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Bob Dylan playing bass in a recording studio,1965 © Sony Music Entertainment, Inc.

“Bob Dylan’s American Journey, 1956–66,” an exhibition at the Weisman Art Museum, fills in and examines those missing years. “Dylan was only here for a short time; he was a student at University from 1959 to 1960,” explains Colleen Sheehy, coordinating curator of the exhibition. “But it completely changed his life.”

The show, created by the Experience Music Project in Seattle, explores the culturally turbulent 10-year period in which Dylan transformed himself from a young rock-and-roller to a folk troubadour and music innovator. Featured are more than 150 artifacts (instruments, photographs, hand-written lyrics, and letters) assembled from sources as diverse as the Bob Dylan Archives, the Smithsonian Museum of American History, and the Civil Rights Museum. Four short films, rare early concert footage, and

A Town Hall concert poster from April 1963, courtesy of Barry and Judy Ollman

a new filmed interview with Dylan about his formative decade are also on view.

But the Weisman, the only art museum presenting the traveling exhibition, has put its own unique stamp on the show. With assistance from University student interns, Sheehy, who taught an American Studies class on Dylan at the University in 2006, conducted extensive research in Hibbing, where Dylan grew up and graduated from high school. Sheehy and her team also met with local artists and historians to learn more about Dylan’s time in Dinkytown, the small-business hub adjacent to the University where the musician lived during his transformation from Zimmerman to Dylan.

As a result, the Weisman has added memorabilia, along with related paintings from the museum’s collections, that make the Minneapolis version of the exhibition “totally unique,” Sheehy says. Those additions include an enlarged snapshot taken by Dylan’s mother of the 17-year-old musician; photographs of the teenage Zimmerman in his first rock-and-roll bands; and audio recordings of the musician singing in his Hibbing living room and in his Dinkytown apartment.

The desk on which Dylan’s high-school English teacher corrected papers (including a Zimmerman term paper displayed in the show), a street sign from the corner on which the Zimmermans lived, and a movie marquee from a theater owned by Dylan’s uncle are among the largest pieces in the exhibition. “What we’ve added,” Sheehy explains, “is memorabilia and iconography that will help viewers understand more deeply why Dylan’s time in the Twin Cities was key to the formation of his artistry.”

A self-taught musician, Dylan was influenced by his high-school English teacher, “who impressed on him

Bob Dylan at my Loft © John Cohen

the power of words and the importance of poetry and opened him up to the history of western literature, which subsequently worked its way into Dylan’s lyrics,” Sheehy says. When Zimmerman arrived in the Twin Cities, Sheehy continues, “He sold his electric guitar and bought an acoustic guitar, went to folk venues like The Scholar, and learned the folk repertoire. It was here that he starting using the name Bob Dylan.”

After moving to Greenwich Village, Dylan quickly became known as a folk singer, songwriter, and voice for civil rights, nuclear disarmament, and ending the Vietnam War. The exhibition, Sheehy says, “puts Dylan in the larger political and social movements of the time.” Dylan also began recording the first of seven albums he would release between 1962 and 1966, “each one of them an astounding group of songs,” Sheehy says.

“People are crazy about Dylan and have been for 40 years,” Sheehy says. “For those people, the exhibition provides an opportunity for them to really focus on and learn more about his early development. For others, the show gives them a chance to see what the fuss is about and why people remain so devoted to Dylan and his work.”

Clearly, Sheehy belongs in the former category. “I really think Dylan is one of the most important artists of the 20^th century in any medium,” she explains. “He’s been so revolutionary, and the quality of his work has so much appeal and depth, it’s cross-generational. People will still be studying Dylan hundreds of years from now.”

“Bob Dylan’s American Journey, 1956-66” continues through April 29 at the Weisman Art Museum, 333 East River Road, Minneapolis, 612-625-9494. Admission is free.
—Camille LeFevre