Art Gallery

Schlitz Audubon hosts seasonal artist exhibits throughout the year in our Mezzanine Art Gallery. Located on the second floor of our Visitor Center, the Art Gallery showcases local artists who create nature inspired art in a variety of mediums. The natural setting of the mezzanine gallery, which features museum quality lighting and fixtures, creates a warm ambiance and is a delightful space to view the work of talented artists. The gallery is wheelchair accessible by elevator.

Current Exhibit

The Art of Ney Tait Fraser & Judith Huf

August 9 – December 29, 2026

Enjoy these stunning and immersive collections by two Milwaukee-based artists. Their hands-on experiences and longstanding care for the natural world inform every piece, with each creator bringing their own unique inspirations and approaches. As you explore this exhibition, you may recognize familiar wildlife and habitats found right here on the Northshore of Milwaukee.

Ney Tait Fraser
This collection features Ney’s large-scale oil paintings focused on close-up nature, with an emphasis on the varied hues and structures of wildflowers. Amongst these vast paintings stands a multi-textured sculpture: a 3D representation of the book Black Elk Speaks by John Gneisenau Neihardt. Across the Mezzanine, her triptych celebrates three women who have championed environmental protection: Rachel Carson, Lorrie Otto, and Else Ankel. Each piece invites viewers to connect with and reflect on the natural world and native ecologies.

Known locally by her married name, Ney Collier, Ney Tait Fraser holds a BFA in Photography from the Massachusetts College of Art as well as an MFA in Photography and Printmaking from the Pratt Institute. Her pieces have been displayed at the Photographers Gallery in London, Milwaukee Art Museum, Madison Art Center, and Racine Art Museum. Writer, speaker, and environmentalist Lorrie Otto has been a major influence for Ney, who is herself a passionate environmental steward and advocate.

Judith Huf
Judith’s collection reflects her interest in nature, along with storytelling and fantasy. Her pieces that appear more realistic often involve cryptic and hidden elements. She enjoys working with diverse media on an array of surfaces, with displayed works ranging from oil on canvas or board to ink and colored pencil on paper, board, and acrylic.

Judith Huf studied at the Maryland Institute College of Art and the San Francisco Art Institute. She has exhibited work in many different places, including New York City, where she lived before moving to Wisconsin. She has also created exhibits at various nature centers and museums. Judith has worked as an artist in many fields throughout her life, including drawing, printmaking, painting, narrative sculpture in mixed media, and illustration, influenced by her enduring fascination with natural history.

Past Exhibits

Nature’s Palette

June 5 – September 3, 2026 

This summer exhibition celebrated the enduring connection between art and nature. Each of the four featured local artists demonstrated their unique interpretations of landscapes, forests, waterways, wildflowers, and other natural elements, captured in a singular moment. Spanning from realism to abstraction, and sometimes blending the two, these pieces transported viewers through expressive brushstrokes, vibrant hues, and nuanced perspectives. Watercolor, gouache, oil, acrylic, and encaustic exalted the natural world that has inspired humans since the dawn of artistic creation.
Featured Artists: May Klisch, Mary Mendla, Anne Reed, and Lynn Rix

Fox Point Bayside School District Art Show

May 12 – June 1, 2026

We were pleased to welcome students from Stormonth Elementary and Bayside Middle School in showing their artwork for the 4th annual Fox-Point Bayside School District Art Show. Students in 3rd through 8th grade submitted art from a school project to display.

Nature school art show

April 9 – May 1, 2026

The Nature School’s second annual Art Show featured a wide variety of projects inspired by Mary Nohl’s home, art, and outdoor sculptures. Our Artist in Residence, Abbey Finn, thoughtfully developed each project to ensure it was age-appropriate, fun, and enriching for young children.

Some art pieces responded to the same surroundings that influenced Nohl herself. Students created Lake Michigan-inspired wet-felted pieces and weavings, translating the water’s movement and color into fiber. After pausing to consider its waves, children also created process paintings to capture the lake’s personality, whether it was calm and glassy or big and crashing. Other projects drew more directly from Nohl’s forms and materials. Children crafted cement stepping stones embedded with beach treasures, emulating Nohl’s shoreline sculptures. They also sculpted imaginative mini creatures with varied textures, incorporating stones, driftwood, and sand. Read this blog post to discover the story behind the exhibition.

vivid

Photos by Zoe Finney
January 15 – March 31, 2026

We were thrilled to share a beautiful collection of photos by our Creative Lead, Zoe Finney. Featuring 63 pieces, this exhibit brought brightness in the midst of winter and hoped to inspire visitors to be on the lookout for their own vivid moments anytime they’re enjoying nature. It might be a splash of color in the form of a tiny warbler on a gray May day before the myriad hues of summer arrive, the electric green of a frog peering up through a mudflat in spring, or the wild palette of fungi in fall. Nature provides these moments every single day if we’re willing to find them and pay attention, no matter the season.  

Green Bay Art Colony

Art of the Aviary
September 1 – December 31, 2025

Schlitz Audubon Nature Center was honored to host Green Bay Art Colony’s first exhibit in the greater Milwaukee area! This iteration of the “Art of the Aviary” exhibit included 31 pieces from 19 Art Colony members. An aviary is a large enclosure that displays flying creatures, often birds. Contributing artists created their unique interpretations of this theme in their pieces, using watercolor, mixed media, vitreous enamel on copper, photography, oil on linen, cold wax, acrylic paint and hand carved stencil, acrylic and collage on canvas, ink and watercolor, and oils.  

Green Bay Art Colony was founded in 1915 by a group of nine visionary women. Current members of the Green Bay Art Colony are proud to carry on the legacy as the longest continuously active women’s art group in Wisconsin. They contribute to their community by planning artist lectures and demonstrations, making charitable gifts and donations, and offering scholarships to young artists in the area. The Green Bay community is richer as a result of their long-term commitment to the visual arts. Learn more about the group and individual members. 

Fox Point ARtists

A Collective of Fox Point & Neighboring Area Artists
May 28 – August 19, 2025

Fox Point Artists, formed in late 2024, is a collective of 37 members from the Fox Point, Bayside, Glendale, River Hills, and Whitefish Bay neighborhoods. The group seeks to establish a community of both professional and emerging artists, supporting further individual and collective artistic development and careers. They are committed to enriching the community and demonstrating that the Northshore is a creative hub through local art shows like this one.