This weekend I finally got a chance to look around the "Man at Work" collection at MSOE's new Grohmann Museum, 1000 N. Broadway. I'd heard a lot about the museum while it was in the works and watched -- from outside -- the transformation of a fortress-like building into one with a bright, open atrium. But my first visit was still a pleasant surprise.
Although I don't love the looming statuary atop the building, the rooftop scupture "garden" looks like it will be great when it's not covered in ice and snow. Nice, too, is the spiral staircase that affords views of Downtown as well as down to the lovely mosaic on the floor and up to Hans Dieter Tylle's mural on the dome and stained glass windows that adorn what will be Eckhart Grohmann's office when it's completed.
Despite having already seen parts of Grohmann's collection of paintings and sculptures that catalog the many ways humans have put themselves -- and each other -- to work, I was still surprised that three floors had to be crammed in pretty tight to show all the works. (Who knows, maybe more are in storage or on display elsewhere, too!)
Most of the artists are German, but certainly not all, and most of the scenes are industrial, but, again, not all. There are paintings of agricultural harvests and frightening early medical scenes, too, for example.
While to the untrained eye a lot of the industrial arts looks a bit samey, there are some great works. Some, like a Tylle painting of a ship under construction, are amazing in their detail. Many are explosions of color, especially the paintings of foundries and furnaces that are awash in the orange-yellow light of fire.
I especially enjoyed the Futurist color use in Getty Bisagni's "Misfortune at the Mine," and the impressionistic earth tones of Estonian painter Eugene Ducker's "Amber Gatherers on the Beach," both on the first floor.
On the top floor, way in the back corner is a study by Max Liebermann for his "Flax Barn" in 1886. This is an early version of a later painting -- now in Berlin's National Gallery -- that is considered among the artist's best works.
The $5 admission is a small price to pay to see an expansive collection of art that reflects one man's passion but at the same time all of our laboring history.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
