The Milwaukee Art Museum has announced its Plan for the Future, a comprehensive public campaign to restore its War Memorial Center and Kahler building and reinstall the galleries. The Milwaukee Art Museum is comprised of three buildings designed by three legendary architects -- the War Memorial Center, a masterpiece of mid-twentieth-century design created by Finnish architect Eero Saarinen in 1957; the Kahler building, which was created by the American architect David Kahler in 1975 to create additional exhibition space; and the Quadracci Pavilion, which was created in 2001 by the Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava.
Last spring, Milwaukee County donated $10 million to help fund the repair of the museum’s War Memorial Center and Kahler building, which house the institution’s Collection galleries. The museum hopes to raise another $15 million to fund additional renovations and a reinstallation of the collections. The institution will be asking for public donations as part of its Plan for the Future campaign, which took two years to develop.
The overarching goals of the Plan for the Future are to increase exhibition space; create a new lakeside entrance, establishing easier public access to the museum; reinstall the collection with a more intuitive layout; and install energy-efficient LED lighting. Repairs and restorations to the Milwaukee Art Museum are slated to begin in the fall. The museum will remain open during the project.
