In the Arts: Met Museum Plaza to Get Makeover, Seattle’s Intiman Rebounds

The Metropolitan Museum of Art will redesign the plaza outside its Manhattan building with a $60-million gift from the billionaire businessman and arts patron David Koch, Bloomberg and The New York Times report.

Mr. Koch, a member of the museum’s board, initially pledged at least $10-million in April 2010 to upgrade the leaky fountains and crumbling sidewalks outside the Met.

Mr. Koch said his support for the effort was inspired by the spectacular fountains at Lincoln Center, for which he has given $100-million. The design for the museum’s plaza, which calls for new fountains, additional seating, and more than 100 additional trees along a four-block stretch of Fifth Avenue, will be formally presented to local planning officials next week.

In other arts news, Seattle’s Intiman Theatre has reached its $1-million goal in a two-month fundraising drive that officials had characterized as a do-or-die campaign for the prestigious but financially struggling stage, The Seattle Times writes.

The theater said an 11th-hour contribution on Friday enabled the group to meet its goal in a campaign launched in November to support a plan by the theater’s new artistic director, Andrew Russell, to revive the Intiman, which six months earlier had laid off staff and cut short its 2010-11 season.

Terry Jones, president of the board, said the donations would be used entirely to pay for a summer season of four plays, the revenue of which will go toward paying down the theater’s debt.