If you walk through the main doors of the Michigan Union at the University of Michigan, take a right-hand turn down, make a sharp left into a tight corridor and turn into a small alcove, you may run into the “Visual History of the Unions” exhibition. Tucked into the Union’s Opera Lounge on the first floor and filled with works by alumni and current students of the Stamps School of Art & Design, the show describes itself as a celebration of how the Union and Michigan League have been epicenters for activism and change.
The exhibition, a collaboration between the Inclusive History Project, the Arts Initiative and the University Unions, has undergone significant changes since its conception. The IHP website originally claimed the show would run from Oct. 16, 2025 to Jan. 31, 2026, spending more than 15 weeks on display in various locations across the Union. In an email from June 23, obtained by The Michigan Daily, leadership shared potential locations within the Union, many of which were located by high foot traffic in the open Willis Ward Lounge or in display cases in the main hallways.
By the time the show held its opening reception last month, however, the scope of the show had been significantly reduced to Nov. 6 to Dec. 17 and moved to the small Opera Lounge located near a conference room down the first-floor hallway. Following vague communication from University Unions’ leadership, some of the artists who participated in the exhibition are accusing the administration of unprofessional conduct and censorship…