The new McMurtry Building for the arts took a step forward with the University’s announcement yesterday that the New York architectural firm Diller Scofidio + Renfro would design the building.

The structure will be built in Stanford’s Arts District, next to the Cantor Arts Center, where it will house the Art and Architecture Library. It will also include gallery space for student works, studios, classrooms and screening spaces.

Burt McMurtry M.S. ’59, Ph.D. ’62 and his wife Deedee provided the $30 million naming gift for the new building. It will bring together under one roof the department of art and art history’s programs in art practice, design, art history, film and media studies and documentary film.

“By bringing together all our visual arts programs in close proximity to the Cantor Arts Center, the McMurtry Building will promote the kind of exchange that sparks creativity and innovation,” said Art and Art History Professor Nancy Troy in an interview with the Stanford Report.

The McMurtry building is under the wing of the greater Stanford Arts Initiative, which was launched in 2006. Part of its mission is to create and endow new arts facilities, faculty positions, graduate fellowships and programs that encourage interdisciplinary collaboration in the arts. Among its other projects is the Bing Concert Hall, a performance venue officials expect to open in winter 2013.

–Tyler Brown