The Office of the Vice President for Research yesterday launched OpenGrounds, a studio space on the Corner geared toward collaborative research.
The center, featuring projectors and sound systems, is the first in a network of spaces the University hopes to open in an effort to encourage interdisciplinary thought.
"The idea is to provide a new way for faculty, students, external partners, community members to come together to take on major questions we face as a society," said William Sherman, the founding director of OpenGrounds and associate vice president for research.
The studio is constructed as a multi-use space with an open environment, featuring multiple projectors, sound systems and tables and chairs. The space is ideal for art exhibitions, concerts or small group work, Vice President for Research Thomas Skalak said.
Skalak said he hopes OpenGrounds will change the way research is conducted at the University, because the studio spaces encourage collaboration by offering a shared location in which ideas and projects can develop.
"We think it's very important to have physical spaces that are a symbolic gesture, and create a physical ability for people to come together in new ways," Skalak said.
Since the University has eleven separate schools with different focuses, Skalak said he hopes each school will one day have a nearby studio space which reflects its own "special flavor." Such spaces would encourage researchers from one school to share knowledge with people studying other disciplines, he added.
The studio is located on the Corner at 1400 West Main Street, which Sherman said was the original entrance to the University.
"It is the traditional face [of the University]... yet [it] opens outward to the world because that's where there's a lot of walking traffic," Skalak said.
The directors said the studio's central location will make OpenGrounds more accessible while also symbolizing the initiative's goal to fuse the University's interests with those of the local Charlottesville community.
To mark its launch yesterday evening, OpenGrounds leaders hosted an event from 5:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. in the studio.
"Tonight's event is a bringing-together of some of the most innovative people in the country," Sherman said in his welcome address. "The theme will be: How do we work together to create new types of institutions that can produce real change in the world?"
English Prof. Rita Dove, environmental activist Phillipe Cousteau and Silicon Valley entrepreneur Doug Garland, who is the director of the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, delivered 10-minute presentations after Sherman's welcome address. A 30-minute interactive workshop led by John Abele, chair of the Boston Scientific Corporation, followed.
OpenGrounds leaders are now discussing opening a second studio space on North Grounds at the Darden School.
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