Exhibitions opening this week at the Trout Museum of Art, Appleton, Wis.
by Beth A. Zinsli
In October 2025, the Trout Museum of Art’s much-anticipated new space at 325 E. College Avenue will open with a slate of exhibitions that set the tone for an exciting chapter in the institution’s evolution. The former building, a furniture store constructed in the 1920s, presented many challenges to displaying contemporary art; the new museum will enable more ambitious exhibitions and related programming. The building was designed by Frederick Fisher and Partners of Los Angeles, in partnership with The Boldt Company, and features 10,000 square feet of gallery space with soaring ceilings. The exhibitions spaces will accommodate a wide variety of contemporary art forms in alignment with museum best practices. All inaugural exhibitions discussed here will open to the public on October 11, 2025; the closing dates for each are noted.
In 2021, the Trout Museum initiated an innovative series guest-curated by an artist on a theme of their choosing. Printmaker Tyanna Buie’s Unraveled. Restructured. Revealed. and photographer and textile artist Dakota Mace’s Reclaiming Identity shows both brought a wealth of engaging artworks into the galleries, while also posing deep questions about the role of art in shaping and responding to social changes. The artist-as-curator series continues in the new building with Guiding Ethos, guest-curated by artist Jenie Gao.
An artist, creative director, and entrepreneur, Gao specializes in printmaking, public art, and community storytelling. Guiding Ethos plumbs the idea and practice of storytelling to reveal the ways visual art can support cultural stewardship, community care, and direct action. The show will feature Wisconsin-based artists familiar to visitors through the annual TMA Contemporary shows (Fatima Laster, Rosy Petri, David Najib Kasir, Valaria Tatera) and a host of artists from further afield showing at the Trout for the first time (Brianna Hernández, Tshab Her, Khim Hipol, and others). Guiding Ethos will continue the Trout’s commitment to supporting artists and recognizing the vital role of art in storytelling and community. Open through January 18, 2026
Visitors who follow the contemporary art scene will recognize the name Michelle Grabner, artist, curator, critic, and professor of painting and drawing at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Her resume reveals she is both an art world star (Guggenheim Fellow, Artforum contributor, co-curator of the 2014 Whitney Biennial) and someone dedicated to sustaining and promoting an art community in her native Wisconsin. This dedication and the much-needed tangible support for fellow artists are exemplified in the artist-run exhibition and residency spaces The Suburban (located in Milwaukee) and The Poor Farm (located in Waupaca County), which Grabner co-directs with her husband, artist Brad Killam.
In her own work, Grabner is interested in what she calls “vernacular patterns,” or the repeating abstract designs that appear in the materials of everyday life: think gingham, lace, knits, the warp and weft of woven cloth. The enduring presence of these vernacular patterns in our day-to-day lives, and the domestic contexts in which they typically appear, mean that they are not often critically considered as visual forms imbued with history and meaning. By exposing these patterns to deeper and repeated scrutiny, Grabner asks viewers to rethink their potential for political meanings. See how many vernacular patterns you can find in her exhibition in the new Trout Museum. Titled Home Rules, the show was conceived as a homecoming for the Oshkosh-born artist. Open through January 18, 2026
Beth Lipman, who lives and works in Sheboygan Falls, will present the show Oncoming Close in the new building. Lipman is best-known for elaborate installation pieces wrought in glass; substantial, highly detailed, unimaginably fragile, and usually site-specific, her works reward sustained looking to digest the many details embedded within them. Lipman often draws a visual connection between her work and the art historical genre of the still life, paintings that present arrangements of flowers, foods, and natural and fabricated objects. The still life is alternately considered a lavish celebration of worldly pleasures or a stark warning about the ephemerality of those pleasures; sometimes, these paintings are intended as memento mori, or reminders of human mortality.
Lipman extends the temporal purview of the still life beyond the relatively brief span of a human life, and beyond the Anthropocene itself, to connect to the much, much longer timescale of geologic events. In works like One’s-Self I Sing (at the Muskegon Museum of Art) and Half-Life (at the Bank of Kaukauna), Lipman pairs evidence of human existence like food, instruments, books, and tools, with long-extinct and diverging flora, which are ancient plants like ferns that have survived multiple mass extinctions in the Earth’s history. Through their abundant details, Lipman’s sculptures juxtapose objects and epochs and ask the viewer to examine their own conceptions of time and humans’ place within it. Open through January 4, 2026
In addition to the exhibition, Lipman’s piece Raveled Edge will be on view for a full year on the main wall of the Grand Gallery, the new building’s entrance hall.
Born into a family of artists, Chinese American artist Li Hu taught drawing and painting at the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh from 1994 to 2016. A beloved art faculty member, Hu inspired a generation of art students in Northeast Wisconsin. Hu’s body of work often presented themes drawn from the array of human experiences and the enduring presence of myth, religion, and tradition across generations. The Tribute to Li Hu exhibition will feature large-scale works from his Table, Migration, and Journey of Silence series, the latter of which was inspired by his time in Tibet and his relocation to the U.S. Open through January 4, 2026
The Trouts compiled their eponymous collection of historical and contemporary works, featured in the Selections from the Dr. Monroe and Sandra Trout Collection show, over the course of decades. A particular gem is James McNeill Whistler Rotherhithe (Wapping), 1860, an etching and dry point. Open through December 21, 2025
The Trout will continue its Artist-in-Residence program in the new building’s expanded spaces. In addition to the opportunity to develop or expand a body of work, the program enables artists to be part of a group exhibition. This AIR exhibition will feature Miranda Moeller, Ally Wilber, and Karen Kjell. Moeller is a printmaker who explores the various roles that domestic spaces play in her life. Wilber is an artist, writer, and curator who specializes in the surrealist technique of fumage, or fire painting, and is also the creative force behind several murals in the Fox Valley area. Kjell is an artist, teacher, and designer who works in ceramics; she is innovative and experimental in her approach to art making and in her embrace of new techniques. Open through November 23, 2025
There are several opportunities to experience the new Trout Museum of Art Building. There will be a Member Preview on Friday, October 10, from 5–8 PM. If you want to see these shows first, you can become a member in advance of the opening events at: https://troutmuseumart.org/
The official Grand Opening is on Saturday, October 11, 9 AM-5 PM. This will be a full day of celebration and community, and everyone is welcome.
Admission to the Trout Museum of Art’s exhibitions in the new building is free for the first year thanks to The Boldt Company.
Beth A. Zinsli is an Associate Provost, Adjunct Associate Professor of Art History, and Director of Museum Studies IA Program at Lawrence University, Appleton, Wis.