Sculpture Milwaukee Adding Spring Exhibit Inside The Avenue

Sculpture Milwaukee 2021 pieces. Photos by Jeramey Jannene.

Sculpture Milwaukee is now bigger, and more local.

The nonprofit organization is adding a secondary series inside The Avenue complex that is to be entirely designed and curated by students and faculty members from four area colleges.

The new exhibition, the 2023 installment of which is known as “Dear Nature,” will run from April through October.

Participating students come from the Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design (MIAD), Milwaukee School of Engineering, UW-Milwaukee Peck School of the Arts and UW-Milwaukee School of Architecture and Urban Planning.

“Through this experience, students learned crucial facets of professional practice that require careful planning, effective communication, and the logistics of showing art in a public setting,” said Jason Yi, MIAD professor of art, in a statement. “Most important, they experienced the inner workings of professional collaboration and built a meaningful community outside the confines of MIAD.” Yi’s art was featured in the inaugural Sculpture Milwaukee exhibition.

Sculpture Milwaukee is also gearing up to bring back its signature exhibit: large sculptures from a mix of internationally-recognized and local artists displayed primarily outdoors along Wisconsin Avenue. No date has been announced for what will be the seventh annual exhibition, but it has traditionally opened early in the summer.

The student-led pieces will be unveiled on Gallery Night, April 21. They will be displayed on the second (skywalk) level of the former shopping center and freely viewable when the complex is open to the public. Formerly known as the Shops of Grand Avenue, the complex was redeveloped into a mixed-use complex starting in 2018. A Sculpture Milwaukee representative said the pieces will be located to the east of 3rd Street Market Hall, 275 W. Wisconsin Ave.

The pieces are being designed in response to “Nature Doesn’t Know About Us,” the 2022 Sculpture Milwaukee exhibition curated by Ugo Rondinone. “Similar to Rondinone’s exhibition, ‘Dear Nature’ explores multiple dimensions of human intersections with nature, while celebrating the disparate elements of the Earth, self, and natural form,” said the organization in a press release.

The exhibit is being curated by UWM professors Whitney Moon and Jennifer Johung.

“These are the artists, architects, and engineers who will create the built environment that marks Milwaukee’s creative and innovative expressions. Through ‘Dear Nature,’ Sculpture Milwaukee is fostering future artists who can thrive within the building and urban planning sectors and engineers whose practicality and innovation will be imbued with a greater sense of creativity,” said Sculpture Milwaukee executive director Brian Schupper.