MILWAUKEE, WI.- The Haggerty Museum of Art at Marquette University announced a Summer season of three exhibitions featuring new works and themes of reflection and commemoration. The Greater Milwaukee Foundation's Mary L. Nohl Fund Fellowships for Individual Artists 2025 exhibition spotlights the work of five Milwaukee-based artists whose novel works encompass a broad range of media. After the Empire: American Prints from the Haggerty Collection explores American identity using satire and social commentary to witness and challenge history. Defying Empire: Revolutionary Prints from Britain and America challenges traditional, nationalistic narratives of the American Revolution. All exhibitions will be on view from June 4 through August 1, 2026.

"We’re proud to again partner with the Lynden Sculpture Garden to support the depth of artistic talent, passion, and resources in the community. It is our pleasure to collaborate on the culmination of the Nohl Fellowship, sometimes providing artists with their first museum show.” explains Director John McKinnon.

The Greater Milwaukee Foundation's Mary L. Nohl Fund Fellowships for Individual Artists 2025, co-presented with the Lynden Sculpture Garden, features new work by established artists Michelle Grabner and Michael Newhall, and emerging artists Sarah Ballard, Margaret Griffin, and Open Kitchen (Rudy Medina + Alyx Christensen). Funded by the Greater Milwaukee Foundation’s Mary L. Nohl Fund, and administered by the Lynden, the Mary L. Nohl Fund Fellowships for Individual Artists provide unrestricted funds for artists selected by a panel of national jurors to create new work or complete work in progress. The program was designed to encourage artists to stay in greater Milwaukee, to evolve as artistic practitioners, and to contribute to our community through the creation of art.

“The 2025 Nohl Fellows were born across the last six decades of the 20th century, and their work reflects a variety of experiences and geographies. In painting, sculpture, and moving images, they tell us something about what it means to be an artist at the end of the first quarter of the 21st.” – Polly Morris, Executive Director of the Lynden Sculpture Garden

On the occasion of the 250th anniversary of America, After the Empire: American Prints from the Haggerty Collection presents a glimpse into American history following the Revolutionary Era. Featuring work created between 1862 and 2017, the exhibition depicts an array of issues, people, and occurrences that shed light on American identity. The work is wide-ranging in subject matter and style with an overarching focus on social and political commentary. The pieces here carry on practices seen in Defying Empire, in which printed materials are created as a means for igniting public conversation and lampooning, satirizing, and bearing witness to historic events and influential figures.

After the Empire was curated by Lynne Shumow, Curator for Academic Engagement, Haggerty Museum of Art, with assistance from Emma E. Erickson, graduate intern from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Department of Art History.

As America celebrates its 250th anniversary, Defying Empire: Revolutionary Prints from Britain and America explores how eighteenth-century prints shaped public opinion and fueled a participatory Revolution. Drawn from the Haggerty Museum of Art and the Chipstone Foundation, this exhibition features over twenty prints, transfer-printed ceramics, and period furniture to frame the era as a transatlantic political exchange.

Works by Paul Revere, William Hogarth, Josiah Wedgwood, and Charles Willson Peale illustrate how images influenced debates on sovereignty and democracy. By highlighting voices ranging from George Washington to politically active women, the exhibition demonstrates how visual media spurred political action and defined the struggle over imperial authority. See full exhibition description here.

Defying Empire: Revolutionary Prints from Britain and America was curated by J. Patrick Mullins, PhD, Associate Professor of History and Public History Director at Marquette University, in collaboration with the Chipstone Foundation and coordinated by Jessica A. Cooley, PhD, Postdoctoral Curatorial and Teaching Fellow, Haggerty Museum of Art.