MILWAUKEE, WI.- Artists who wish to apply to the 2004 Lakefront Festival of Arts may request an Artist Prospectus from Friends of Art, Milwaukee Art Museum, 700 N. Art Museum Drive, Milwaukee, WI 53202. The 42nd annual festival will be held on the grounds of the Milwaukee Art Museum, June 18 - 20, 2004.  Interested artists may also call the LFOA Hotline at 414-224-3854, or visit www.mam.org/lfoa and click "2004 Prospectus" for an on-line version of the application.  Applications must be postmarked by December 19, 2003 to be considered. Lakefront Festival of Arts is sponsored by Friends of Art of Milwaukee Art Museum to benefit the Museum’s Art Acquisition and Exhibition Fund. 

The Milwaukee Art Museum had its origin in two institutions, the Layton Art Gallery, which was established in 1888, and the Milwaukee Art Institute, founded in the early 1900s. These two institutions joined forces in 1957 to form the private, nonprofit Milwaukee Art Center (now the Milwaukee Art Museum), and moved to its current lakefront location.

The Milwaukee Art Association encouraged Frederick Layton, owner of a meat packing business, to fulfill a promise he made earlier to establish Milwaukee’s first art gallery. A classic-styled building costing $115,000 was built downtown on the corner of Mason and Jefferson Streets, and opened in 1888 as the Layton Art Gallery. The building was designed by London architects W.J. and G.A. Audsley, and constructed by E.T. Mix & Co. Layton provided the gallery with a $100,000 endowment and 38 paintings, many of which remain as the nucleus of the Milwaukee Art Museum’s Layton Art Collection. The gallery’s board of trustees included Layton and other prominent Milwaukeeans including John Mitchell, Charles Ilsley and William Plankinton.