Lynette Pohlman is not pretending that retiring is easy.
“I’ve said it before. I’m not sure this is a good idea,” she said in a news release. “It’s a good idea for the institution, but it’s breaking my heart.”
After 55 years spent building, shaping, and fiercely protecting University Museums at Iowa State University, Pohlman retired on Wednesday, June 3.
The founding director of the museums organization leaves behind a campus transformed by public art and a community shaped by her belief that art belongs to everyone.
She was lauded by former President Wendy Wintersteen for setting the aesthetic tone at Iowa State University.
“Lynette has truly been the creative force in defining Iowa State’s aesthetic and elevating the university’s national reputation for excellence in the arts,” Wintersteen said during the University Museums 50th Anniversary Celebration in September 2025.
Pohlman arrived at Iowa State as an interior design major from tiny Moorhead, Iowa, with a population of 199. She planned to become internationally known. Instead, she found a calling she never expected.
“It gave me a whole new idea of what’s possible,” she told the Ames Tribune in a previous interview.
Building a museum from the ground up
Pohlman’s mentor and faculty advisor, then Professor of Applied Art Neva Petersen, helped steer her toward museums, first through the restoration of the Farm House Museum and later through the massive task of unpacking two semi‑truckloads of decorative art for the Brunnier Art Museum.
Pohlman still remembers the first box she opened: a 19th‑century cinnabar plate so intricate it took time to identify.
It was then that she realized museum curation could be a career.
Under her leadership, the Art on Campus Collection grew to more than 2,700 public works spread across 1,900 acres — a collection she believes is the largest in the nation.
“Art on campus is about object‑based learning,” she told the Ames Tribune. “The whole reason we do all of this is to teach students and inspire students.”
University Museums has a statewide and global reach
Pohlman’s work reached far beyond Ames. She helped central Iowa cities select public art and curated the celebrated “Land of the Fragile Giants” exhibition, which grew out of the Loess Hills near her hometown.
The exhibition eventually traveled three continents through the U.S. Department of State’s Art in Embassies program.
Pohlman’s career was a life built with other people
Pohlman rarely speaks about her accomplishments without redirecting credit. She mentored hundreds of students and docents, many of whom became museum professionals.
She and her husband, John, opened their home to 23 students over the years, earning their residence the nickname the “Pohlman Palace.”
“We worked ourselves to the bone and laughed the whole way through,” she said in the release. “We learned a lot.”
What comes next for Lynette Pohlman?
Retirement begins with the construction of a pergola at the family place in Moorhead, followed by the long list of “we’ll do that tomorrow” destinations she and John passed during decades of art‑moving trips.
Pohlman leaves behind a campus that sees itself differently because of her. It’s become a place where students pose with sculptures as if they’ve always belonged to them.
“You can’t mandate the legacy of a work of art,” she said in the release. “People have to find their own way to it.”
Ronna Faaborg covers business and the arts for the Ames Tribune. Reach her at rfaaborg@usatodayco.com.
This article originally appeared on Ames Tribune: After 55 years, Iowa State’s only University Museums director retires
Reporting by Ronna Faaborg, Ames Tribune / Ames Tribune
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By Ronna Faaborg, Ames Tribune | USA TODAY Network
