both of accessibility and acoustics. The ground-breaking ceremony for this exciting new space, designed by Diamond Schmitt Architects, took place Thursday, October 24th and featured a ceremonial ritual led by Korean percussionist, Dong-Won Kim.