Center for the Study of Upper Midwestern Cultures

432 East Campus Mall, Room 332
Madison, Wisconsin 53706
608-262-8180
Web site: http://csumc.wisc.edu

Wisconsin Arts Board (Map)

Michigan Traditional Arts Program Research Collection and Reference Library (Map)

A joint venture to reach out to economically restrained and underserved areas, the Michigan-Wisconsin Border Project was coordinated through the Wisconsin Arts Board's Folk and Community Arts Specialist Richard March and Michigan Traditional Arts Program coordinators Marsha MacDowell and Yvonne Lockwood. Five fieldworkers explored the five Wisconsin border counties of Iron, Vilas, Forest, Florence, and Marinette in summer 1994, prepared preliminary documentation on over a dozen traditional artists, and submitted reports on each county's cultural activities and needs. Through 1995, six Michigan Traditional Arts Program researchers reviewed its extensive ethnographic archives, research resources, and numerous cultural agency reports, and contacted knowledgeable sources for Michigan's four border counties of Gogebic, Iron, Dickinson, and Menominee. The two surveys resulted in overlapping listings of artists, traditional artists, local historians, museums, galleries, businesses and organizations that support the area's arts and cultural heritage -- over 400 from the Wisconsin work and over 225 from the Michigan work.