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The Woodruff Arts Center is the largest arts center in the Southeast as well as one of the largest in the nation. The Woodruff is unique in that it combines four visual and performing arts divisions on one campus as one not-for-profit organization. Opening in 1968, the Woodruff Arts Center is home to the Alliance Theatre, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, the High Museum of Art, Young Audiences and the 14th Street Playhouse.

For more than 35 years, the Woodruff Arts Center has set the arts standard for Atlanta and the Southeast. In 1962, Atlanta suffered an unprecedented loss when a plane filled with the leaders of Atlanta’s arts community crashed on the runway in Orly, France. As the city grieved, it came together and used the devastating loss as a catalyst for the arts and built a fitting memorial to these victims. This led to the creation of the Atlanta Arts Alliance, now known as the Woodruff Arts Center (renamed in 1982 to honor its greatest benefactor, Robert W. Woodruff.)

The Memorial Arts Building opened October 5, 1968. The building housed the Woodruff Arts Center which included the Atlanta College of Art, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and High Museum of Art. All three entities were combined into one corporation, then as now, unprecedented in this country. The Alliance Theatre was added in 1970 as the fourth division of the Woodruff and thirty-five years later in 2005, a fifth division was added when Young Audiences joined the center. This addition ensures the Woodruff’s PreK-12 programs now reach more than one million children annually, the largest base of any arts center in the country.

The Woodruff campus expanded in 1983 with the addition of the Richard Meier-designed High Museum of Art building. This building made Meier the youngest Pritzker award-winning architect at that time.

On November 12-13, 2005, the Woodruff introduced its biggest expansion since opening in 1968. The new addition features two new exhibit buildings and a new administrative and curatorial building for the High Museum of Art; a residence hall and state of the art sculpture studio; a full-service restaurant for patrons and the community, Table 1280 at the Woodruff; plus public piazzas and a new parking structure. This new “village for the arts” was designed by another Pritzker award winner, Italian architect Renzo Piano.

The Woodruff campus sits on 12.25 acres and will grow to 18.25 acres after the full expansion occurs in the next few years. Currently, the campus is 906,000 square feet of exhibition, educational and performance space, plus a 200,000-square-foot garage located beneath the village. In the next few years, an estimated 1.26 million square feet will be added with the completion of a new Santiago Calatrava-designed Symphony Center, which will extend the entire village for the arts south to 14th Street.

The Woodruff’s village currently includes the Grammy-award winning Atlanta Symphony Orchestra; the south’s premiere regional theatre, the Alliance Theatre; the leading art museum in the southeast, the High Museum of Art; and Young Audiences, the largest provider of arts education in Georgia. Additionally, Woodruff owns and operates the only mid-sized theatre in Atlanta, the 14th Street Playhouse.

• List of major concert halls

• Woodruff Arts Center website
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