The MSU Museum reopened to the public on January 14, 2026 after 18 months of work and more than 28 million dollars in renovations. Despite a heavy snowstorm, more than 400 visitors joined us to celebrate this milestone. Michigan State University Provost Laura Lee McIntyre and Trustee Rebecca Bahar-Cook shared warm remarks that welcomed our communities back into the museum. The day set an energizing tone for what promises to be a full and exciting year for the MSU Museum.

You can view photos and explore the extensive media coverage of the event here: Detroit News, Lansing State Journal, MSU Today, and WKAR Public Media.

With the reopening, we introduced several new exhibitions. One highlight is “Blurred Realities,” an exhibition that looks at the challenges created by disinformation, misinformation, artificial intelligence, and the shifting nature of truth. Instead of focusing only on deception, the exhibition shows how our perceptions can be shaped, influenced, and sometimes manipulated. The CoLab Studio team led this work, and their innovative, collaborative approach is already drawing attention across the US museum field.

This growing interest has helped the exhibition process gain even more recognition. An article that describes our approach will appear soon in Exhibition journal. The work also appeared in a Trends Brief titled “Increasing Social Divisions,” published by the Association of Science and Technology Centers. In the months ahead, we will take part in panel discussions, webinars, and other public presentations to share what we have learned.

This attention reflects the strength of the ideas that shaped “Blurred Realities.” A global open call invited proposals from academics, artists, researchers, students, and activists. We received 241 submissions from 34 countries, which brought in a wide range of ideas, media, and perspectives. From this group, we selected eight exhibits across four sub-themes.  The resulting sub-themes, and their corresponding exhibits, are:

• The Power of Bias in Shaping Reality.
  This subtheme explores how perception and interpretation are filtered through cultural, technological, and historical biases. Projects in this subtheme include: The Museum of Alternative History, which challenges the authority of historical narratives by presenting alternate versions of reality shaped by subjective filters; and Terram in Aspectu, in which cartographic technologies are examined as world-building tools that often mask partiality behind a veneer of neutrality.

• Authenticity Unbound.
  This subtheme looks at shifting boundaries between the real and the synthetic, and questions where authenticity resides in a world shaped by simulations and sentient machines. In this subtheme, the sensorial environments of Dark Loops blur distinctions between living and nonliving entities; and Romantic Relationships with AI probes the possibility of genuine emotional connection with artificial partners, complicating ideas of love, presence, and human experience.

• Truth and Manipulation in the Digital Age.
  Here, we bring into focus the infrastructures of influence that shape belief in online spaces. Whispers: Unveiling the Mechanics of Influence maps how digital echo chambers distort perception and entrench ideologies; and Generative Persuasion illustrates how large language models can be deployed to create deceptive narratives, pushing audiences to question the credibility and intent behind the content they consume.

• Reimagined Narratives.
  This subtheme invites audiences to consider the role of imagination in shaping alternative pasts and futures. In Ile Omi: House of Water, speculative storytelling reclaims African diasporic memory through a vision of underwater resilience, while Synthetic Nostalgia: Memory, Myth, and Machine reconfigures recollection through AI-generated objects, inviting reflection on the entanglement of memory, identity, and machine creativity.

To support the exhibition, which is on display through July 18, 2026, is a robust bevy of public programs.

You can read more about Blurred Realities at The State News and WILX.