Exhibit of Professor's Projects on Display in Architecture School Dean's Gallery

February 16, 2012 — "Studies," an exhibit by W.G. Clark, Edmund Schureman Campbell Professor in the University of Virginia's School of Architecture, will be on display in the Dean's Gallery in Campbell Hall Feb. 24 through June 3.

An opening reception will be held Feb. 24 from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m., in conjunction with the Arts Grounds Final Fridays event. The exhibit will be open weekdays from 9 a.m. until 5 p.m.

The exhibit consists of sketches and models – studies for projects that were never built, plus drawings for a built project, the east addition of Campbell Hall, which was dedicated in 2008.

"Unrealized projects have always fascinated me; they are more easily forgotten than constructed work, so it's always a surprise to come across the old drawings and model studies of un-built ideas," Clark said.

"Their abandonment has many causes: better ideas replace them, clients quit, even successful competitions are either not built or, if so, made unrecognizable from the entry. But, although unborn, these lost projects don't die; their ideas remain in play and tend to migrate to later, and perhaps realized buildings," he said.

With the exception of drawings for the Campbell Hall addition, the works in the gallery exist solely as artifacts of design, but they each have contributed to the evolution of Clark's work over time.

"Often we are not even aware that an old idea is influencing a new scheme; it's how fossils work, where the material becomes replaced, but the form remains true to the original," he said.

A Louisa native, Clark studied architecture at U.Va. He began architectural practice in Charleston, S.C. in 1974 and won several national design competitions, including the New Orleans Museum of Art competition in 1983.

In 1998, he was appointed chairman of the Architecture Department at U.Va. His work has been widely published and is the subject of Richard Jensen's book, "Clark and Menefee."

He was included in "40 under 40" by the Architectural League of New York and twice listed in Time magazine as one of America's best designers.

His work has received three National Design awards from the American Institute of Architects for his built projects: Middleton Inn in Charleston, S.C., Reid House in John’s Island, S.C,. and Croffead House on James Island, S.C. His current project is a guest house for a Cistercian monastery, Mepkin Abbey and Meditation Chapel, on the Cooper River in South Carolina.