Past Exhibits

A Campus Divided: Progressives, Anti-Communists, Racism, and Antisemitism at the University of Minnesota, 1930-1942 examines the campus climate during a time of division over issues including racial and economic equality, opposition to war, and students rights. Exhibit panels on display at Wilson Library, fourth floor, feature archival images and descriptions. This is the reprisal of the exhibit originally displayed at Elmer L. Andersen Library in fall 2017.

The Wangensteen Historical Library's new exhibit — "The Secret Lives of Books" — reveals the past and present secret lives of books and tells their captivating stories of health, illness, and the human experience. In an evolving exhibit experience, guest-curated exhibit vignettes will be changed each month to reveal more stories about rare books and their intersections with current events, historical experiences, and the research programs at the University of Minnesota.

Emerging local talent, Shanna Allyn, has composed photographic portraits of women that are like butterfly specimens displaying and showing-off beauty and presence. Two series of Allyn's work are one exhibit, one of which is new and seen for the first time. 

2018 marks the 90th anniversary of the University of Minnesota Archives, giving us a prime opportunity to highlight what we have and what we do. Please explore the online exhibit by diving into an entire section examining the role of academic freedom and tenure at the University or the University’s response to the massive influx of students following World War II. Or spend some time with a panel or two.

June 4 through September 14, 2018 at Elmer L. Andersen Library Gallery and Wallin Gallery. Libraries, archives, museums, historical societies, other cultural heritage institutions, and private collectors are invited to participate in a state-wide exhibition of global treasures from Minnesota’s book and manuscript collections. The exhibits will focus on the “best” rare and unique books and manuscripts drawn from Minnesota institutions and individuals.

May 14 through September 7, 2018 at Elmer L. Andersen Library Atrium Gallery. From Winona to Luverne, from Moorhead to Duluth, writers in Minnesota are inextricably connected. This exhibit will explore the reciprocal and often intimate relationships among writers and the role of editors and publishers in anchoring and supporting a literary community.

February 12 through May 18, 2018 at Elmer L. Andersen Library Gallery. This exhibit recovers the diverse, delightful, provocative, and sometimes unexpected stories from across the University of Minnesota’s Archives and Special Collections that have been unearthed as part of Umbra Search African American History’s effort to digitize hidden African American history materials.

Yarn, knotting, and color are used symbolically to raise awareness about domestic abuse. This piece, No Private Matter, offers a sensitive and poignant, and even beautiful, way to think about a serious and painful national issue. Ongoing exhibition.

This exhibition celebrates the collaborations of the dance company, Black Label Movement (BLM), known for its daring physical, intellectual, and emotional compositions. On exhibit January 9,through March 9, 2018 at Wilson Library and at the Ritz Theater during Black Label Movement performances in January 2018.

January 22 through March 23, 2018 at the Architecture & Landscape Architecture Library. Printed on Moab Kozo paper, Thomas Rose's photographs of botanicals almost look like ink drawings. Further illuminating the mysterious beauty of the plant and its shadows is the spontaneous gesture of a drawing pencil dipped in sumi ink and incorporated into the compositions.

January 19 through April 27, 2018 at Elmer L. Andersen Library Atrium Gallery. Learn about the individuals and events that shaped the University’s institutional history with the University of Minnesota Archives.

October 13, 2017 through January 31, 2018. This exhibit highlights the diversity, resilience, and creativity of the Trans* and Gender Non-conforming community in Minneapolis and throughout the Upper Midwest, through images, storytelling, film, and critical conversations. The content draws from material in the Tretter Collection and the Transgender Oral History Project currently underway.

"Earth-Art-Movement: Andy Goldsworthy and Land Art" is an exhibit currently on display in the Northrop Atrium. features a multi-media installation, a large-scale rock installation, and a tableau of cropped photographs that illustrate the breadth and innovation of Andy Goldsworthy's land art.The exhibit is sponsored by University Libraries and Northrop and is related to a November 2 event, featuring ODC/Dance.

Now open through December 22, 2017. The University of Minnesota was a microcosm of the wider political battles in the 1930s and 1940s that pitted campus anti-communism, anti-Semitism, and racism against progressive administrators, students, and faculty. Conflicts around housing, admission to professional schools, student organizations, and ideas reveal the political issues of the period and how they were central to campus life.

Why Treaties Matter: Self-Government in the Dakota and Ojibwe Nations is a nationally recognized, award-winning, traveling exhibit made in partnership with the Minnesota Indian Affairs Council and the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian. On view Monday, September 18 through Friday, October 13, 2017 at Walter Library, 2nd Floor.

September through December 2017 In the exhibition Residuals, an artist and a landscape architecture studio test, question, and respond to the extraordinary embedded in overlooked, liminal spaces of the city. The work revels in the...