WHY NOT THE WORKSHOP?

With the needs of the Fine Arts Department more than met by the recent generosity of alumni and others, a rumor is in circulation that the Fogg Art Museum is to be torn down on grounds of future uselessness. In spite of the wide difference of opinion which exists on the architectural merits of the building, it is hard to believe, when space for special facilities is at a premium, that such an idea can be seriously entertained.

The glowing opportunity presented of at length housing the 47 Workshop in adequate quarters cannot be passed by. Although the thought of transforming the Museum into an experimental theatre seems at first somewhat fantastic, it is a project that appears, upon consideration, to be both feasible and practicable.

It must be admitted at once that the necessary alterations would be expensive, for the Fogg Museum is sturdily built and might conceivably resist structural changes; but even when this is taken into account, the cost should be appreciably less than that of constructing an entirely new building.

If such a plan were carried out, the Fogg Theatre would be far more than a home for the Workshop. It would offer facilities for valuable laboratory experimentation without which a complete mastery of dramatic technique must be difficult, if not impossible; and it would serve, to take only one example, as a center for the continuation from an American point of view of the work which the Germans, in their recent productions, have so successfully begun.