Faced with the loss of their historic Rieman Dance Center home in 2005, Harvard’s dancers are now calling on the College to keep the Rieman Center dance space or to build a new facility.

Members of the dance community circulated a letter over e-mail lists this weekend urging students to lobby University President Lawrence H. Summers and Dean of the Faculty William C. Kirby in support of their cause.

“We have determined that losing this space, without a comparable facility to move into immediately after its reacquisition, will decimate the Harvard Dance Program and thereby profoundly damage Harvard’s artistic community at large,” the letter reads.

The College currently leases Rieman from Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, which recently confirmed its plan to convert Rieman into a meeting space.

The letter suggests administrators form a student-faculty committee to consider renegotiating the lease or building a new, state-of-the-art performance space.

Last night, about 25 dancers met in the Agassiz Theatre to plan ways to petition the administration—including a Science Center postering campaign, letter-writing or inviting Summers to a dance performance.

“We need to get as much energy around this as possible,” said Adrienne M. Minster ’04, a dancer who helped organize the meeting.

Ryuji Yamaguchi ’03, another dancer leading the group’s lobbying effort, said he hopes to make administrators aware of the large contingent of people using Rieman. More than 600 students are currently involved in dance at Harvard.

But Radcliffe leaders say they won’t change their plans.

“We are committed to reclaiming the use of Rieman for the fellowship program,” says Radcliffe Executive Dean Louise M. Richardson. “The plan is absolutely essential for Radcliffe to become the best institute for advanced study in the world.”

New Vision for Rieman

Using Rieman and Byerly Hall—which Radcliffe will reclaim in 2006—will allow Radcliffe Yard to become “the center of all intellectual activity” for the Institute, Richardson says.

The Radcliffe fellows—about 50 scholars each year who come to Radcliffe from a variety of academic fields—currently meet at the Cronkite Center on Ash St. and have offices at 38 Concord St.

Meetings of fellows are integral to the mission of Radcliffe, Richardson says, because they allow for cross-discipline interaction.

Kathryn Chan, a fellow in visual arts, says the current meeting location in the Cronkite Center doesn’t “have a totally professional feel.”