The Milwaukee Art Museum has received a $10 million commitment from Sheldon and Marianne Lubar to establish the Lubar Family Center for Drawings and Prints, a permanent home for the care, study and exhibition of works on paper. The gift, announced by the museum on 5 November and reported by Artforum on 9 November, endows a curator, a paper conservator, a fellow and an exhibition programme.

Works on paper span more than five centuries and make up over half of the museum's collection of more than 35,000 works, yet they spend most of their lives in storage because light damages them and they can only be shown for limited periods. The new centre is aimed squarely at that problem, giving sustained support to research and conservation as well as display.

The gift endows four posts and programmes by name: the Lubar Family Curator of Drawings and Prints, the Lubar Family Paper Conservator, the Lubar Family Fellow in Drawings and Prints, and the Lubar Family Drawings and Prints Exhibition Program. Nikki Otten, who joined the museum in 2018, has been named the first Lubar Family Curator of Drawings and Prints and will lead the centre's activities.

The Lubars, who are life trustees of the museum, made the gift with Joan Lubar and John Crouch, David and Madeleine Lubar, and Susan Lubar. Sheldon Lubar, who founded the private investment firm Lubar & Co. in the late 1960s, served as president of the museum's board and led the fundraising effort that completed the Santiago Calatrava-designed Quadracci Pavilion. The gift follows a separate $10 million commitment announced in October by the Quadracci family and the Windhover and Winderful foundations to endow the long-term preservation of the pavilion as it marks its 25th anniversary.