U-M students will find all kinds of things to do and experience at UMMA. Our diverse programs are designed to reflect the range of perspectives and interests on our campus and in our community in order to provide a welcoming atmosphere for all.
UMMA programs are free and open to all U-M students. Many feature student creators and performers. We invite you to attend one of our dynamic programs, host your own event, or participate in a creative project.
Every year UMMA hosts a number of museum-wide events featuring music, art activities, and a fun atmosphere.
UMMA and Arts at Michigan team up each fall to welcome incoming freshmen to Michigan at Artscapade! More than 4,500 students attend this high-energy Welcome Week event.
Organized by UMMA’s Student Engagement Council, in partnership with Maize Collective, and inspired by the exhibition Art in the Age of the Internet, the 10th annual Student Late Night event at UMMA was a fun-filled creative explosion! Students enjoyed some of the best fun that the digital age has to offer. Including live collaborative art making, motion graphics, and sound mixing as well as a silent disco.
Occurring twice a year (once in fall, once in winter), UMMA After Hours is a free community open house with gallery talks by curators and artists that bring to life the season’s special exhibitions, live music, and refreshments, in a sophisticated-yet-relaxed atmosphere.
Through a robust array of collaborations with many U-M student organizations and departments, as well as community organizations, UMMA is home to a performing arts series, a reading series of nationally-known authors as well as a series featuring our own MFA writers, talks by artists and scholars, symposiums, films, hands-on workshops, and more.
Programs are organized around our special exhibitions, the themes and concepts reflected in the art in our collection, and the ideas and interests of our partners.
Every year, UMMA partners with student organizations to create a space for student ideas and voices to engage with a larger audience. Collaborations such as last year’s Our Global Africa, a program partnership with the African Students Association, Caribbean Student Association, Creatives of Color, and Black Student Union, was an exciting evening of food and performance celebrating the cultural heritage of the African diasporic community in conjunction with the UMMA exhibition Beyond Borders: Global Africa. UMMA also supported the creative endeavors of Maize Collective to host Open Mic Night, and MUSIC Matters on A Night at the Museum and SpringFest 2019.
Each year UMMA and the U-M School of Music, Theatre & Dance present the SMTD@UMMA Performance Series. Featuring critically acclaimed U-M composition and performance faculty and their students, these performances are a unique opportunity to see creativity in action and experience original and existing repertoire related to UMMA’s exhibitions and collections.
Creative Writing presents two authors’ series: the Zell Visiting Writers Series featuring emerging and established writers; and the Mark Webster Reading series where current MFA students strut their stuff.
Student voices and creativity are celebrated at UMMA. Through a series of co-creation projects, UMMA invites students to share their own creative work (photographs, video, music, performance, written work) in response to the themes and ideas of our exhibitions and collections.
Since 2014, SEC members have curated installations for the study cases in the education wing of the Museum. This year’s project, The Mirrored Image, is a visual conversation about issues of identity and the self.
