INDIANAPOLIS.- IMA Indianapolis Museum of Art officials announced today that it had received an $11 million challenge grant from the Richard M. Fairbanks Foundation for the development of the new IMA Virginia B. Fairbanks Art & Nature Park. Located on 100 acres of woodlands, wetlands, lake and meadow adjacent to the Museum, the Fairbanks Art & Nature Park will feature site-specific commissions in diverse media that explore the natural features of the Park.

The IMA also announced that it had recently selected artist Mary Miss to create the Park’s first site-specific work, a suspended bridge through the canopy of trees, which will serve as a pedestrian gateway between the Museum and the Park.

Scheduled to open in 2009, the Fairbanks Art & Nature Park will become the largest museum contemporary art park and the only park of its kind in an urban setting in the United States. The IMA’s goal will be to present art projects, exhibitions and discussions designed to strengthen the public’s understanding of the unique, dynamic relationship between contemporary art and the natural world. The programming for the Art & Nature Park will grow directly out of the art projects, which will include temporary and permanent installations from artists at all stages of their careers. In addition to the Park, the IMA includes 52 acres of historic and contemporary gardens.

“Virginia B. Fairbanks Art & Nature Park will create a new forum for artists to foster a public dialogue about art and the environment,” said Maxwell L. Anderson, director and CEO of the IMA. “The Richard M. Fairbanks Foundation has been a staunch supporter of this project, and shares our vision that the Park will become a new destination in the Midwest and a wonderful way for visitors of all ages to experience art.”

The IMA has raised $21.5 million to date towards the Park’s campaign goal of $36 million, which is the third phase of the IMA’s expansion campaign. The institutional upgrade also included a completed expansion and renovation of the Museum’s building in 2005 and the renovation of the IMA Oldfields-Lilly House & Gardens, completed in 2002.

This $11 million gift for the Fairbanks Art & Nature Park endowment brings the Fairbanks Foundation’s total support of the park to $15 million. The Fairbanks Foundation, named for the late Richard M. Fairbanks, previously committed $4 million in 2001 for construction of the Park. Mr. Fairbanks was a leader and innovator in radio broadcasting, founded the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Network and brought WIBC radio to prominence in Indianapolis. Fairbanks Art & Nature Park is named for Virginia Nicholson Brown Fairbanks, his wife.

“My mother is delighted and honored that the Fairbanks Foundation is committed to the IMA’s Art & Nature Park project,” said Elizabeth N. Mann, daughter of Virginia Fairbanks. “This was the perfect way for Richard to honor Virginia’s lifetime love affair with gardens and outdoor spaces.”

The IMA has engaged architect Marlon Blackwell and landscape architect Edward L. Blake to work with the selected artists to transform the 100 acres into a unique place to experience art. Formerly a gravel pit, the land was donated to the IMA in 1972 by the Indianapolis construction firm Huber, Hunt and Nichols. Since that time, a natural reclamation has occurred and the land has evolved into its current state of woodlands, wetlands and a 30-acre lake.

Prominent features of the park will be the Fehnel Experiential Center, located at the end of the Mary Miss walkway, and the Fehnel Interpretive Pavilion, located across from the Oldfield’s Ravine Garden. Visitors will be encouraged to interact with the experiential center, as its design will blur the distinction between architecture, sculpture and nature. The interpretive pavilion will contain educational facilities. Designed to be seamlessly woven into the natural environment, both centers will be constructed with recycled materials in order to achieve LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification from the U.S. Green Building Council. The Fehnel Experiential Center and Interpretive Pavilion are made possible by a gift from Edgar and Dorothy Fehnel, longtime IMA supporters.

A National Advisory Committee of four distinguished leaders in the fields of art and architecture assisted the IMA in developing plans for the Fairbanks Art & Nature Park. The advisors are: John Beardsley, senior lecturer in the landscape architecture department at Harvard Design School; Mary Beebe, director of the Stuart Collection, University of California, San Diego; Reed Kroloff, dean of the School of Architecture at Tulane University and former editor of Architecture magazine; and Ned Rifkin, Undersecretary for Art at the Smithsonian.

Mary Miss - Mary Miss, an artist known for her environmentally-sensitive art work, is based in New York. For more than three decades, Mary Miss’s work has examined the intersection of sculpture, architecture, landscape design and installation art. Grounded in the context of a place, Miss creates installations that allow the visitor to become aware of the site’s history, its ecology, and surrounding environment. Permanent installations designed by the artist include a Federal Courthouse project in St. Louis, the Union Square Subway Station in New York City, a riverwalk along the Milwaukee River (which incorporates a storm water treatment project) and a wetlands preservation project in Des Moines, Iowa.