‘EMPAC is a cutting-edge experimental performing arts venue currently being designed by the Grimshaw New York team for Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York.

The building is located on a steep hillside at the west edge of the campus, overlooking Troy and the Hudson valley below. EMPAC will contain a 1,200-seat concert hall, a 400-seat theatre with flytower, two black box studios, a dance studio, a suite of artist-in-residence workshops, and professional audio and video recording, editing and production facilities. A rectangular south wing of the building, containing the more digitally oriented facilities, shields the atrium
and public spaces from summer solar heat gain. The concert hall, clad entirely in western red cedar, dominates the north wing of the building and is visible to the outside through a dramatic 100-foot high glass curtain wall.

EMPAC’s mission is not only to provide an environment conducive to the generation of innovative digital work, but also to actively change perceptions about the nature of sound, vision and the human experiential condition. Its unique program, combining the highest quality venues suitable for the performance of both traditional and contemporary music, dance, theatre and visualization, will be unmatched by academic institutions elsewhere in the world.’

Completion: 2008

For further information visit: www.grimshaw-architects.com.