Elvehjem Museum of Art
About Elvehjem Museum of Art
The Chazen Museum of Art is an art museum located on the campus of the University of Wisconsin–Madison in Madison, Wisconsin.
Founded as the Elvehjem Art Center (later Elvehjem Museum of Art) in 1970, the museum moved into a brutalist building designed by Illinois architect Harry Weese to house the university's collection of 1,600 artworks. The museum was named after then-president of UW-Madison, biochemist Conrad Elvehjem.
In 2005, the institution was renamed Chazen Museum of Art following an important gift by businessman Jerome A. Chazen and his wife Simona, both university alums. The gift provided part of the construction funds for an additional museum building. The structure was designed by the Boston-based architectural firm Machado-Silvetti and inaugurated in 2011.
With 176,000 sq. ft. of gross floor area and a collection of over 25,000 objects as of 2026, the Chazen Museum of Art is the second-largest art museum in Wisconsin, after the Milwaukee Art Museum.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
- Founded
- 2005
Photos of Elvehjem Museum of Art
01MadisonJames Steakley · CC BY-SA 3.0
02Chazen Museum of Art InteriorJohn Benson from Madison WI · CC BY 2.0
03Chazen Museum of ArtCorey Coyle · CC BY 3.0
04Fall of novgorod lebedev chazenKlaudii Vasilievich Lebedev (Russian, 1852-1916) · Public domain
05Emancipation Group Thomas Ball ChazenThomas Ball (American, 1819-1911) · Public domain
Shared by photographers under free licenses on Wikimedia Commons. Tap a photo to see it full size there.
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Nearby museums
Make a day of it. 4 more museums are within a mile of Elvehjem Museum of Art; the closest, Chazen Museum of Art, is practically next door.
