In terms of square feet, the Milwaukee Art Museum (MAM) has been more closed than open for the past 14 months. Only the large exhibition space in MAM’s Quadracci Pavilion has been operational while repairs and renovations shuttered two of the institution’s three interconnected buildings. The temporary downsizing was in fact long overdue.
“The Saarinen and Kahler buildings suffered from deferred maintenance,” said Chief Curator Brady Roberts, “There were some leaks in roofs that kept getting worse each winter. One ceiling tile became so saturated that it fell to the floor. It could have hit a painting or a patron! We were at a critical juncture.”
MAM collaborated on the project with Milwaukee County, which covered $10 million of the $34 million cost, and the War Memorial Corporation, with which MAM cohabits the 1957 Eero Saarinen-designed War Memorial Center.
Of course, the money buys more than the assurance that patrons won’t be struck by falling ceiling tiles. MAM has expanded by 20,000 square feet of gallery space, translating to new acquisitions in every collection and the display of works that have hibernated for decades in storage due to space restrictions.
Considering the enormity of the project and the specialized knowledge needed to make the most of what Roberts describes as “a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to rethink and reinstall a world-class art collection,” MAM’s expert team of curators were turned loose in their respective spaces.
“That’s the most fun part,” laughs Lisa Sutcliffe, Curator of Photography and Media Arts. “That’s why we’re all excited to be here now. Rarely do you get to show your collection in a new space and it’s even less common to be the one envisioning the space itself. We all got to reexamine our collections with an eye towards the different stories and histories that they can tell.”
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“I didn’t try to tell the history of design because that’s not something our fledgling collection can do,” added Monica Obniski, Demmer Curator of 20th- and 21st-Century Design, “Plus it’s kind of a totalitarian thing that I’m not all about. I try to show vignettes and strengths of the collection as well as to signal some of the interesting place markers around which we can build the design collection. The ‘chair wall,’ for instance, already ranges from 1920s furniture to 3D printed specimens. This is just one of our possibilities for growth. In a few years time we can be a place that people consider when they think about design.
