Schedule for the day:
11-12 John Michael Kohler Arts Center
12:15-2:45 Lunch followed by mural walk downtown
3-4 Kohler Art Preserve
4:15-4:45 James Tellem Woodland Sculpture Garden
Please note admission everywhere is free and self guided. I looked into getting docents at the museums, but they needed firm headcount two weeks in advance, and I cannot do that with this group. We will go around the museum at a self pace, so it is fine to break into smaller groups, but I tend to lose cohesion of the groups when I do museum events, so please stay in contact via phone as we move across the city as you wish to rejoin us.
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Whether gallery art or public art, few cities in Wisconsin embrace, art culture like Sheboygan. Thanks to the generosity of the Kohler foundation, the city hosts two high caliber art museums (with some of the coolest bathrooms I’ve ever seen), in addition to having a small sculpture garden, murals lining the downtown drag, and a shipwreck that has been beached and set up as an art display. We will visit all of these places, beginning with the more “mainstream” art gallery, before moving onto lunch downtown, and then a walk past the shipwreck and the murals and boutique stores of downtown. In the afternoon we will visit the art preserve, which is dedicated to finding permanent housing for folk art that was originally site specific—think art like Dr Evermor’s Forevertron, Jurustic Park, Dickeyville Grotto, Phillips Concrete Park, etc. we will then finish the day by seeing one example of this type of art in its original context – – the James Tellem Woodland sculpture garden.
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About the John Michael Kohler Arts Center
The John Michael Kohler Arts Center (JMKAC), located north of Milwaukee in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, is known for promoting the understanding and appreciation of the work of self-taught and contemporary artists through exhibitions and commissioned works of art.
Founded in 1967, JMKAC has preserved, studied, and exhibited artist-built environments, earning a worldwide reputation. Art environments involve an individual significantly transforming their surroundings into an exceptional, multifaceted work of art.
The Arts Center’s downtown Sheboygan facility includes eight galleries, two performance spaces, a café, a museum shop, and a drop-in art-making studio. Among its program offerings are community arts projects; artist residencies; presentations of dance, film, and music; a free weekly summer concert series; classes and workshops; an onsite arts-based preschool; and approximately twelve original exhibitions of the work of self-taught and contemporary artists annually. JMKAC also administers the renowned Arts/Industry residency program, which is hosted by Kohler Co.
About the Art Preserve
In 2021, the John Michael Kohler Arts Center opened the Art Preserve, the world’s first museum to focus entirely on work from art environments. Located three miles from JMKAC, the 56,000-sq.-ft., three-level building holds more than 25,000 works in the Arts Center’s world-renowned collection, which includes complete and partial environments by more than thirty vernacular, self-taught, and academically trained artists.
Visitors experience unprecedented access and insight into the display, preservation, conservation, and interpretation of the Arts Center’s premier collection through tableaux as well as a unique system of curated, visible storage of the works of art.