As Vancouver Art Gallery seeks new building design, should it also look for new location?

Some in Vancouver’s cultural community are talking about a total rethink of the city’s art gallery, including different locations. Others say searching for a new site is a waste of time. Read more.

Could western Canada’s largest art gallery find new life in a reimagined department store space? Or possibly in a vast underground expanse? Could it be the centrepiece of a broader new cultural district?

Or should gallery leadership forge ahead with a simpler building at the planned site, not wasting any more time?

Although the scuttling of those plans will delay the new gallery, possibly by a number of years, some prominent local voices are embracing the opportunity for a range of new ideas.

Bob Rennie, founder of the Rennie group of real estate companies, had long been critical of what he saw as the VAG’s obsession with “starchitecture” and a splashy new building. Rennie, a major art collector, believes new options should be on the table now that the Herzog and de Meuron plan has been scrapped.

In a recent interview, Rennie said the city could sell the Larwill Park property, an entire city block of about 1.2 hectares, to a developer that could build rental housing and office towers there.

“They could sell it for $250 million and give the VAG $200 million … and say: ‘Go underground,’” Rennie said, referring to the idea, which has been discussed over the years, of expanding subterranean gallery space in the area around the VAG’s current home, a location he describes as “centre-ice in our city.”

Of the underground gallery concept, Rennie said: “The Louvre did it, and no one’s saying the Louvre is bad.”

Rennie said he recently reached out to Spencer Chandra Herbert, B.C.’s newly appointed minister of tourism, arts, culture and sport, urging the province to audit how the VAG spent as much as $60 million of donors’ and taxpayers’ money on the now-shelved project.

“I sit on other philanthropic boards in the city, and this is a black eye to philanthropy,” Rennie said. “We have to understand where this went off the track, and ensure that it won’t happen again … so that we can reassure other donors to other needs that this was an anomaly.”

“The choices are: Do we sweep it under the carpet? Or do we have an audit?”

Rennie raised another idea for the gallery’s future: instead of expanding below ground, the VAG could look right across Howe Street, to the 230,000 square feet of empty retail space in Pacific Centre vacated last year by Nordstrom department store.

A spokesperson for Pacific Centre’s owner, Cadillac Fairview, confirmed that a new tenant for the former Nordstrom space has not been found, and the landlord’s leasing team “continues to explore options and there is good interest.”

Leila Getz, founder and artistic director of the Vancouver Recital Society, also sees potential in the former Nordstrom space. Getz’ organization is part of a coalition of more than a dozen local arts groups, including the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, Vancouver Opera, Ballet B.C. and DanceHouse, that have come together to push for a multi-venue performing arts “cultural precinct.”

Getz envisions a repurposed Nordstrom space for the performing arts groups, and the VAG moving into another department store property just one block to the east: the Hudson’s Bay department store.

That stretch of West Georgia Street is a prime location in the middle of downtown, but has “lost its former lustre,” Getz said. “In the 1970s and ’80s, it was hopping.”

Getz envisions a vibrant cultural district centred around Howe and Georgia, with the city’s premier visual art museum, top performing arts venues, and new food and drink destinations to “bring life back to downtown centre,” she said.

Asked if the new gallery will definitely be at Larwill Park or if a different location could be considered, VAG CEO Anthony Kiendl said in an emailed statement. “In the new year, we look forward to sharing more about the future vision for the new Vancouver Art Gallery. This period remains an important time of reflection for us, as we continue to carefully listen to and understand the needs of our communities.”

When news broke that the VAG was parting ways with Herzog and de Meuron, local developer and philanthropist Michael Audain, whose $100 million pledge to the new VAG in 2021 was described as the largest gift to a Canadian gallery, told Postmedia he was “kind of delighted that they’re going to a new architect.”

Audain said he hopes the VAG will hire a Canadian architect for the new building, but he does not want to waste time considering an alternate location.

“I believe the Larwill Park site is perfect for a new VAG building as the downtown is moving east and it’s right next door to a SkyTrain station,” Audain told Postmedia. “With city council support, and the project finally in good hands with developer Jon Stovell (who took over as VAG board chair in February 2024) at the helm, I see absolutely no point in wasting years searching for another site.”

Vancouver Coun. Sarah Kirby-Yung, one of two council appointees on the VAG board of trustees, said it is too early to know what might be the next tenant in the courthouse building after the art gallery moves out. But, she said, she expects it will be some kind of “cultural institution,” possibly a museum.

In an emailed statement December, Herzog and de Meuron said: “We are disappointed that the Vancouver Art Gallery has decided to pause their building project and part ways with Herzog and de Meuron. Since starting the project in 2014, we have valued the collaboration and have enjoyed working closely with the diverse groups of people involved, always open to adapt to the evolving requirements of the city, community and leadership.”

With files from Joe Ruttle