Minneapolis’s Walker Art Center to Temporarily Close in Support of ICE Protest
38Jan. 23, 2026
TheWalker Art Centerin Minneapolis will close to the public on January 23 in support of the Day of Truth and Freedom protest taking place in Minnesota that day. The museum is the most high-profile organization to announce that it will remain dark during the general strike, mounted by a group of faith leaders and unions in opposition to Operation Metro Surge and the presence of ICE in communities around the state. Participants are urged not to spend money and not to go to work or school.
“This reflects our institutional values to center our community, support our staff, and to approach our work with care and safety in mind,” a representative for the Walker told Minnesota news outletBring Me the News. The museum additionally canceled a performance of Nile Harris’sthis house is not a homescheduled for that day. The Walker will reopen on January 24, and a performance of Harris’s work will go ahead as planned.
More than three hundred businesses and institutions have announced their closure as part of the action, which follows the January 7 killing of American citizen and Minneapolis resident Renée Good, a mother of three, by ICE agent Jonathan Ross. Among the Minneapolis institutions closing in solidarity with the protest are the American Swedish Institute, the Bakken Museum, the Minneapolis Institute of Art, the Minnesota Museum of American Art, the Museum of Russian Art, the Textile Center, and the Weisman Art Center at the University of Minnesota. The Bell Museum, the Minnesota Children’s Museum, and the Science Museum of Minnesota, all in neighboring St. Paul, will close as well.