The Eisner Museum’s Glimpse of Milwaukee’s ‘Unseen Architecture’

The architect exhibits art on a daily basis, as every residential and commercial design subtly defines a city’s skyline and streets. In an effort to highlight the artistic nature of architecture, an exhibition titled “Unseen Architecture: MKE” (through April 1, 2010) at the William F. Eisner Museum of Advertising & Design celebrates inspirational, never-before-seen concepts envisioned by 18 local architecture firms.

The projects mounted in the Eisner’s second-level gallery also pay tribute to the American Institute of Architects (AIA). The exhibit acknowledges the organization’s 150 years of service throughout the country. AIA members provide community organization, functional buildings for living and working, and cultural comfort with an eye toward design excellence. This work not only enriches the nation’s environments, but also creates the art featured in this exhibit.

To this end the Eisner presents seven three-dimensional scale models built to illustrate proposals for uncompleted city developments. One example details Kahler Slater’s design for a bridge to connect city neighborhoods at the North Avenue Dam, a sculpted wood landscape called The Urban Conduit. These floor models then become integrated into their selected settings through the use of digital photography, which is incorporated into complementary descriptive pictures and explanatory text that line the gallery’s walls. All these images focus attention on the AIA ideals that require a keen technical interest in urban planning and architecture.

A small auxiliary exhibit that consists of several informational panels curated by Milwaukee AIA members offers more intriguing designs. This display begins with photographs showcasing completed Milwaukee architecture from the past—including the Polish flat, Frank Lloyd Wright’s residential designs and Henry P. Plunkett’s 1933 Home Show winner. Plunkett’s surprisingly modern home, painted pink and white, offered a classic contribution to Milwaukee that conceptualized the timeless International Style prevalent in the ’30s.

John Randal McDonald’s Japanese Snow Flower depictsa residential house from 1940s Racine. There’s also a design that captured the first Wisconsin National AIA Housing Design Award for Johnsen Schmaling Architects in 2005. The firm’s Urban Infill 01 home provides contained but contemporary living constructed on a typical 30-foot-wide city lot.

Milwaukee’s unseen architecture proves to be interesting, though it is the existing architecture accomplished by these diverse local firms that provides invaluable insight into the city’s urban culture and development. Exhibiting these successful buildings shows that the aesthetic contributions of architecture will advance society’s needs for a sustainable and affordable future.