Get Real

After all the buzz from A $25 million Eastside arts center grant, a $100 million question remains.

The space formerly known as PACE (Performing Arts Center Eastside) is now the Tateuchi Center, thanks to a $25 million grant from the Atsuhiko and Ina Goodwin Tateuchi Foundation. “After what has seemed like an endless loop of cutback stories, it’s a much-needed booster shot to the arts and culture scene of Bellevue,” says Yoko Ott, director of Bellevue’s Open Satellite.

“It’s just a huge adrenaline rush,” says Stephen Elliott, manager of the Theatre at Meydenbauer. “Maybe it turns a few heads and opens a few checkbooks.”

The grant by Atsuhiko’s widow, Ina Tateuchi – who lives just down the street from the PACE site – had better open quite a few checkbooks. Even when the grant is added to the $35 million already donated by the center’s board, Kemper Freeman, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Microsoft, the City of Bellevue and many others, the campaign remains $100 million shy of the cash needed to build. But the Tateuchi Center is not just a construction project; it is a 135,000 square-foot, LEED Gold–certified symbol of the Eastside’s desire to be a destination of its own, one that doesn’t have to commute to Seattle to get its big shows.

“Big” is key. Pacific Northwest Ballet, which calls Seattle’s McCaw Hall home, is looking forward to performing on the Eastside. Tateuchi organizers suggest the Seattle Symphony may be interested too. Eastside arts organizations, however, are conspicuously absent from fundraising events or planning initiatives.

“Most [Eastside arts organizations] have a budget under half a million dollars,” suggests Dan Meyers, executive director of Kirkland Performance Center. “This is about Eastside audiences and regional arts organizations.”

“What we have on the Eastside.” adds Elliott, “is a lot of organizations where four hundred seats is all they serve.”

But Bellevue Arts Commision chair Betina Finley feels the size of the Theatre at Meydenbauer is what’s holding groups back. “You need so much space – you have nothing like what Tateuchi will offer on the Eastside.” And the Tateuchi design is flexible, with a 2,000-seat theatre that can be lit so that a five-hundred-person crowd isn’t dwarfed. There’s also a 250-seat cabaret, designed to attract nightlife and the younger generation.

Also cool: $3 million of the Tateuchi donation will fund “Japanese and Japanese-inspired performances.” Board member Alka Badshah says the Indian Community Eastside (ICE) has already raised half of the million dollars it has pledged for programs there. In 2008, Bellevue, Washington’s fifth-largest city, had the state’s highest percentage of foreign-born residents. Many are happy that their influence is on the rise.

Building the Tateuchi Center is already the biggest arts campaign in Eastside history. But if another $100 million doesn’t get raised in time to for construction to begin in 2011, the center will be a big fat embarrassment instead – and will bolster the cynical argument that Eastsiders care more about high-end shopping than high art.

If I were on Tateuchi’s board, I’d gather my neighbors around me – those that have already built Eastside audiences – and show that there is such a thing as Eastside art right now, and it’s worthy of a home. •

 

Comments

July 9, 2010 at 3:11 PM | Visitor
Your article on the proposed Tateuchi Center is interesting. But to say that "Eastside arts organizations, however, are conspicuously absent from fundraising events or planning initiatives" shows inadequate investigative reporting. Who did you ask? The Bellevue Youth Symphony Orchestra has supported the Center from the beggining. Our brass ensemble played for a fundraising event back before the Hyatt was expanded, at the Wintergarden. Our board members and staff have attended events and have even given money that would otherwise have come straight to us. We also met with John Haynes of PACE to access our status with them. We were pleased to find that we were already in their planning sights. The Meydenbauer may be just right or too big for some groups, but for the Bellevue Youth Symphony Orchestra -- we are bursting the walls at most of the Eastside venues in which we perform. We are eagarly waiting the expanded capabilities of the Tateuchi Center. Art and Music, whether high or not, is the future of our communities. They are reasons for richness long after the shopping is forgotten. We on the Eastside are waiting. Have YOU stepped to the plate?
July 12, 2010 at 12:54 PM | Visitor
Many thanks for your spirited and accurate riposte, BYSO.  If Ms. Huberman had bothered to ask anyone at Tateuchi Center, she might have had some actual, factual information in her article.  My conversations with you about how we hope to figure prominently in your future growth and success have been repeated many times with Bellevue Philharmonic, International Ballet Theatre, Bellevue Youth Theatre, Village Theatre, and others.  As the chief artistic and administrative officer of Tateuchi Center (nee PACE) I would have thought that my voice and intentions would have been relevant.  Oh well.  
July 12, 2010 at 2:58 PM | Bond Huberman

Dear commenters,

Thank you for weighing in - I'm glad to hear from you both.

In my defense: I contacted three people at Tateuchi Center: one active board member, one public relations rep and one permanent staff member (who never returned my phone or e-mail requests to put me in touch with the appropriate leadership). The executive director, I was made to understand, was unavailable to answer my questions in any depth.

And neither of those people I did speak to - who it seems, are charged daily with representing the mission and goals of TC - had an answer to the question that I'm actually posing in this article: not whether or not the Tateuchi Center will have future relationships with local arts groups: but which local arts groups are currently involved and visible in its fundraising efforts right now? In my mind, having all arts groups visibly involved would be a great way to connect with and energize active local arts supporters.

That said, I'm glad to hear to that I'm wrong in one regard; and that a group like BYSO does feel so connected to and so invested in the Tateuchi Center. (Dear BYSO, I apologize for the ommission. I would have included you in the article, but no one I spoke to at TC even mentioned your existence).

So, though you may want to scapegoat my journalism in this matter; I believe I've effectively revealed a different problem: the goals regarding the community involvement of Tateuchi Center need to be a lot clearer and visible for everyone, including its own staff.