[UVa News Services, by Marian Anderfuren]

The University of Virginia has presented the same challenge to many distinguished architects: How does one build upon a masterpiece?

As the University has grown, Thomas Jefferson's vision has been tried and tested, adapted and interpreted. A new exhibition, "From Village to Grounds: Architecture After Jefferson at the University of Virginia," explores the solutions to the architectural challenges posed by adding to the Academical Village – from 19th-century picturesque ideals to the classicism of McKim, Mead & White and the modern architecture of the 20th and 21st centuries.

The exhibition opens Tuesday at the Harrison Institute/Small Special Collections Library and runs through June 30. It is part of the University's 2009 celebration of the centennial of Carr's Hill, the president's residence and the last of the buildings designed for the University by the prestigious architectural firm of McKim, Mead & White.

Also as part of the celebration, the U.Va. Art Museum will host "Thomas Jefferson's Academical Village: The Creation of an Architectural Masterpiece," a new version of the groundbreaking 1993 presentation of the same name, from Saturday through Jan. 3. And the museum and the departments of Architectural History, Art History and Harrison Institute/Small Special Collections Library will present a scholarly symposium, "Jefferson, Palladio, Art and Architecture and the University of Virginia," on Nov. 20 and 21, to consider the Grounds in the context of architecture, landscape design and art.

U.Va.'s architecture stems from a creative tension Jefferson embodied, according to architectural historian Richard Guy Wilson, curator of both exhibits and the University's Commonwealth Professor of Architectural History.

"He balanced a belief in classical precedent with a passion for innovation and the technology of his time," Wilson said.

"From Village to Grounds" is organized in a series of chronological sections, ranging from the additions made in 1825 for the University's 123 original enrollees to today's South Lawn Project, a contemporary response to the needs of a growing institution with more than 21,000 students.

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