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Fall 2025
Campus

Celebrating Arts Anniversaries

This year marks milestones for three premier music and theater venues on the Evanston campus — striking spaces where students perform, learn and grow.

A performer in a white costume with a red belt opens her arms to the audience.
Arwen-Vira Marsh ’25 played the titular character in a production of Antigone at the Virigina Wadsworth Wirtz Center for the Performing Arts.

Fall 2025
Impact

Celebrating 45 Years

The Virginia Wadsworth Wirtz Center for the Performing Arts began as the Theatre and Interpretation Center in 1980. A gift from the late W. Rockwell “Rocky” Wirtz ’75 and his wife, Marilyn, supported renovations that were completed in 2017. The building was named for Wirtz’s grandmother, a 1924 Northwestern graduate. Pictured is a recent performance of Museum at the Wirtz Center.

Celebrating 10 Years

A photograph of the outside of the Patrick G. and Shirley W. Ryan Center for the Musical Arts.

Credit: Todd Rosenberg

Patrick G. and Shirley W. Ryan Center for the Musical Arts is the lakefront home of the Bienen School of Music and the School of Communication’s theater and performance studies departments. Its name honors alums Patrick G. ’59, ’09 H and Shirley W. Ryan ’61, ’19 H.

Celebrating 10 Years

Nine people play instruments on stage at the Mary B. Galvin Recital Hall.

Credit: Elliot Mandel

The Mary B. Galvin Recital Hall within the Ryan Center for the Musical Arts features optimal acoustics and stunning lake views. The space was named for Mary B. Galvin, a 1945 Northwestern graduate, in recognition of a gift from the Robert W. Galvin Foundation.

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