By Melanie Radzicki McManus | Photo by Travel Wisconsin – Rachel Hershberger
Wisconsin is home to a wide range of art museums, parks and installations, which together offer an exciting mix of creativity to uncover. Some of these attractions focus on a particular art form or subject, for example, while others are more comprehensive. Several boast rooftop or outdoor gardens. Most offer hands-on art classes and special events.
Ready to start exploring? Below are several possibilities. Many of these places are part of Wisconsin Art Destinations, a new art museum-based collective with 14 members. Visit any member museum and you’ll be eligible for discounts at area lodging facilities, restaurants and other attractions.
COMPREHENSIVE ART MUSEUMS
Milwaukee Art Museum
Wisconsin’s largest art museum perches along the Lake Michigan shore in downtown Milwaukee. Home to more than 34,000 works, its art genres include American and European paintings, sculpture, photography, folk and self-taught art, conceptual and minimalist art, prints and drawings.
Entry for children 12 and under is free, and kids can check out activity bags, borrow sketching supplies or try on costumes inspired by the museum’s artworks. Everyone is welcome to craft their own piece of art in the Kohl’s Art Studio on Saturdays and Sundays. Time your visit to catch the opening or closing of the building’s famous outdoor “wings,” which are part of a moveable sunscreen.
Chazen Museum of Art
The University of Wisconsin-Madison is home to the the Chazen. Open daily with free admission, the museum houses more than 24,000 artworks covering every culture, period, media and genre. The Chazen also offers numerous special events, such as lectures, musical performances, films and conversations with curators.
Kids will enjoy visiting during Family Days, when attendees can explore various mediums through hands-on workshops. Family Days may focus on making music, too.
Madison Museum of Contemporary Art
The free Madison Museum of Contemporary Art houses some 6,000 objects. Significant holdings are in Mexican Modernist prints, photography and Chicago Imagism. Sprinkled throughout the building are Learning Centers containing art- making activities and educational resources geared toward families. Special events include art markets and drink-and-draw events.
The museum also contains a popular rooftop sculpture garden, which is being renovated and updated with native plantings, a water feature and more. It’s scheduled to reopen in spring 2026.
John Michael Kohler Arts Center
Sheboygan’s free John Michael Kohler Arts Center boasts eight galleries, two performance spaces and a drop-in artmaking studio. Its collections and exhibitions focus on self-taught and contemporary artists, while program offerings are vast. Think community arts projects; dance, film and musical presentations; a summer concert series; summer camps; and various classes and workshops.
Three miles west is the JMKAC- affiliated Art Preserve, which contains the museum’s collection of artist- built environments. Don’t leave either building without using at least one of its restrooms, all of which were created by artists as a way to show art can be enjoyed everywhere.
THEMED ART MUSEUMS
Bergstrom-Mahler Museum of Glass
This free Neenah museum opened in 1959, thanks to Evangeline Bergstrom’s lifetime fascination with antique glass paperweights. While she was a child when first fascinated by these sparkling objects, Bergstrom didn’t begin collecting them until she was 63. Over the years her collection and subject expertise grew, and after she and her husband passed away, they left both their Tudor mansion and a substantial sum of money to the city of Neenah to create a museum for her collection.
Today, the Bergstrom-Mahler Museum of Glass contains more than 3,500 glass objects — Bergstrom’s paperweights, but also art glass, Germanic glass and contemporary glass. Art classes aimed at adults, kids, families and those with memory loss are frequently available, and there’s a monthly Art Activity Day, where visitors can create their own glass treasures. Once a year, the museum hosts an outdoor Glass Arts Festival; if you go, save time to stroll through the property’s gardens.
Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum
This bird-focused Wausau art museum is free and located in a former Tudor- styled home. In addition to its emphasis on the avian world, exhibits focus on the connection between nature and art. Check out the artwork inside the building, then stroll through both the outdoor and rooftop sculpture gardens.
The museum’s Art Park gallery is the spot for hands-on activities, creative play and storytelling, while its Glass Box Studio is the spot where teens and adults can create artwork using their own materials. Special events are numerous and include musical performances, drop-in artmaking and even art sessions for kids two-years- old and younger.
Museum of Wisconsin Art
The Museum of Wisconsin Art, located in West Bend, began in 1961 as the West Bend Gallery of Fine Arts. Its sole purpose was to showcase the work of Carl von Marr, a Wisconsin artist whose most famous creation was the painting The Flagellants. Over the decades, the museum expanded its collection and mission, tweaked its name and today has an expansive definition of what constitutes “Wisconsin art.”
Its main campus in West Bend features indoor and outdoor exhibits and installations, and offers programs for adults, teens, younger kids and families. There’s also a satellite facility in Milwaukee’s Saint Kate — The Arts Hotel. Additionally, you can find MOWA collections and programs in various spots throughout the state, including an annual exhibition at the Governor’s Residence in Madison and at MOWA on the Lake, a gallery open to the public that’s housed in Saint John’s on the Lake, a downtown Milwaukee retirement campus.
OUTDOOR ART
Eau Claire Sculpture Tour
Eau Claire is home to more than 120 rotating sculptures that you can enjoy while strolling around town. Every year a new set of sculptures is installed and the public votes for its favorite.
The winning sculpture remains on the streets, where it will be surrounded by a new set of sculptures the following year. Tour maps are available at select locations. You can also find the sculptures’ locales on Google Maps.
Mt. Horeb Trollway
Mt. Horeb celebrates its Norwegian heritage via its popular Trollway, a collection of hand-carved wooden troll sculptures scattered throughout the village. More than three dozen trolls line the town’s main streets, with a few inside local businesses. The trolls are engaged in various activities, such as watering flowers, tending chickens and eating ice cream. Taking selfies with them is encouraged.
Wisconsin Concrete Park
Tucked along Hwy. 13 just south of Phillips, Wisconsin Concrete Park contains more than 200 sculptures created by the late Fred Smith. The self-taught Smith began crafting the towering statues at age 65, using cement, glass shards and other found objects. They are both generic and mythic — a cowboy drinking beer, Paul Bunyan, the Budweiser Clydesdales. The free park includes a nature trail, restrooms and picnic facilities.
Dr. Evermor’s Forevertron
This free, outdoor art park contains a wealth of metal sculptures created by the late Tom Every, a.k.a. Dr. Evermor. Every, a demolition expert, collected antique machinery, scrap metal and other objects throughout his lifetime to create “Forevertron,” reportedly the largest scrap metal sculpture in the world. The futuristic “Forevertron” contains lightning rods, high-voltage components from 1920s-era power plants and even the decontamination chamber from the Apollo 11 spacecraft.
The rest of the grounds are dotted with an assortment of other metal artwork, including frogs, musicians, aliens and insects.
Also be sure to check out the 27 mural Janesville Public Art Trail.
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