Ulrich Museum’s ‘Bare It All’ Opens Its 7,300-Work Collection to Public View

WICHITA, Kansas — The Ulrich Museum of Art has opened Bare It All, an ambitious collection project designed to bring nearly all of its roughly 7,300 works into public view while the museum rethinks how art is stored, interpreted and shared. The initiative began August 27 and is scheduled to continue through May 8, 2027. It combines dense on-site presentation with satellite exhibitions and community programs beyond the Wichita State University campus.

The premise challenges the normal rhythm of museum display. Most institutions own far more than they can show, leaving the majority of their collections in storage while a small selection rotates through galleries. Bare It All makes that hidden ratio visible. Rather than presenting a narrow curatorial argument through a few polished rooms, the Ulrich is inviting visitors to confront the scale, variety and practical responsibility that come with maintaining thousands of objects.

The museum describes the on-site portion as an opportunity to revisit familiar works, encounter overlooked pieces and consider the untold stories inside the collection. That language is important because abundance alone does not create understanding. The exhibition’s success will depend on how clearly it helps visitors navigate differences in period, material, authorship and context. Showing more art can expand access, but interpretation determines whether the experience feels illuminating or merely crowded.

Visit Wichita says the project showcases nearly all 7,300 works while highlighting the challenges of preserving and displaying a collection of that size. Artforum’s guide confirms the exhibition dates, and the Ulrich’s own program information outlines both the gallery presentation and the community-facing component. Local public radio station KMUW has also examined the work behind the initiative, including the role of staff members who help organize, track and care for objects.

Bare It All extends outside the museum through smaller thematic displays, pop-up presentations, collaborations and educational programs at partner locations. That satellite model can reach people who may not regularly visit a university museum. It also asks curators to respond to the character of different neighborhoods and venues rather than expecting every audience to enter the same institutional setting. The collection becomes a civic resource moving through the city, not simply an inventory held on campus.

The practical side of the exhibition may be as revealing as the artwork. Collections require climate control, documentation, conservation, secure handling and enough physical space to protect objects over decades. Those systems are usually invisible when a finished exhibition opens. By foregrounding storage and stewardship, the Ulrich can show that a museum’s work continues when galleries close. Preservation is not passive ownership; it is a continuous set of decisions about resources, risk and public value.

The project also creates an opportunity to question how collections were built. A museum’s holdings reflect donations, purchases, institutional priorities and historical blind spots. Bringing a larger share into view can reveal patterns that a tightly edited display might hide: which artists were collected deeply, which communities remain underrepresented and how ideas about artistic importance have changed. Transparency becomes meaningful when the museum is willing to discuss those imbalances rather than presenting quantity as neutral.

One of the Ulrich’s best-known works is Joan Miró’s monumental mosaic Personnages Oiseaux, installed on the exterior of the museum complex. Its presence illustrates how the collection already shapes the daily life of the Wichita State campus, even for people who do not enter a gallery. Bare It All expands that principle by treating visibility as a form of access and by inviting the public to see how individual objects sit within a much larger institutional story.

For visitors, the exhibition rewards more than one trip. No one can absorb thousands of works with equal attention in a single visit, and the program’s long run allows audiences to return with different questions. Families may focus on materials and color, students on collection management, and artists on overlooked connections across decades. The satellite projects should create additional entry points, helping the initiative avoid becoming an endurance test centered only on the impressive number of objects.

Bare It All is ultimately a public argument about what a museum owes its community. The Ulrich is making its holdings more visible while exposing the labor and choices behind them. That openness will be valuable if it produces conversation, better documentation and stronger relationships beyond campus. A collection reaches its full purpose not when every object is merely counted, but when people can encounter it, question it and understand why it is being preserved.