While most arts organizations across the city are coping with the difficult economic climate by scaling back, officials at the Brooklyn Academy of Music will announce Wednesday that the group has begun a $300-million expansion project that aims to create a new theater, several spaces for screening films, new festivals for opera and Muslim culture, and a strengthened endowment, reports The New York Times.

“Announcing this campaign is not meant to be arrogant. It’s going to be very hard; we have a huge job to do,” said Karen Brooks Hopkins, president of the academy, acknowledging the recent losses among the investment portfolios of many New Yorkers and corporations.

More than half of the money — $160-million — has already been raised, including $22.5-million from the city and $10-million from Jeanne Donovan Fisher, the widow of Richard B. Fisher, who served as chairman of the academy’s endowment trust.

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