Art Hounds: Recent Episodes
Minnesota Public Radio
Each week three people from the Minnesota arts community talk about a performance, opening, or event they're excited to see or want others to check out.
Luverne Seifert is a Twin Cities actor and acting teacher. He recommends going to see “The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie” from Dark & Stormy Productions.
In this edgy production, set at Marcia Blaine School for Girls in 1930s Scotland, the lessons are less about math and reading than they are about love and sex. “It’s a very provocative play,” Seifert said. “And at times I think your jaw will drop.”
The cast consists of University of Minnesota students making their professional stage debut, and the production runs through Sept. 17 at the Gremlin Theater in St. Paul.
Duluth filmmaker Khayman Goodsky, of the Bois Forte Band of Chippewa, loves a good book. That’s why Goodsky suggests going to the “Meet the Artist” series at Two Loons Gallery in Duluth any time, but especially on Aug. 26, when Thomas and Betsy Peacock are the artists in question.
The two co-own Black Bears and Blueberries Publishing, which specializes in Native written and illustrated books. “Everything they’ve put out has been researched and carefully developed, so, I mean you can’t go wrong with reading their books,” Goodsky said.
You can meet Thomas and Betsy Peacock, Saturday, Aug. 26, at Two Loons Gallery, 2025 W. Superior St., Duluth.
Luis Fitch is a Mexican artist, designer and creative entrepreneur based in Minneapolis. His recommendation is “Immigrant Roads,” a solo exhibition of largescale paintings exploring the legacy of Mexican-born families who built the Santa Fe railroad in the early part of the 20th century.
“What I’m excited about in this exhibition is the hope that the artist brings to restore some of the stolen dignity from Latinx workers,” Fitch said.
“Immigrant Roads” is on display through Sept. 22 at the CLUES Latino Art Gallery, 797 East Seventh St., St. Paul.
Meggie Moench is a Minneapolis-based musician and dancer who is excited to attend 10th Wave Chamber Collective’s upcoming event “At Dusk: Outdoor Chamber Music Concert Series.”
“I love listening to local live music in Minneapolis, and 10th Wave Chamber Collective is a group whose performances I always make sure to see,” Moench said.
This particular concert series is extra special, she said, because it features all BIPOC, contemporary composers with a modern flare playing outside in nature.
There are two concerts. The first is at 7 p.m. on Aug. 19 at Lutherie Lab (2619 Ulysses St. N.E., Minneapolis). An additional performance take place a week later at 7 p.m. on Aug. 26 at the University Lutheran Church of Hope Courtyard (601 13th Ave. S.E., Minneapolis).
Karla Grotting is a local dancer, choreographer and dance educator who says Rhythmically Speaking’s event, “The Cohort,” makes jazz dance approachable and fun for any audience.
“It’s very legible and accessible and captures all elements like jazz music does,” Grotting said.
The show runs Aug. 17-19 at the Southern Theater (1420 Washington Ave. S., Minneapolis).
Amy Tervola Hultberg is an education consultant from New York Mills, who loves to see the community come together for the town’s annual puppet pageant.
“The children involved, the families involved, the residents involved are also very dedicated.” Hultberg said. “Children are learning how to walk on stilts … it’s a true puppet experience.”
The pageant tells the story of Kalevala, which is based on the Finnish national epic poem, and tells a story of creation. The community has worked on the puppets for weeks and will get to debut their own latest creation to the public at 7 p.m. on Aug. 18 at New York Mills VFW Post 3289.
An additional performance will take place at noon on Aug. 19 at the Finn Creek Open Air Museum.
Former St. Paul art critic Diane Hellekson came out of retirement to rave about Kathryn Nobbe’s exhibition “Indelible Vestiges: Mother, Her Mother, Me.” The exhibition attempts to capture the the blurred reality between the present and past through memory through a vareity of multimedia elements.
“There’s old shoes that look like little ghosts walking alongside the gallery.” Hellekson said. “Indelible Vesitages” is open through Sept. 9 at Form + Content Gallery at 210 Second St. N. in Minneapolis. Special performances designed to complement the installations punctuate the run, including a spoken word event 4-6 p.m. on Aug. 19.
West Coast transplant Juliet Parisi lives in Eagan, Minn., now, where she uses alcohol-ink and mixed media to turning everyday chaos into something beautiful. No wonder she is drawn to Caponi Art Park’s annual “Hot Art” event, where participants carve sand molds that are then used to create molten metal castings with help from Igneous Metal Arts.
“They toss in scrap iron, like radiators, bits of pipe, iron sheets,” Parisi said, “toss it into a huge cauldron and they melt it down to hot, molten lava.”
The 2023 event is Saturday, Aug. 12 at noon at Caponi Art Park in Eagan.
Minneapolis musician Barb Brynstad is in the band Turn Turn Turn. Every year, she looks forward to the Downtown Minneapolis Street Art Festival. The event features mural art, food trucks and hosts a variety of different musical acts.
“Something I really love about this event is that you can actually watch artists creating these unique, beautiful pieces,” Brynstad said. The 2023 Downtown Minneapolis Street Art Festival runs 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Aug. 12-13.
Nat El-Hai describes herself as a Minneapolis writer, organizer and lesbian commentator. She’s looking forward to the latest Southside Shtetl — an outdoor Jewish makers market that celebrates the local Jewish community and includes everything from pottery to political education.
Plus: Anyone can join in the klezmer jam session from 6-8 p.m.
“This month’s event is really grounded in the Jewish diaspora,” El-Hai said. “You’re not going to find any other Jewish event in Minneapolis like this.”Southside Shtetl takes place 4-8 p.m. Aug. 13 at 3103 Chicago Ave. in Minneapolis.
Tinia Moulder is a fan of Sue Scott’s recurring variety show and podcast “Island of Discarded Women.”
The actor, choreographer and teaching artist, who just wrapped a production of “Glensheen” at the History Theatre in St. Paul, said the show is a great introduction to all kinds of artists – writers, musicians, spoken-word artists, and more.
“I especially love the interview that Sue does with a woman on each show,” Moulder said.
In August, that special interview guest was violinist, composer and disability activist Gaelynn Lea. The live events take place in an intimate supper club setting. And the best part, Moulder said, is that if you can’t make it, you can hear it all on a podcast released a few weeks later.
The episode of “Island of Discarded Women” featuring Gaelynn Lea was recorded on Aug. 3 at Crooner’s Supper Club in Minneapolis. The next live event, featuring former TV news anchor Pat Miles, happens Oct. 12.
Duluth is going a little bit country for the North of Nashville festival. But most of the bands playing at the one-day country music fest didn’t have to travel far.
“It features bands that are right on the cusp of making it from southern Minnesota and northern Minnesota,” said Duluth guitarist and songwriter Chris Allen, who is stoked for this outdoor summer concert and afterparty.
On the lineup: Lexie Houle, Bo Allen, Luke Lynell. Plus, a blast from the past: 1980s act West Wind.
North of Nashville happens 7 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 5 at the Cast Iron Bar and Grill in Duluth; call 218-729-7514 for tickets.
Ian Francis Lah is an actor and the executive artistic director for the Northern Lakes Art Association in Ely, Minn. He’s currently in rehearsals for the musical “Songs for a New World,” but this week he took time out to sing the praises of another event.
“I love this time of year in Ely, Minnesota, because it’s when the Blueberry Art Festival happens, he said of the festival, which features more than 200 artists and crafters, 25 food vendors, a beer garden, and freshly baked blueberry pies.
“It’s a wild time. Ten thousand people pass through a day and that is triple the amount of citizens in Ely.”
The Blueberry Art Festival takes place in Whiteside Park and runs from Friday, July 28, through Sunday, July 30.
By day, Carolyn Cherry is an educator with the Burnsville-Eagan-Savage School District. In her spare time, she is passionate about nurturing her inner artist.
She met fiber artist Deborah Foutch while taking a class built around the book “The Artist’s Way.” Foutch, whose work focuses on the natural world, spends a lot of time mentoring other artists. Cherry was delighted to get a sneak peek at Foutch’s exhibition “Nine Artists in Conversation,” which features the work of Foutch and eight of her mentees.
”It’s a nurturing exhibition for those who want to be creative in different ways,” Cherry said. ”In ‘The Artist’s Way,’ they talk about artist dates, and I think this is the perfect artist date.”
The exhibition opens with a reception 6-8 p.m. Saturday, July 29, and runs through August at the On2 Gallery in the California Building in Northeast Minneapolis.
Sasha Warren is a Minneapolis writer whose work has been published in the mental health magazine “Asylum.”
“I try to pay attention to events both in the literature world and in the disability scene,” he said. Cowchella, put on by Cow Tipping Press “is the real big event that joins the two.”
The literary festival features writers with developmental and intellectual disabilities. “Every year there’s some kind of surprise,” he said. “But the best part is just walking around, soaking in the scene and feeling the pervasive joy of the atmosphere.”
Cowchella takes place 4-8 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 4, at Springboard for the Arts in St. Paul.
Singer-songwriter Katy Vernon, who was born in London and now lives in White Bear Lake, recommends Theatre 55’s production of “A Chorus Line – In Concert,” based on the 1975 musical about aspiring Broadway dancers.
“Everything they do is geared towards performers 55 and up,” she says. “And as a performer myself, reaching that age in the next few years, I just really am encouraged and inspired by theater that shows none of us have an expiration date.”
She adds: “‘A Chorus Line’ is all about putting yourself out there.”
Performances run Friday through July 23 at Caponi Art Park in Eagan.
Pamela McNulty of Minnetonka has been retired for four years after two decades of working in fundraising for women's higher education. Her recommendation, Shakespeare’s “Twelfth Night,” is produced by The Gray Mallard Theater Co. and is their second production.
“It is incredibly special, given the wonderful production, the fact that it's free and open to everyone in the community and presented by outstanding actors who are diverse,” McNulty says. “They provide Shakespeare in a brand new manner.”
Performances will be at Sociable Cider Werks in Minneapolis in the parking lot. It runs July 20-August 6.
Amanda Malkin of St. Peter, Minn., is an art conservator. She is also a lover of all things art and music and a mother of twins. Amanda is especially looking forward to the Minnesota Original Music Festival, a network of free concerts, workshops and events in St. Peter, Minnesota, beginning July 19.
Malkin highlights a unique opportunity at the festival: a 48-hour band challenge.
“The challenge is a spirited contest, where all musicians playing original music are encouraged to participate,” Amanda explains. “Through a random draft process, new bands are formed for just 48 hours. The new bands then create a new song together for the event and compete in front of a panel of judges with their original tunes.”
Winners showcase their music on the weekend mainstage at Minnesota Square Park. The weeklong festival culminates with concerts on July 22- 23.
Anastasia Hopkins Folpe of Rochester, Minn., first encountered the Minnesota Marine Art Museum in Winona several years ago.
“I would describe it as a hidden gem,” Folpe said. “It's on the river in Winona, kind of behind the downtown. You have to hunt for it a little bit.”
She credited the museum’s director Scott Pollock for investing in spaces devoted to younger visitors.
“It's just a very welcoming and mellow place. I just like to go there and hang out. I think people just don't know about it. So I hope everyone learns and goes there.”
Peg Guilfoyle is a writer living in downtown St. Paul and a longtime arts enthusiast. She’s also a fan of sea shanties.
“There is something about coming off the street into a room filled with singing,” she explained. “I'm here to testify to the flat fun of the sea shanty singalong held monthly at the Dubliner Pub on University Avenue in St. Paul, and also in Minneapolis at Merlin's Rest on Lake Street.”
“No band, no sheet music or lyrics and all volunteer singers,” Guilfoyle enthused. “Who knew there were so many people who love sea shanties?”
The next sea shanty singalong will be July 10 at the Dubliner.
Katrina Knutson of Minneapolis is a teaching artist and muralist.
“You should definitely go check out the Chroma Zone Mural and Art Festival,” she said. The event will feature new murals painted by six artists.
“I'm really excited to see work by Sydney James, who is an artist who's visiting from Detroit,” Knutson added, “and Leslie Barlow, one of my very favorite Minnesota painters, will also be painting a mural.”
She pointed out additional pleasures of the festival, its location in St. Paul’s Creative Enterprise Zone, between the two downtowns: “It's a great neighborhood to go around because there are dozens of murals within a few blocks of each other,” Knutson said, who takes friends and out of town visitors on a tour of the murals.
Events related to the festival are scheduled through Sept. 16, including a talk by artist Sydney G. James at Urban Growler in St. Paul on July 14.
Kyle Bernier is a Minneapolis-based art therapist and author of “Lazy Creativity: The Art of Owning Your Creativity.” He wanted to introduce Art Hounds audiences to the work of Susanna Gaunt, whose work can be seen through Sept. 5 at the Merrill Lynch Fine Arts Gallery of the Great Lakes Aquarium in Duluth.
“Susanna is a Duluth-based artist who's been working at the GLA for a year now on the Great Lakes Almanac,” Bernier said. “Susanna has been gathering stories from the community about their engagement with natural history, whether at the aquarium or just out in nature in general. Susanna has taken the survey and created artwork from those stories that she's now put up on display.”
Gaunt’s work can also be seen online.
Heather Beal of Minneapolis is a journalist who writes about the arts and all aspects of the built and natural environments. She recently heard about an art event that she says “sounds very cool.”
The event is Midsummer: a Summer Solstice Festival, taking place Saturday from 5 p.m. to midnight at Franconia Sculpture Park in Shafer, Minn.
“I've always enjoyed touring Franconia’s grounds because of the wonderful way that more than 100 sculptures by contemporary artists are woven into the landscape,” Beal said. “There is always something new to see and experience. This is why I'm especially looking forward to the Franconia Summer Solstice Festival. It offers opportunities to interact with the work of 10 local artists, including several whose work is in progress or has recently been installed at the park.”
Activities include contributing to a prayer flag installation, making Solstice suncatchers and creating crowns from native flowers, as well as taking part in a maple dance, pine tree derby and a lantern-lit procession. There will also be a sunset observation and a bonfire. At 10 p.m., the Minnesota Astronomical Society will provide telescopes that visitors can use to view the night sky.
Laurel Podulke-Smith of Rochester, Minn., is a performing arts enthusiast. She recommends a new production of “A Raisin in the Sun” at the Rochester Repertory Theater.
“The Rochester Repertory Theater is unique among community theaters because it's entirely volunteer-staffed,” she says. “I'm excited about this production. Because, first of all, it's a fantastic play, a fantastically dramatic play. It has an almost all-Black cast and it's co-directed by two Black directors, E.G. Bailey and Shá Cage.”
The play runs through June 25.
Noah Hynick of Minneapolis works at an escape room. He recommends a new play at Bryant Lake Bowl titled “The Assassination of the Archduke of Austria-Hungary Franz Ferdinand.” The play was written by Minnesota stand-up comic Joey Hamburger and is produced by Jackdonkey Productions.
“It's all about the events leading up to the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand,” Hynick explains. “It's sort of a tragic comedy and follows some real things that happen as well as some not quite true things.”
“Lots of places are still feeling the effects of COVID and everything. And now having new theaters come out, I think it's a really good chance to support smaller theaters and new art,” Hynick said.
The show runs June 14-17, with an additional performance June 22.
Amy Garretson of Rochester is the education and community outreach coordinator with the Rochester Art Center. She’s excited that a new art house movie theater has opened in the Cooke Park neighborhood of Rochester, Pop’s Art Theater.
“The type of films they're showing are either films that are shown before the wider release at the big theaters, or they're just independent cinema that you're really just not going to see screened anywhere else in southeast Minnesota,” Garretson said. “After a long drought, there's finally a place where you can go to see interesting, innovative independent cinema here in Rochester.”
Pop’s Art Theater’s screenings currently include “Dalíland,” a 2022 film about Salvador Dalí starring Ben Kingsley, and two classics of Hong Kong action cinema, “Police Story 2” with Jackie Chan and 1972’s “Fist of Fury” with Bruce Lee.
St. Paul’s Christine Sweet is a former classical music broadcaster with Classical MPR and a current member of the Twin Cities theater community. “Ladyslipper Ensemble is one of my favorite local chamber music ensembles,” she says. “And that's because every time I've been to a Ladyslipper concert, I hear something wonderful that I've never heard before — whether it's brand new or just new to me.”
She explains that Ladyslipper is “a group of four instrumentalists plus mezzo-soprano Sahar Hassan, who is its director. They typically don't perform as a quintet but in combinations of those instruments, or instruments and voice and sometimes they also have guest performers.”
The next Ladyslipper performance will include music of Gabriel Fauré and Erich Wolfgang Korngold, as well as a premiere of a new piece by Minnesota composer Carol Barnett. The event will take place June 12 at MetroNOME Brewery in St. Paul.
Ashley Hanson wants you to know about an exhibit that celebrates rural Minnesota artists and stories. Hanson, executive director of the nonprofit Department of Public of Transformation in Granite Falls, recommends “Field Notes: 7 Truths about the Rural,” which draws together the work of seven artists of various disciplines. They explore subjects that make up our rural places, including small-town newspapers, post offices, mining and extractive economies, relationship to the land, and more.
Laura Youngbird of the Minnesota Chippewa, Grand Portage Band uses mixed media to investigate “issues of identity as they relate to family members’ forced enrollment in boarding schools.” Installation artist Matthew Fluharty of Winona looks at the ways rural communities are presented in national print media compared with local newspapers. Abstract painters Andrew Nordin and Lisa Bergh of New London look outward to architecture and inward to our emotional landscapes.
Hanson highlights the timing of this exhibit makes it powerful as it celebrates the complexities of rural life at a time when political coverage focused on voting blocs can oversimplify rural life. The exhibit runs at Form+Content Gallery in Minneapolis through Dec. 23.
Theater maker Ryan Paul North of St. Anthony Village is looking forward to seeing Spiked! at Granada Theater in Minneapolis. A co-production of Table Salt Productions and Rock What You Got, this classic holiday variety show promises music, improv and sketch comedy, along with a great line-up of guests that vary from show to show.
It’s family friendly, with a run time of three hours. North is looking forward to a chance to sit back, relax with a drink, and laugh.
“Spiked!” runs Thursday at 7:30 p.m., Dec. 3 and 4 at 2 p.m. and Dec. 6 and 13 at 7:30 p.m. Dining options are available before the show for additional cost.
Nicole Watson, director of the Catherine G. Murphy Gallery at St. Catherine University, wants to shine a light on a Twin Cities-area art exhibit that she found utterly thought-provoking. “Surface Tension” at Bethel University’s Olson Gallery features the work of four female photographers, Sophia Chai, Paula McCartney, Christine Nguyen and Letha Wilson. Chai is from Rochester and McCarthy is based in the Twin Cities.
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Paula McCartney's work, "Acquaintance," glazed and unglazed stoneware and archival pigment print on a wood base.
Each artist pushes their work beyond the bounds of a printed photograph. Sometimes these changes are 3-dimensional, like McCartney’s ceramic geometric shapes that play on the light and shadow in her photographs. “The longer you look at them the more surprises that surface,” Watson said. In Nguyen’s work, light and time change the appearance of her unprocessed photographic paper.
The exhibit is open to the public and on view through Dec. 16.
St. Paul poet and artist Hawona Sullivan Janzen was deeply moved by the multimedia exhibition “Beneath the Stripes, Under the Stars,” curated by Fawzia Khan. Ten female artists explore American identity.
All of the artists “have lived a life that requires some navigation between American culture and at least one other culture,” says Sullivan Janzen, “and the work that they have produced in response to this is wide ranging. It’s technically, visually and intellectually some of the most complicated work I've seen in a recent show exploring these topics.”
Sullivan Janzen was particularly struck by a beautiful bedsheet by Khan, whose intricate embroidery explores “what it means to be a woman and a sexual being coming from Pakistan and living in America.”
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An embroidered bridal bedsheet by Fawzia Khan.
The show runs through Dec. 11 at the Catherine G. Murphy Gallery at St. Catherine University in St. Paul, with an artist discussion Dec. 7, 6:30 p.m. via Zoom.
Chris Schellinger, director of the Avon Hills Folk School, appreciates the intersection of art and environmentalism that’s happening at the Whitney Gallery in St. Cloud. Their juried art show “Trail Mix” features over 50 works — drawings and paintings, textile and sculpture — by local artists celebrating the beauty of nature and the work to fight climate change.
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“Enough with the Pipelines” by Erik Jon Olson.
The show runs through Dec. 10, with additional works on view at the Good Earth Food Co-op Gallery through Jan. 1.
Schellinger notes that this show is a great chance to see the Whit before it closes Dec. 12. The gallery is also hosting a line-up of “Last Call” shows and events on that closing date.
Printmaker and quilter Laura Brown of Grand Marais recommends checking out an upcoming solo show by artist and art therapist Lauren Callis. Entitled “Careful May Fall Apart,” the show uses watercolor, quilting, and writing to process the death of her beloved grandmother and other life events.
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A painting from Lauren Callis's solo show "Careful, May Fall Apart."
Callis created a zine with selected writings, so visitors can view the show and read about the “real-time” experiences that inspired the pieces, creating the feel of an interactive memoir.
“She’s really bringing in the value of using art as a tool for processing emotion and understanding experiences that happen to all of us,” Brown said.
“Careful, May Fall Apart” is showing at the Pink Slip Gallery in Minneapolis, with an artist opening Friday, Nov. 18 from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. The exhibit is open by appointment Nov. 19 through 25.
Arts and culture enthusiast Tommy Sar of St. Paul recommends checking out the screening of a new documentary centering women and nonbinary people in Taiko drumming. Filmed in Minnesota and Japan, “Finding Her Beat” makes its state premiere this weekend during the Sound Unseen film festival.
For centuries, only men were allowed to take part in the traditional Japanese art form of Taiko drumming. That has changed in recent years. Sar remembers when performers gathered at the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts in St. Paul several years ago, which is featured in the film. Sar called the documentary of the performers’ Taiko journeys “moving and powerful,” with high-energy performances.
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The first showing of the film on Friday has sold out, but there is a second showing Sunday at 8:15 p.m. at the Parkway Theater in Minneapolis. Virtual tickets are also available.
Amateur guitarist Chuck House of St. Paul plans to attend the next concert in the Minnesota Guitar Society’s new Jazz and Fingerstyle Guitar Concert series. The concert on Tuesday features two talented local guitar duos playing hot club jazz.
At 6 p.m. the Red Hot Django Peppers duo Ryan Picone and Jose Betanzos show off the intricate fingerwork and swinging rhythms of late Romani guitarist Django Reinhardt. Famous for his improvisations, Reinhardt didn’t write his compositions down. Instead this Twin Cities duo will play a mix of original arrangements and tunes adopted from recordings by Reinhardt and his fans.
From 7 to 9 p.m., guitarists Pavel Jany and Dean Harrington take the stage with a variety of styles including swing.
The event is free, but seating is limited at MetroNOME Brewery in St. Paul.
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As an artist in southwestern Minnesota, Lucy Tokheim of Dawson has seen the ripple effect first-hand of the long career of Franz Allbert Richter in nearby Clarkfield. Richter, who recently turned 80, worked closely with Minnesota poets Robert Bly and Bill Holm, creating drawings from many of Bly’s books during the Seventies Press period.
A collection of Franz Allbert Richter’s pencil drawings and clay folk figures, titled “A Life in Art,” is at Madison Mercantile, which has a gallery space, in Madison, Minn. The show’s opening is Thursday at 7 p.m., when Pioneer PBS will interview fans of Richter’s work for a “Postcards” episode to air next year. The work will be on view through the month of November.
Tokheim notes that many of Richter’s drawings from the 1970s and 80s were completed at a time when good art photography was scarce, making it difficult to preserve copies of original drawings. She says this gathering of even a portion of Richter’s work is a great opportunity.
Mark Ceilley of St. Paul has picture books on the mind, as a debut author himself. On a recent trip through Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, Ceilley discovered Picture Book Parade.
The series features one picture book by a Minnesota author every two months through next August. Individual pages are blown up on panels so that visitors may feel they are stepping into the story.
The book for this month and next is “In Search of the Gingerbread Man” by Timi Bliss, followed in 2023 by Peter Pearson’s “How to Eat an Airplane,” Molly Beth Griffen’s “Ten Beautiful Things,” Cheryl Minnema’s book “Johnny’s Pheasant” and Bao Phi’s “A Different Pond.”
The exhibit is located between gates C18 and C19 at Terminal 1.
Wendy Knox of Frank Theatre stopped at Prove Collective in Duluth to see Carolyn Sue Olson’s work. Olson created a series of brightly colored oil pastel portraits of essential workers, beginning with the stay-at-home order in March 2020 and continuing through July 2021.
The portraits have been on display in various locations around the state, but this is the first time all 100 have been exhibited together. Olson has put the complete series in a book, which is available through her website. The show runs until Nov. 18.
Knox found encountering the entire collection a powerful experience. “You forget certain things that have happened” over the course of the pandemic, Knox said, “it is a little stroll down a not-pleasant memory lane, but it is really informative to see” what we’ve been through.
Breanne Tepler, lead singer/songwriter of Breanne Marie and the Front Porch Sinners, loves the art and music scene in Duluth. This Thursday evening, she’s heading to Wussow’s Concert Cafe, which she calls “the heart and soul of the Duluth music scene,” for a concert and artist’s opening reception.
The artist is Annmarie Geniusz, a “wickedly talented” Duluth-based artist who creates joyful, whimsical creative works, from illustrations and murals to stained glass creations. Geniusz will be the November featured artist at Wussow’s, and the artist’s reception will feature local ska band, Woodblind, from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.
Tepler also says to check out the mural Geniusz painted next door Wussow’s, at Zenith Bookstore.
Musician Woody Stulberg looks forward to wearing his Halloween costume to Cabarave: MadHaus III this weekend.
He says the event by RatHaus Productions as an “immersive nightclub experience with a theater twist.” Pop-up live performances include aerial silks, fire dancing, live music and performance painting, which take place around — and above — the audience.
Stulberg describes the atmosphere as “sensual” but also welcoming to all. Halloween costumes and audience participation are encouraged.
The shows take place this Friday and Saturday evening at Brother Justus Whiskey Company in Minneapolis. Doors open at 7 p.m. and the shows start at 8 p.m.
Greg Krausert of Austin, Minn. is also planning on wearing a Halloween costume this Saturday night when he attends a cabaret performance at the Austin Country Club by local drag performer Roxie Manacoochi.
Backed by a DJ, Manacoochi sings a range of styles from Cole Porter to Madonna to contemporary fare. She was named first runner up to Miss Gay Iowa USofA and is preparing to compete again this January.
“It’s unbelievable fun,” says Krausert of the show, recalling Manacoochi’s September performance, which kept the audience laughing and singing far beyond the scheduled run time. Saturday’s cabaret show starts at 7:30 p.m.
Twin Cities filmmaker Peter Groynom is looking forward to attending the Twin Cities Film Fest, which continues with a full lineup of showings tonight, Friday and Saturday.
The films play at the ShowPlace ICON Theatre in St Louis Park, and Groynom says this centralized location makes it easy to see multiple shows and also have a chance to connect with other filmmakers and enthusiasts.
The year’s festival has drawn about 70 films by local, national and international filmmakers. The films are also accessible to stream through the festival website.
Groynom appreciates how the festival spotlights diverse programming. On his watch list: a series of dramatic shorts called “American Tales” Friday at 2:30; a block of comedic shorts called “The Joke’s on Us” Saturday at 12:30 — both with filmmaker Q&As afterward; and a Saturday afternoon documentary, “Jimmy in Saigon,” which explores the life, romance and death of a queer veteran in Vietnam. Find the schedule here.
Actor Heather Meyer of Eden Prairie has a goal to watch all 11 productions in the Twin Cities Horror Festival. Advertised as “the longest-running horror theater festival in the country,” the event pays homage to the horror genre from psychological thrillers to true crime, spooky cabaret, and scream-inducing plays replete with stage blood.
Meyer says each show in the line-up is rated for language, violence and blood, so you can pick the brand of horror that works for you.
The festival runs Thursday through Oct. 30 at the Crane Theater in Minneapolis. Masks are required except when eating, drinking or performing on stage.
Minneapolis actor Cathleen Fuller calls concerts by the Minnesota Bach Ensemble “balm for the soul.” She enjoyed watching their concerts online when venues were closed amid the pandemic, and she’s excited to see them return to live performances as they launch their 10th anniversary season, beginning this Saturday.
As the name implies, the ensemble focuses on the music of Johann Sebastian Bach and other baroque contemporaries. This performance includes Bach’s “Coffee Cantata” and G. F. Handel’s “Water Music,” along with works by Rameau and Purcell, featuring soprano, tenor and baritone soloists.
Concerts are Saturday at 3 p.m., Monday at 7 p.m. at Antonello Hall at MacPhail Center for Music in Minneapolis.
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Actor Leslie Vincent loves the podcast “This Queer Book Saved My Life.” She appreciates that each episode focuses on one book from the LBGTQ+ cannon that profoundly affected one reader. The podcast leans into the power of reading and sharing stories.
Host J.P. Der Boghossian and producer Jim Pounds are based in the Twin Cities, and while guests are national and occasionally international, the most recent episode delves into local history.
Recorded live at Lush Lounge and Theater in Minneapolis, the episode is about a memoir, “The Evening Crowd at Kirmser’s: A Gay Life in the 1940s,” by Ricardo J. Brown, and a reader who found that book at the perfect time in his life.
The second season dropped Oct. 4, with new episodes each Tuesday.
Correction: A previous headline misstated the type of art featured in the Twin Cities Horror Festival. The above headline is correct.
Karen Mary Davalos, professor of Chicano and Latino Studies at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, suggests a visit to see Dougie Padilla and Xavier Tavera’s new work at Anderson Center at Tower View in Red Wing. Titled “Frontera Liminal,” the show investigates borders both physical and spiritual.
Padilla’s series of screen prints forge a connection with his great-grandmother, whom he never met. Among his images are ghost prints, the second, third, or more pulls on the same inked plate of a printing press, that produce ethereal remnants of the original image. Even the hanging of the images is ghostly, said Davalos. The images hang free from the ceiling, allowing them to move in the breeze and adding a sculptural element to 2-D images.
Tavera is a photographer who has been traveling to the Mexican border for more than six years. He’s interested in the intersection of Catholic and Indigenous spiritual practices, creating images that Davalos calls “charged and emotionally compelling.”
The exhibit runs through Nov 5. and is capped with an artist talk and closing reception at 1 p.m. that afternoon.
Beverly Roberts of Homewood Studios appreciates the intricate felted creations of Susan J. Sperl. Sperl’s latest exhibit, entitled “Voices from the Water,” showcases her detailed, colorful sea creatures with such enticing names as warty frogfish, leafy sea dragon, wolf eel, Tasmanian sawshark. Many of these creatures face challenges due to plastics and pollution in their ocean environments.
Courtesy of ABSPhoto
Susan J. Sperl's "Leafy Sea Dragon" is one of the intricate felted sea creatures on display in her show "Voices from the Water" at Westminster Gallery in Minneapolis.
Bringing these ideas closer to home are the cartoons about local water conservation and clean-up efforts, created by Winter Crenshaw and Donte Beck, students at Plymouth Youth Center’s Arts and Tech High School. Together, the exhibit is part inspiration and wonder, part encouragement to protect our water, from Minneapolis storm drains to ocean depths.
The show runs through Nov. 20 at the Westminster Gallery, located within Westminster Presbyterian Church in Minneapolis. There’s an artist reception Sunday from 2 - 4:30 p.m.
Ilene Krug Mojsilov has long admired the work of sculptor and painter Dodie Logue and she highly recommends a visit to see her show “Color Thoughts” on display at One Division Art in Buffalo, Minn.
Mojsilov recalled visiting Logue’s studio this summer and looking out through the open barn doors at the restored prairie in full bloom. The prairie’s color and texture infuses Logue’s abstract paintings, whose grids and dots always deserve a closer look. Mojsilov explains Logue’s work celebrates “the unexpected poetry of hard and soft…the interactions between color and texture.”
The exhibit runs through Oct. 22. The gallery is open Friday 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. and Saturdays 12 p.m. to 5 p.m.
Courtesy photo
"Lullaby" on canvas by Dodie Logue.
Rita Walaszek Arndt, White Earth Nation, recommends “Kindred Spirits: Three Indigenous Artists Who Speak Through Beads” at the Gordon Parks Gallery on the Metro State University campus in St. Paul.
Curated by professor and gallery director Erica Rasmussen, the exhibit features three artists, from Minnesota and Wisconsin; Walter Super LaBatte, member of the Sisseton Wahpeton Oyate, Sarah McRae, member of the Red Lake Nation, and Douglas Limón, member of the Oneida Nation. The art displayed includes traditional clothing, paintings, wall art and wearables.
The exhibition runs through Oct. 20.
Painter and scientist Suhaila Ihsanullah attended the opening night of the two exhibits currently running at Groveland Gallery in Minneapolis, and suggests others check it out.
“[The opening] was very impressive, and I think that’s why I wanted other people to go and see it,” Ihsanullah said.
The two exhibits are “Night Shadows”and “Thinking Outside,” featuring the works of Michael Kareken and Jean Gumpper, respectively. Kareken’s medium is drawings and paintings. Gumpper works in woodcut prints.
Both exhibits close Oct.15.
Former owner of the Grand Hand gallery Ann Ruhr Pifer is excited for the upcoming American Craft Made market in St. Paul. The event, formerly known as the American Craft Council show, was last held in 2019.
Sponsored by the Minnesota-based nonprofit American Craft Council, the event brings artisans from across the country to showcase and sell their work.
Ruhr Pifer also says this year will feature more emerging artists and Minnesota artists than in past years. “It’s like a new version of an old favorite.”
The American Craft Made show is Friday through Sunday at RiverCentre.
Heather Lawrenz of Red Wing Arts was deeply inspired by Journey to Rock Bottom, a visual arts show that celebrates athleticism. Burnsville artist Annie Young began creating this show after running an ice marathon in Antarctica in 2018.
She interviewed her fellow runners about their Antarctica journeys, then created paintings inspired by their stories and her imagination. An artist living with blindness, Young also collaborated with 10 local artists with a variety of backgrounds and abilities.
A free artist reception Saturday will bring together many of the artists as well as the “athletes coming in from all over the world who inspired these pieces,” Lawrenz said. Some of the runners plan to compete in the Twin Cities marathon on Sunday. The reception is from 5:30 to 8 p.m. The show runs through Nov. 5 at the Ames Center Art Gallery in Burnsville.
There is an audio description of the exhibit scheduled for Oct. 15, 10:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., including a discussion led by the artist.
Singer/songwriter Clark Machtemes of Waconia is preparing for a trip west this weekend to meander through towns along the Upper Minnesota Valley, checking out arts studios. The annual Meander Art Crawl is a juried event with more than 30 stops at studios in Ortonville, Appleton, Madison, Milan, Dawson, Montevideo and Granite Falls.
This free, self-guided tour includes potters, printers, basket weavers, painters, and more. Machtemes says he discovers something new every year. The Meander runs Friday through Sunday. Find a map and description of all the stops here.
Farther north, the 19th annual Fargo Moorhead Visual Arts (FMVA) Studio Crawl invites visitors to check out the work of 40 artists and organizations Saturday and Sunday afternoon. Find a map here.
If you take the studio crawl, Naomi RaMona Schliesman of Fergus Falls recommends a stop in Moorhead to see the collaborative “Mother Trees” exhibit from Ms. Anna Lee’s Gray Matter Series.
Courtesy image
A mural and a dinner table setting are part of a multi-sensorial exhibit called "Mother Trees."
The title refers to trees in the forest that connect with and nourish others through the mycorrhizal relationship between fungus and plant.
The multi-step collaboration behind this exhibit moved from art to dinner party to more artwork. Chris Larson’s mural was the backdrop for a fungi-themed dinner party created by chef Candace Stock. Local creatives gathered at the dinner possessed skills ranging from photography to poetry to hairstyling. Photographer Sarah Faith Strong, artist Nancy X. Valentine, and poet Julie Larson created works resulting from that evening.
The works are on display at the Arthouse Gallery, a new space in Moorhead.
Heather Lawrenz of Red Wing Arts was deeply inspired by Journey to Rock Bottom, a visual arts show that celebrates athleticism. Burnsville artist Annie Young began creating this show after running an ice marathon in Antarctica in 2018.
She interviewed her fellow runners about their Antarctica journeys, then created paintings inspired by their stories and her imagination. An artist living with blindness, Young also collaborated with 10 local artists with a variety of backgrounds and abilities.
A free artist reception Saturday will bring together many of the artists as well as the “athletes coming in from all over the world who inspired these pieces,” Lawrenz said. Some of the runners plan to compete in the Twin Cities marathon on Sunday. The reception is from 5:30 to 8 p.m. The show runs through Nov. 5 at the Ames Center Art Gallery in Burnsville.
There is an audio description of the exhibit scheduled for Oct. 15, 10:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., including a discussion led by the artist.
Singer/songwriter Clark Machtemes of Waconia is preparing for a trip west this weekend to meander through towns along the Upper Minnesota Valley, checking out arts studios. The annual Meander Art Crawl is a juried event with more than 30 stops at studios in Ortonville, Appleton, Madison, Milan, Dawson, Montevideo and Granite Falls.
This free, self-guided tour includes potters, printers, basket weavers, painters, and more. Machtemes says he discovers something new every year. The Meander runs Friday through Sunday. Find a map and description of all the stops here.
Farther north, the 19th annual Fargo Moorhead Visual Arts (FMVA) Studio Crawl invites visitors to check out the work of 40 artists and organizations Saturday and Sunday afternoon. Find a map here.
If you take the studio crawl, Naomi RaMona Schliesman of Fergus Falls recommends a stop in Moorhead to see the collaborative “Mother Trees” exhibit from Ms. Anna Lee’s Gray Matter Series.
Courtesy image
A mural and a dinner table setting are part of a multi-sensorial exhibit called "Mother Trees."
The title refers to trees in the forest that connect with and nourish others through the mycorrhizal relationship between fungus and plant.
The multi-step collaboration behind this exhibit moved from art to dinner party to more artwork. Chris Larson’s mural was the backdrop for a fungi-themed dinner party created by chef Candace Stock. Local creatives gathered at the dinner possessed skills ranging from photography to poetry to hairstyling. Photographer Sarah Faith Strong, artist Nancy X. Valentine, and poet Julie Larson created works resulting from that evening.
The works are on display at the Arthouse Gallery, a new space in Moorhead.
Heather Lawrenz of Red Wing Arts was deeply inspired by Journey to Rock Bottom, a visual arts show that celebrates athleticism. Burnsville artist Annie Young began creating this show after running an ice marathon in Antarctica in 2018.
She interviewed her fellow runners about their Antarctica journeys, then created paintings inspired by their stories and her imagination. An artist living with blindness, Young also collaborated with 10 local artists with a variety of backgrounds and abilities.
A free artist reception Saturday will bring together many of the artists as well as the “athletes coming in from all over the world who inspired these pieces,” Lawrenz said. Some of the runners plan to compete in the Twin Cities marathon on Sunday. The reception is from 5:30 to 8 p.m. The show runs through Nov. 5 at the Ames Center Art Gallery in Burnsville.
There is an audio description of the exhibit scheduled for Oct. 15, 10:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., including a discussion led by the artist.
Singer/songwriter Clark Machtemes of Waconia is preparing for a trip west this weekend to meander through towns along the Upper Minnesota Valley, checking out arts studios. The annual Meander Art Crawl is a juried event with more than 30 stops at studios in Ortonville, Appleton, Madison, Milan, Dawson, Montevideo and Granite Falls.
This free, self-guided tour includes potters, printers, basket weavers, painters, and more. Machtemes says he discovers something new every year. The Meander runs Friday through Sunday. Find a map and description of all the stops here.
Farther north, the 19th annual Fargo Moorhead Visual Arts (FMVA) Studio Crawl invites visitors to check out the work of 40 artists and organizations Saturday and Sunday afternoon. Find a map here.
If you take the studio crawl, Naomi RaMona Schliesman of Fergus Falls recommends a stop in Moorhead to see the collaborative “Mother Trees” exhibit from Ms. Anna Lee’s Gray Matter Series.
Courtesy image
A mural and a dinner table setting are part of a multi-sensorial exhibit called "Mother Trees."
The title refers to trees in the forest that connect with and nourish others through the mycorrhizal relationship between fungus and plant.
The multi-step collaboration behind this exhibit moved from art to dinner party to more artwork. Chris Larson’s mural was the backdrop for a fungi-themed dinner party created by chef Candace Stock. Local creatives gathered at the dinner possessed skills ranging from photography to poetry to hairstyling. Photographer Sarah Faith Strong, artist Nancy X. Valentine, and poet Julie Larson created works resulting from that evening.
The works are on display at the Arthouse Gallery, a new space in Moorhead.
Updated: 9:47 a.m. Raya Esmaeili of northeast Minneapolis is looking forward to the “Music of Iran” concert, part of the Twin Cities Iranian Culture Festival. The show will feature Minnesota-based artists performing a variety of Iranian music.
One of the groups performing is The Ensemble Aras, consisting of Niloofar Sohi, Negin Chahardoli, Yashar Alizadeh and Aidin Milani. Esmaeili said the group performs music from different ethnic groups and cultures found in Iran, including in different languages.
“If you haven’t heard it before, I think it’s a great introduction,” Esmaeili said.
Others performing include the Twin Cities Daf Ensemble and vocalist Aida Shahghasemi.
The “Music of Iran” concert at the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts is Sunday at 2 p.m. in St. Paul.
Co-artistic Director of Ragamala Dance Company Aparna Ramaswamy highlights an event for Minnesota writer Will McGrath’s new book “Farewell Transmission: Notes from Hidden Spaces”. The book, published in August, is a collection of essays featuring insight into the lives of people from different parts of the world.
One of the people featured in the book, comedian Ali Sultan, will be performing at the event. A conversation with novelist Curtis Sittenfeld will also take place.
A launch event is Tuesday, 7 p.m. at Sisyphus Brewing in Minneapolis.
Theater professional Catherine Glynn in Lanesboro recommends checking out History ALive! Lanesboro’s pop-up plays “Roma,” “Norskies” and “Bumtown.” Organized by Artistic Director Jane Peck, the pop-up plays depict real events from the towns’ past and are performed for audiences as they tour throughout Lanesboro.
This year's stories are set in 1935 and allow audience members to walk through a Roma camp, experience a short play in Norwegian and interact with local historical characters like journalist Cecil Ward.
The pop-up plays take place on Saturday and Sunday, with tours departing from Lanesboro’s Sons of Norway Lodge, 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. both days.
Correction (Sept. 22, 2022): An earlier version of this article misidentified where Raya Esmaeili lives and had the incorrect name of the ensemble. The article has been updated.
Updated: 9:47 a.m. Raya Esmaeili of northeast Minneapolis is looking forward to the “Music of Iran” concert, part of the Twin Cities Iranian Culture Festival. The show will feature Minnesota-based artists performing a variety of Iranian music.
One of the groups performing is The Ensemble Aras, consisting of Niloofar Sohi, Negin Chahardoli, Yashar Alizadeh and Aidin Milani. Esmaeili said the group performs music from different ethnic groups and cultures found in Iran, including in different languages.
“If you haven’t heard it before, I think it’s a great introduction,” Esmaeili said.
Others performing include the Twin Cities Daf Ensemble and vocalist Aida Shahghasemi.
The “Music of Iran” concert at the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts is Sunday at 2 p.m. in St. Paul.
Co-artistic Director of Ragamala Dance Company Aparna Ramaswamy highlights an event for Minnesota writer Will McGrath’s new book “Farewell Transmission: Notes from Hidden Spaces”. The book, published in August, is a collection of essays featuring insight into the lives of people from different parts of the world.
One of the people featured in the book, comedian Ali Sultan, will be performing at the event. A conversation with novelist Curtis Sittenfeld will also take place.
A launch event is Tuesday, 7 p.m. at Sisyphus Brewing in Minneapolis.
Theater professional Catherine Glynn in Lanesboro recommends checking out History ALive! Lanesboro’s pop-up plays “Roma,” “Norskies” and “Bumtown.” Organized by Artistic Director Jane Peck, the pop-up plays depict real events from the towns’ past and are performed for audiences as they tour throughout Lanesboro.
This year's stories are set in 1935 and allow audience members to walk through a Roma camp, experience a short play in Norwegian and interact with local historical characters like journalist Cecil Ward.
The pop-up plays take place on Saturday and Sunday, with tours departing from Lanesboro’s Sons of Norway Lodge, 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. both days.
Correction (Sept. 22, 2022): An earlier version of this article misidentified where Raya Esmaeili lives and had the incorrect name of the ensemble. The article has been updated.
Updated: 9:47 a.m. Raya Esmaeili of northeast Minneapolis is looking forward to the “Music of Iran” concert, part of the Twin Cities Iranian Culture Festival. The show will feature Minnesota-based artists performing a variety of Iranian music.
One of the groups performing is The Ensemble Aras, consisting of Niloofar Sohi, Negin Chahardoli, Yashar Alizadeh and Aidin Milani. Esmaeili said the group performs music from different ethnic groups and cultures found in Iran, including in different languages.
“If you haven’t heard it before, I think it’s a great introduction,” Esmaeili said.
Others performing include the Twin Cities Daf Ensemble and vocalist Aida Shahghasemi.
The “Music of Iran” concert at the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts is Sunday at 2 p.m. in St. Paul.
Co-artistic Director of Ragamala Dance Company Aparna Ramaswamy highlights an event for Minnesota writer Will McGrath’s new book “Farewell Transmission: Notes from Hidden Spaces”. The book, published in August, is a collection of essays featuring insight into the lives of people from different parts of the world.
One of the people featured in the book, comedian Ali Sultan, will be performing at the event. A conversation with novelist Curtis Sittenfeld will also take place.
A launch event is Tuesday, 7 p.m. at Sisyphus Brewing in Minneapolis.
Theater professional Catherine Glynn in Lanesboro recommends checking out History ALive! Lanesboro’s pop-up plays “Roma,” “Norskies” and “Bumtown.” Organized by Artistic Director Jane Peck, the pop-up plays depict real events from the towns’ past and are performed for audiences as they tour throughout Lanesboro.
This year's stories are set in 1935 and allow audience members to walk through a Roma camp, experience a short play in Norwegian and interact with local historical characters like journalist Cecil Ward.
The pop-up plays take place on Saturday and Sunday, with tours departing from Lanesboro’s Sons of Norway Lodge, 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. both days.
Correction (Sept. 22, 2022): An earlier version of this article misidentified where Raya Esmaeili lives and had the incorrect name of the ensemble. The article has been updated.
Art curator and bilingual instructor William Franklin recommends a trip along the St Croix River this weekend for the River Valley Potters Fall Tour, with stops at three pottery home studios in Shafer and Marine on St. Croix.
Nick Earl, Peter Jadoonath and father-daughter duo Guillermo and Alana Cuellar are the host potters, each of whom will host an additional four to six artists, ensuring that there will be plenty of handmade ceramics to see at each stop. Franklin particularly appreciates the work of fellow Venezuela-to-Minnesota transplant Guillermo Cuellar.
The pottery tour runs Sept. 16-18 from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. It’s part of a larger event called Take Me to the River, which celebrates “art at every bend in the river” through Oct 2.
Rachel Miller looks forward to her hometown Lakeville Art Festival every third weekend of September. Held on the grounds of the Lakeville Area Arts Center, Miller says the two-day festival is a celebration of art that is intimate in feel. She loves getting to know the creatives who return year after year for the juried arts show as well as those emerging on the scene.
“Each time I go, I am so inspired, and it’s not just because of the fine artists. It just gives me a sense of community,” said Miller.
She particularly recommends checking out the vivid paintings of Olga Krasovska, originally of Ukraine, now living in Granite Falls, and the wooden furniture of Justin Hossle of Minneapolis, who she says won Best in Show at last year’s festival. The festival also includes a community art project. This year it’s a 3D sculpture whose theme is “Setting Sail” — along with a youth art tent, live music, food, and art demos.
The festival runs Saturday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Sharon Mansur of Winona was a McKnight dance fellow from 2018, and she is looking forward to seeing SOLO: the world-premiere dance performances by the 2020 and 2021 McKnight cohort. The performance will be a night of hip-hop, rhythmic Chicago footwork, Brazilian contemporary choreography, and modern contemporary dance. Each of the six dance solos lasts up to 10 minutes, interspersed with short videos showing behind-the-scenes looks at the artist’s process.
Each year, this prestigious award goes to three dancers who each develop a new solo dance work with the help of a choreographer they commission. Last year, the previous two cohorts presented their work as dance videos amid the pandemic; this year, the performances will be live.
The 2021 dance fellows whose work will be presented this year are Alexandra Eady, Hassan Ingraham, and David Stalter, Jr. The 2020 fellows are Non Edwards, Melissa Clark, and Marciano Silva dos Santos.
The dancers take the stage Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m. at the Goodale Theater at the Cowles Center for Dance and The Performing Arts in Minneapolis. Saturday’s performance is pay-as-you-are and will be live-streamed.
Art curator and bilingual instructor William Franklin recommends a trip along the St Croix River this weekend for the River Valley Potters Fall Tour, with stops at three pottery home studios in Shafer and Marine on St. Croix.
Nick Earl, Peter Jadoonath and father-daughter duo Guillermo and Alana Cuellar are the host potters, each of whom will host an additional four to six artists, ensuring that there will be plenty of handmade ceramics to see at each stop. Franklin particularly appreciates the work of fellow Venezuela-to-Minnesota transplant Guillermo Cuellar.
The pottery tour runs Sept. 16-18 from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. It’s part of a larger event called Take Me to the River, which celebrates “art at every bend in the river” through Oct 2.
Rachel Miller looks forward to her hometown Lakeville Art Festival every third weekend of September. Held on the grounds of the Lakeville Area Arts Center, Miller says the two-day festival is a celebration of art that is intimate in feel. She loves getting to know the creatives who return year after year for the juried arts show as well as those emerging on the scene.
“Each time I go, I am so inspired, and it’s not just because of the fine artists. It just gives me a sense of community,” said Miller.
She particularly recommends checking out the vivid paintings of Olga Krasovska, originally of Ukraine, now living in Granite Falls, and the wooden furniture of Justin Hossle of Minneapolis, who she says won Best in Show at last year’s festival. The festival also includes a community art project. This year it’s a 3D sculpture whose theme is “Setting Sail” — along with a youth art tent, live music, food, and art demos.
The festival runs Saturday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Sharon Mansur of Winona was a McKnight dance fellow from 2018, and she is looking forward to seeing SOLO: the world-premiere dance performances by the 2020 and 2021 McKnight cohort. The performance will be a night of hip-hop, rhythmic Chicago footwork, Brazilian contemporary choreography, and modern contemporary dance. Each of the six dance solos lasts up to 10 minutes, interspersed with short videos showing behind-the-scenes looks at the artist’s process.
Each year, this prestigious award goes to three dancers who each develop a new solo dance work with the help of a choreographer they commission. Last year, the previous two cohorts presented their work as dance videos amid the pandemic; this year, the performances will be live.
The 2021 dance fellows whose work will be presented this year are Alexandra Eady, Hassan Ingraham, and David Stalter, Jr. The 2020 fellows are Non Edwards, Melissa Clark, and Marciano Silva dos Santos.
The dancers take the stage Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m. at the Goodale Theater at the Cowles Center for Dance and The Performing Arts in Minneapolis. Saturday’s performance is pay-as-you-are and will be live-streamed.
Art curator and bilingual instructor William Franklin recommends a trip along the St Croix River this weekend for the River Valley Potters Fall Tour, with stops at three pottery home studios in Shafer and Marine on St. Croix.
Nick Earl, Peter Jadoonath and father-daughter duo Guillermo and Alana Cuellar are the host potters, each of whom will host an additional four to six artists, ensuring that there will be plenty of handmade ceramics to see at each stop. Franklin particularly appreciates the work of fellow Venezuela-to-Minnesota transplant Guillermo Cuellar.
The pottery tour runs Sept. 16-18 from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. It’s part of a larger event called Take Me to the River, which celebrates “art at every bend in the river” through Oct 2.
Rachel Miller looks forward to her hometown Lakeville Art Festival every third weekend of September. Held on the grounds of the Lakeville Area Arts Center, Miller says the two-day festival is a celebration of art that is intimate in feel. She loves getting to know the creatives who return year after year for the juried arts show as well as those emerging on the scene.
“Each time I go, I am so inspired, and it’s not just because of the fine artists. It just gives me a sense of community,” said Miller.
She particularly recommends checking out the vivid paintings of Olga Krasovska, originally of Ukraine, now living in Granite Falls, and the wooden furniture of Justin Hossle of Minneapolis, who she says won Best in Show at last year’s festival. The festival also includes a community art project. This year it’s a 3D sculpture whose theme is “Setting Sail” — along with a youth art tent, live music, food, and art demos.
The festival runs Saturday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Sharon Mansur of Winona was a McKnight dance fellow from 2018, and she is looking forward to seeing SOLO: the world-premiere dance performances by the 2020 and 2021 McKnight cohort. The performance will be a night of hip-hop, rhythmic Chicago footwork, Brazilian contemporary choreography, and modern contemporary dance. Each of the six dance solos lasts up to 10 minutes, interspersed with short videos showing behind-the-scenes looks at the artist’s process.
Each year, this prestigious award goes to three dancers who each develop a new solo dance work with the help of a choreographer they commission. Last year, the previous two cohorts presented their work as dance videos amid the pandemic; this year, the performances will be live.
The 2021 dance fellows whose work will be presented this year are Alexandra Eady, Hassan Ingraham, and David Stalter, Jr. The 2020 fellows are Non Edwards, Melissa Clark, and Marciano Silva dos Santos.
The dancers take the stage Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m. at the Goodale Theater at the Cowles Center for Dance and The Performing Arts in Minneapolis. Saturday’s performance is pay-as-you-are and will be live-streamed.
Cynthia Hall-Duran of St. Paul has been a fan of the AZ Gallery (also called Argyle Zebra Gallery) in Lowertown for a while, and she was able to attend the soft opening of their September show “Rejected.”
More than 2,200 artists, both emerging and professional, submitted their work to the State Fair’s Fine Arts show this year, and only 324 were on display. Plenty of quality work didn’t make the cut, and AZ’s “Rejected!” gives these photos, paintings and other works a second chance to be seen. Hall-Duran called the show delightful.
AZ Gallery is open 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays. There’s an artist reception from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Friday. The show runs through Sept. 25.
Art lover Florence Brammer of West St. Paul said she can’t stop telling people about the Weisman Art Museum’s fall exhibition, surveying three decades of art by Piotr Szyhalski. “We Are Working All The Time!” displays an impressive array of Szyhalski’s work, including posters, painting, web projects and public performance.
Raised and trained in Poland, Szyhalski is a professor of design and media arts at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design. Brammer singles out Szyhalski’s Labor Camp Report posters: a series of 225 hand-inked posters created daily over the course of eight months during the pandemic.
“To see them all together, chronologically hung, is really stunning,” Brammer said.
The show is open for public viewing now, but the gallery will host an opening bash on Sept. 15 at 7 p.m, its first such event since the pandemic hit. The exhibit will be on view at the gallery on the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities campus through Dec. 31.
Courtesy of Weisman Art Museum.
Installation view of Piotr Szyhalski: We Are Working All The Time!, at the Weisman Art Museum through Dec. 31, 2022.
Teacher, theater director and artist Justin Spooner of Minneapolis is looking forward to attending Exposed Brick Theatre’s Through Our Eyes Festival that starts this weekend. The festival spans two weekends and features two new plays back-to-back. “Freeing Assata” by interdisciplinary healing artist Sterling Miller takes on the incarceration and liberation of political activist Assata Shakur. Siddeeqah Shabazz’s play, “A Love Story in 8 Scenes,” which explores the clash of love and religion for one teenage Muslim girl.
Spooner appreciates that, in addition to showcasing two world premieres, the festival includes a series of short workshops, whose subjects include Spontaneous Storytelling, Decolonizing the Artist, and Exploring Childhood through your Senses. The festival starts Friday Sept. 9 at 7:30 p.m. and runs through Sept. 18 at Open Eye Theatre in Minneapolis.
Cynthia Hall-Duran of St. Paul has been a fan of the AZ Gallery (also called Argyle Zebra Gallery) in Lowertown for a while, and she was able to attend the soft opening of their September show “Rejected.”
More than 2,200 artists, both emerging and professional, submitted their work to the State Fair’s Fine Arts show this year, and only 324 were on display. Plenty of quality work didn’t make the cut, and AZ’s “Rejected!” gives these photos, paintings and other works a second chance to be seen. Hall-Duran called the show delightful.
AZ Gallery is open 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays. There’s an artist reception from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Friday. The show runs through Sept. 25.
Art lover Florence Brammer of West St. Paul said she can’t stop telling people about the Weisman Art Museum’s fall exhibition, surveying three decades of art by Piotr Szyhalski. “We Are Working All The Time!” displays an impressive array of Szyhalski’s work, including posters, painting, web projects and public performance.
Raised and trained in Poland, Szyhalski is a professor of design and media arts at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design. Brammer singles out Szyhalski’s Labor Camp Report posters: a series of 225 hand-inked posters created daily over the course of eight months during the pandemic.
“To see them all together, chronologically hung, is really stunning,” Brammer said.
The show is open for public viewing now, but the gallery will host an opening bash on Sept. 15 at 7 p.m, its first such event since the pandemic hit. The exhibit will be on view at the gallery on the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities campus through Dec. 31.
Courtesy of Weisman Art Museum.
Installation view of Piotr Szyhalski: We Are Working All The Time!, at the Weisman Art Museum through Dec. 31, 2022.
Teacher, theater director and artist Justin Spooner of Minneapolis is looking forward to attending Exposed Brick Theatre’s Through Our Eyes Festival that starts this weekend. The festival spans two weekends and features two new plays back-to-back. “Freeing Assata” by interdisciplinary healing artist Sterling Miller takes on the incarceration and liberation of political activist Assata Shakur. Siddeeqah Shabazz’s play, “A Love Story in 8 Scenes,” which explores the clash of love and religion for one teenage Muslim girl.
Spooner appreciates that, in addition to showcasing two world premieres, the festival includes a series of short workshops, whose subjects include Spontaneous Storytelling, Decolonizing the Artist, and Exploring Childhood through your Senses. The festival starts Friday Sept. 9 at 7:30 p.m. and runs through Sept. 18 at Open Eye Theatre in Minneapolis.
Cynthia Hall-Duran of St. Paul has been a fan of the AZ Gallery (also called Argyle Zebra Gallery) in Lowertown for a while, and she was able to attend the soft opening of their September show “Rejected.”
More than 2,200 artists, both emerging and professional, submitted their work to the State Fair’s Fine Arts show this year, and only 324 were on display. Plenty of quality work didn’t make the cut, and AZ’s “Rejected!” gives these photos, paintings and other works a second chance to be seen. Hall-Duran called the show delightful.
AZ Gallery is open 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays. There’s an artist reception from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Friday. The show runs through Sept. 25.
Art lover Florence Brammer of West St. Paul said she can’t stop telling people about the Weisman Art Museum’s fall exhibition, surveying three decades of art by Piotr Szyhalski. “We Are Working All The Time!” displays an impressive array of Szyhalski’s work, including posters, painting, web projects and public performance.
Raised and trained in Poland, Szyhalski is a professor of design and media arts at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design. Brammer singles out Szyhalski’s Labor Camp Report posters: a series of 225 hand-inked posters created daily over the course of eight months during the pandemic.
“To see them all together, chronologically hung, is really stunning,” Brammer said.
The show is open for public viewing now, but the gallery will host an opening bash on Sept. 15 at 7 p.m, its first such event since the pandemic hit. The exhibit will be on view at the gallery on the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities campus through Dec. 31.
Courtesy of Weisman Art Museum.
Installation view of Piotr Szyhalski: We Are Working All The Time!, at the Weisman Art Museum through Dec. 31, 2022.
Teacher, theater director and artist Justin Spooner of Minneapolis is looking forward to attending Exposed Brick Theatre’s Through Our Eyes Festival that starts this weekend. The festival spans two weekends and features two new plays back-to-back. “Freeing Assata” by interdisciplinary healing artist Sterling Miller takes on the incarceration and liberation of political activist Assata Shakur. Siddeeqah Shabazz’s play, “A Love Story in 8 Scenes,” which explores the clash of love and religion for one teenage Muslim girl.
Spooner appreciates that, in addition to showcasing two world premieres, the festival includes a series of short workshops, whose subjects include Spontaneous Storytelling, Decolonizing the Artist, and Exploring Childhood through your Senses. The festival starts Friday Sept. 9 at 7:30 p.m. and runs through Sept. 18 at Open Eye Theatre in Minneapolis.
Monarda Thrasher loved Mixed Precipitation’s traveling production of “The Magic Flute” when they saw it earlier this month in Grand Marais, and they highly recommend this fun, modern take on Mozart’s opera.
Mixed Precipitation calls its traveling series “The Pickup Truck Opera” because the truck and trailer are both the mode of travel and part of the set design. Set in Strange Land Middle School, this production explores teacher shortages, burnout and toxic positivity. Papageno and Papagena are janitors, and the raging Queen of the Night is recast as an education administrator.
The dialogue is in English, and performers slip easily from German arias to pop songs and back again. As an opera lover, Thrasher worried that this shortened production might leave them wanting more, but they said there was enough of the original music to satisfy, danced and sung in a way that kept their whole family entertained.
The outdoor production takes place Saturday and Sunday at 2 p.m. at Alexis Bailly Vineyard in Hastings, as well as Sept. 10 at Swede Hollow Park in St. Paul and Sept. 11 at JD Rivers’ Children’s Garden in Minneapolis.
Minneapolis comedian Robert Fones plans to spend his Labor Day weekend at Prairie Fyre music festival in Wood Lake in southwestern Minnesota. The camping/music festival runs Friday evening through Monday, with a line-up of over 50 bands and performers. Fones says the space that will hold the event is beautiful, and he’s intrigued by the line-up of music, burlesque, comedy, and poetry.
Festival attendees can also join in on glitch art workshops Saturday and Sunday mornings in nearby Granite Falls and get back in time for the musical events that start at 2 pm. Friday evening’s opening event features a Q&A with comic book author Rob Sheridan, who is best known for his art work with Nine Inch Nails.
Will Dykes of the band Montclair really enjoys the sound of the Rat Castle Jazz Ensemble. He says the Minneapolis group has a unique sound that doesn’t pander and they collaborate and connect with other local bands.
You can find the Rat Castle Jazz Ensemble’s work on all streaming platforms as well performing across the Twin Cities.
Here they are at the White Squirrel bar in St. Paul:
Don't see video? Click here.
Nancy XiáoRong Valentine is a visual artist in Underwood, and she was deeply moved by the exhibit, "Return to Normal? COVID Diaries from Local Youth" at the Otter Tail County Historical Society in Fergus Falls, Minn.
The exhibition by five high school students and one college student uses a range of artistic styles to tell the story of how COVID-19 affected their lives and education — and what it means to return to normal.
Valentine was struck by how thoughtful and vulnerable each of the artists were in considering the complexities of the pandemic. She says she was moved to tears by the work of Sylvia Pesch, who wrote an original piano piece that pairs with poetry and visuals.
The show runs through Sept. 30.
Retired arts educator Le Ann Gehring-Ryan of North Mankato recommends a show at the Owatonna Arts Center, the solo exhibit by landscape painter Andrew Judkins.
Judkins, also of North Mankato, is an avid hiker, and many of his landscape paintings feature water — from the waterfalls in the Mankato area to scenes on the North Shore.
Gehring-Ryan appreciates Judkins’ eye for color and his carefully layered paint that makes images “jump right off the canvas.”
Aurora: Landscapes by Andrew Judkins runs through Sunday.
Bill Childs of St. Paul runs a weekly radio music show for kids called “Spare the Rock, Spoil the Child,” and he loves the new album, “The Greats,” by Louis and Dan and the Invisible Band. The Northfield-based group is the brainchild of Louis Epstein, who teaches musicology at St. Olaf College, and Dan Groll, who teaches philosophy at Carleton College. Childs calls the album “goofy and funny and very smart.”
“It’s kind of like a standards album, except that none of the songs are covers.” Childs added that Louis and Dan are masters at each genre they tackle.
The album includes several guest artists, including Tesfa Wondemagegnehu, Chapel Choir director at St. Olaf, who joins in on a jazzy tune about the joy of singing and a blues number about barbeque.
The band will be performing on Sept. 4 as part of the 10th annual Fest du Nord at Camp du Nord in Ely. The festival runs Sept. 2 - Sept. 4.
Puppeteer Karly Bergmann was a fellow in the previous PuppetLab cohort, and she is excited that the series is back after a pandemic hiatus for its 10th year. Four residency artists have spent the past six months developing and workshopping new, experimental works with puppets, which will air as two distinct shows this weekend and next. Titled, The PuppetLab Festival of New Work at Open Eye Theatre in Minneapolis, Dominique Herskind and Mary Plaster will perform this Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. Amoke Kubat and Liping Vong perform Aug. 19-21. Both shows run about 60 minutes. Masks are required in the theater.
Photo by Bruce Silcox
Artist Dominique Herskind in costume for the Puppet Lab.
Brian Parmeter has been a fan of Prudence Johnson’s singing career for decades. He’s looking forward to seeing her and a number of other performers he recognizes from “Prairie Home Companion” at the Backus Community Center in International Falls on Friday, Aug. 12 at 7 p.m. The free concert is entitled “An Evening of Stories, Songs & Laughs” and it features storyteller Kevin Kling along with musicians Dan Chouinard and Randy Sabien, as well as special guest Anishinaabe comedian Pebaamibines.
Visitors can also check out a show of paintings and photography, “Natural Wonders II,” at the Backus Center through Aug. 12. There is an artists’ reception for both performers and artists at 5:30 p.m. on Friday.
Matt Wehling of Northfield is an artisan violin bowmaker and musician, and next weekend he’s ready to head to the Cannon River Clay Tour in and around Northfield. Wehling remembers last year’s event as “a wonderful weekend to be out,” adding that he invariably runs into people he knows and pottery he likes. This year, 21 potters are displaying their creations at four different locations in the Northfield area Aug. 20-21 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. You can find a map of the locations here.
Mai Tran, a woodcut and print artist from Mankato, is looking forward to seeing an exhibit at her favorite local gallery, 410 Project. The show is titled “Art Inside,” and it features 60 works made by people incarcerated at Minnesota Correctional Facility - Faribault.
The artists are students in Scholars Serving Time, a Minnesota State University, Mankato program. Tran is impressed with the works the gallery has revealed so far online. The exhibit runs Aug. 5 - 20, with an opening reception Friday from 7 - 9 p.m.
Courtesy of Dana Sikkila
Hummingbird by artist Nicholas P. "Inspired by hummingbirds I have seen when I was younger. I've always loved birds and in general I love looking at paintings of them."
The Fringe Festival kicks off Thursday and runs through August 14 with shows running under an hour at venues across the Twin Cities. Callie Aho, a director and intimacy counselor from Savage, is looking forward to attending. In particular, she’s planning to see Sheree Froelich’s show “My Empty Arms.”
The two-woman show tells of Froelich’s decision to give her daughter up for adoption more than two decades ago. The subject strikes a personal note for Aho, whose mother was adopted, and she says this poignant show is bound to spark conversation.
The show runs August 4, 6, 7, 11, and 13 at the University of Minnesota’s Rarig Center Arena. The show is appropriate for ages 16 and up. Find information on attending all the Fringe Festival shows here.
Suzanne Tibbetts is a huge fan of Twin Cities comedian Trish Cook, who will be performing along with Jonny R. and “The Rez Reporter” Rob Fairbanks at the NDN Way Comedy show next week. Tibbets, who saw the show a few weeks ago and plans to watch it again, says the three Native American comedians play off each other, but each has their own style.
Cook has ties to both the Red Lake reservation in northern Minnesota and to Minneapolis; she uses both of those worlds in her storytelling.
The show will be at Rick Bronson’s House of Comedy in the Mall of America on Aug. 10. Cook performs at 7:30 p.m.
Laura Burlis of Minneapolis appreciates the work of the organization “Art to Change the World,” and she’s looking forward to attending the artist talks at Saturday’s closing event for their “Age of Age” project.
The exhibit features 10 pairs of artists, roughly 20 years apart, who create art works either together or in conversation with one another. The artists’ ages span from 25 to 103 years old, and they vary in experience level. Burlis enjoyed hearing about the connections that the creatives formed.
Courtesy of Barbara Bridges.
"Resilience" on acrylic and mixed media by Rebecca Davis and Bronwyn Waid.
One pair, Madalina Kelner, 25, and Layl McDill, 51, reached back to their childhoods to create habitats for fairies and Smurfs from found objects. Other pairings created paintings and self-portraits, and other works sure to spark conversation in this exhibit designed to spark conversation about age.
The exhibit at Homewood Studios in Minneapolis is on view Friday 1 to 6 p.m., with a closing event Saturday from 2-4:30 p.m. The Saturday event is one of many taking place during the FLOW Northside Art Crawl Thursday through Saturday.
Painter Alena Hrabcakova is at an artist residency in Pennington, Minn., and she’s heading to Puposky, north of Bemidji, this weekend to see a concert performance of a new musical. “Water from Snow” was written and directed by Minneapolis playwright Janet Preus, with music co-composed and co-arranged by Fred Steele, of the singing family The Steeles, and Robert Elhai, Tony-nominated for his work on Broadway’s Lion King, also of Minneapolis.
Set in northern Minnesota, the musical tells the story of a single mother finding her way in the world, who returns to her hometown to make peace with her teenage daughter.
Produced by Mask and Rose Women’s Theater Collective, which lifts up work by women playwrights, the concert performance has three showings: Saturday at 2 p.m. and 7 p.m. and Sunday at 2.
Novelist Linda LeGarde Grover of the Bois Forte Band of Ojibwe has a recommendation for families in Duluth. Every Wednesday and Saturday at 1 p.m. through Labor Day, there is an Ojibwe story time at the Lake Superior Ojibwe Gallery, located on the fourth floor of The Depot.
Through the stories told each session, listeners can learn about Ojibwe cultural teachings. Books were selected by the St. Louis County Historical Society American Indian committee.
Story time is aimed at children ages two to 12, but all are welcome and it’s free.
Brad Pappas of St. Louis Park performed in Theatre 55’s concert production of “Hair” last summer. Now he’s looking forward to seeing the company’s performance of “Jesus Christ Superstar,” opening Friday.
Pappas said the show promises strong actors in a beautiful setting, at the outdoor amphitheater at Caponi Art Park in Eagan.
Lyrics will be provided for the audience to sing along to the title song during the encore, though the audience is welcome to sing along during the show as well. It runs through July 24. Tickets are $15 a person or $30 per vehicle with up to six people inside.
St. Paul actor and director Greta Grosch recently discovered the Minnesota Mandolin Orchestra, and she’s excited to spread the word about this community ensemble with several upcoming concerts. Formed in 1991, the Minnesota Mandolin Orchestra has about 25 musicians playing a range of classical and contemporary music on plucked stringed instruments.
“It's what a community orchestra is supposed to be: people coming together because they have a passion for music,” she said.
Grosch said she was delighted to learn that Minnesota has a rich history of mandolin orchestra. Because the instrument was affordable and fairly easy to learn, mandolin groups were hugely popular in Minnesota in the early 1900s, though they fell out of fashion starting in the 1940s.
The Minnesota Mandolin Orchestra performs this Sunday at the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum from 1:30 p.m. to 3 p.m. An entry ticket to the Arboretum is required.
Upcoming free public performances will be at the Richfield Band Shell on July 26, the Loring Park Art Festival in Minneapolis on July 31, and Centennial Lakes Park in Edina on August 1.
Escape room enthusiast Michael Larson of Minneapolis recommends a new backstage escape room set inside a theater. In “The Show Must Go On,” two to eight participants must find the missing diamonds of a visiting Broadway legend before she takes the stage in 75 minutes. The escape room is designed by David Pisa of Walking Shadow Theater.
Larson appreciates Pisa’s inventive shows, which explore the line between immersive theater and escape room puzzles. There are no live actors in this particular escape room but, like the best puzzle experiences, this one will leave you feeling like you’ve lived through the drama.
“The Show Must Go On” takes place at Daleko Arts in New Prague and runs through the summer. Individual tickets go on sale Friday.
Join MPR News, Art Hounds and the APM Research Lab for a celebration of the art and artists that have been essential to Minnesota’s communities. Some of our MPR News Art Hounds will share their insights, and detail how we can ensure art, theater and music are serving diverse communities in Minnesota.
Plus, the APM Research Lab will share how Minnesotans of color view and access the state’s cultural amenities. We’ll highlight how the arts community is addressing the longstanding barriers to access and inclusion in the arts, and we’ll share how you can get involved.
Hosted by Denzel Belin and featuring Ben Clary from the APM Research Lab as well as the following artists: Lily Tung Crystal; Autumn Cavender; Dae Yang; Lue Thao; May Lee-Yang; Mary Anne and Sergio Quiroz; and Tish Jones.
The full results of the Minnesota's Diverse Community Survey related to Arts & Culture are available at the APM Research Lab's website.
Watch their discussions using the video player above.
This activity is made possible in part by the Minnesota Legacy Amendment's Arts & Cultural Heritage Fund.
Bobby Marines of Rochester heard about a juried arts show about walking and wondered what such a pedestrian topic would yield. The Rochester Art Center show blew Marines away.
Titled “Walk With Us,” the show of 15 local, national and international artists is varied and creative in its use of space. The exhibit is tucked into the hallways and alcoves of the building.
Artists explore the physical act of walking, its meditative properties and our connections to land and water. Marines liked Presley Martin’s cairns made of plastic that the artist found walking along the Mississippi River and painted to resemble rock. The exhibit runs through October 3.
Emma Fitzsimmons is a dancer and choreographer in St Paul. She’s been able to get a sneak peek at the show La.dy.like opening Saturday at Lowertown Underground Artist Gallery.
Andrea Bagdon (she/her) and Spencer Gillespie (she/they) investigate femininity. The space uses painting, projections, and multimedia works to ask what and who gets to be called “ladylike,” and what does it mean?
Fitzsimmons says the exhibit invites guests to peer into boxes or hold art pieces in their hands. “From the moment you step in, you're going to be immersed in this feminist experience,” said Fitzsimmons.
The show runs through July.
Sometimes there are performers whose work you enjoy so much, you’d see whatever they are in. That’s how Sean Dillon, managing director of HUGE Improv Theater, feels about James Rone, Mike Fotis and Jen Scott.
The three Twin Cities artists are teaming up for a night of original songs and funny stories Friday at Bryant Lake Bowl Theatre under the title “There’s a Crack in Everything.” Rone is a songwriter and musician, Fotis is a storyteller and comedian and Scott is a musician who performed as Penny and the Bandits.
Dillon says the show promises to be full of humor and heart. The show starts at 7 p.m.
Correction (June 30, 2022): A previous version of this report misidentified Presley Martin. The story has been updated.
St. Paul creative Tommy Sar recommends checking out the play “Cambodian Rock Band” at the Jungle Theater in Minneapolis, co-produced by Theater Mu. The play follows a Khmer Rouge survivor returning to Cambodia after 30 years as his daughter prosecutes a war criminal.
Key to the show is its music, as the actor-musicians perform popular Cambodian psychedelic rock music from the 1960s and new music by the American band Dengue Fever, whose lead singer is Cambodian.
“Many times, whenever we Cambodians are portrayed as survivors and victims of tragedy, and that is very valid,” said Sar, whose father survived the Khmer Rouge and was also a musician. “But I also feel it's important to see Cambodians not just as survivors but as rising again and thriving again and rediscovering and creating new music, we have so much to offer. And we are very proud of our heritage.”
The play runs through July 31 at the Jungle Theater. Single tickets are valued at $45, but people may choose to pay less or more depending on their situation.
Jean Marie Durant is a big fan of public art, and she plans to hop on a bus tour this Saturday for a Women on Walls tour of murals by women artists. The bus tour is part of Chroma Zones Mural and Arts Festival, which runs through Sunday, celebrating murals and graffiti art by local and international artists. Five women artists will collaborate on a new mural over the course of the five-day festival.
The 45-minute guided bus tours will explore the stories behind at least eight woman-created murals in the University-Raymond Ave. area, including a look at the mural-in-progress. Tours leave from Workhorse Coffee at 10 a.m. and 11:30 a.m. on Saturday.
Tanya Anderson, co-coordinator of the St Anthony Park Arts Festival, loves the original jewelry of Louise Payjack-Guillou. Anderson loves the unique ways the Duluth artist pairs gems and metal. Her store, Atelier & Stone is located in Duluth, and the trained goldsmith will be at Park Point Art Fair this weekend and at the Grand Marais Arts Festival July 9 and 10.
Her jewelry “just has this stately presence. It's kind of magical in how it makes you feel when you see it and and wear it,” Anderson said.
Sally Power, a paper marbling artisan in St. Paul, took a trip to the Owatonna Arts Center for Kristin Peterson’s exhibit, “Children of Nature: Find your Wonderland.” This solo exhibit of pencil drawings and watercolor is an invitation to pause and find delight in plants, insects, and shells.
“You can walk through the show and see the different things that caught her attention and come out thinking, well, what should I focus on?” Powers said.
The show runs through June 30.
Rachel Doran of Crash.Dance.Productions. calls RatHaus’ immersive Cabarave performances “what you wish every night out could be.” The cabaret includes aerial artists, fire performers, singers, dancers and painters performing short sets around — and occasionally above — the audience.
The audience has a 360-degree-view of the artists. Doran’s favorite part is when the performers teach the audience a brief dance sequence and everyone joins in.
Prior to the pandemic, Cabarave shows took place twice a year. The theme of their newest show is “Euphoria.” It takes place Thursday and Friday at Brother Justus Whiskey in northeast Minneapolis, with an outdoor pre-party at 6:30 p.m. The performance begins at 8 p.m. Proof of COVID vaccination or a negative COVID test within 72 of the event is required for admission.
Sandra Agustin has been an active member of the Twin Cities arts scene for decades as a choreographer and arts administrator. Recently, Agustin attended a concert by Minnesota Boychoir and she says she was “hooked” by the joyful noise. Singers aged six to 18 performed a range of genres from classical to pop.
“Their voices were uplifting. The confidence and pride that they showed us all and camaraderie was infectious,” Agustin said.
Minnesota Boychoir is celebrating 60 years with a concert on Saturday at 7 p.m. at Orchestra Hall in Minneapolis. The performance has a livestream option through the Boychoir website.
Behavioral artist Aki Shibata is delighted that the all-night festival Northern Spark will return to her Frogtown and Rondo neighborhoods. This year’s festival takes place at four locations along and near University Avenue in St. Paul, from 9 p.m. Saturday until 2 a.m., with a closing event Sunday morning that ends shortly after sunrise on Raspberry Island.
The theme for the artists’ work is “What the World Needs Now.” Visitors may navigate their way among the locations to admire a range of art, many of which have interactive elements.
The locations include the Victoria Theater Arts Center, the Rondo Community Library, Springboard for the Arts, and the Minnesota Museum of American Art. Shibata says she plans to attend them all, but she is particularly looking forward to the Drive-in Movie Extravaganza with shadow puppets, created by Eva Adderlay at the Victoria Theater, and to watching the sun rise over the interactive closing event by Sequoia Hauck, which will include painters, singers, and dancers celebrating our connection to the water.
Allison Baker, an art professor at Hamline University, was excited to see the solo show by Ta-coumba T. Aiken at Dreamsong Gallery in northeast Minneapolis. Baker said the show “couldn’t have been better timed,” coming weeks after Aiken was awarded a prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship for 2022. The exhibit, entitled “Awakenings,” features Aiken’s large, abstract paintings and works on paper.
Photo by Tom Dunn, courtesy of Dreamsong
Ta-coumba T. Aiken. Ripple Effect, 2021. Acrylic on canvas.
“He talks about channeling the spirits of his ancestors into form and color,” said Baker, adding that he does so in “beautiful and incredible ways.” In some paintings, figures seem to emerge from the energetic lines on the canvas. She also recommends paying attention to the smaller studies and collages, which are a delicate counterpoint to the larger work.
The exhibit at Dreamsong runs through June 25.
You may see more of Aiken’s work at Soo Visual Arts Center in Minneapolis. The show, opening Sunday, is “Change is God-Take Root Among the Stars: Black Abstraction in the Midwest” and features the work of 17 artists.
Minneapolis-based performer and costumer Anissa Lubbers suggests catching the “10-Minute Play Festival” from the Lakeshore Players, which runs through Sunday at the Hanifl Performing Arts Center in White Bear Lake. Lubbers said the festival is an audience favorite that traditionally wraps up the players’ season.
The show features 10 plays, written by playwrights around the world and performed and directed by local talent. As for style, the audience can expect a bit of everything, from the silly to the serious and timely, from comedy to horror.
Elementary school music teacher and singer Ellen Christensen, of Minneapolis, is a big fan of the Bakken Trio, and she’s looking forward to their final show of the season where they will perform Pavel Haas’ String Quartet No. 2 “From the Monkey Mountains'' alongside the puppeteers of Z Puppets Rosenschnoz.
To create the show, the Bakken Trio invited listening groups to describe what they saw when they heard the music. Those imaginings informed the storytelling puppetry that will accompany the live performance.
Haas was a prolific composer whose musical career was tragically cut short when he was murdered in Auschwitz in 1944. His music was nearly lost following his death but has seen a resurgence in recent decades.
Christensen is glad that Minnesota audiences will have a chance to hear and see this 1925 composition presented in an imaginative way. The performance is Sunday at 4 p.m. at the Barry Family Campus of Sabes Jewish Community Center in Minneapolis.
Arts enthusiast Doris Rubenstein of Richfield recommends painter Carolyn Kleinberger’s solo show at the Hopkins Center for the Arts.
True to its title, the large portraits allow viewers to feel “Up Close from a Distance.”
The 28 paintings in the show were all created over the last two years as the artist’s antidote for social isolation during the pandemic. The portrait exhibition in Hopkins runs through June 18.
Marisa Hoogenakker loves to visit open artists’ studios in her hometown of Duluth, and that interest led her to the studio of abstract painter David Austin. Austin’s enthusiasm as he described his abstract paintings drew her in. Although the abstract and mixed media forms felt new, Hoogenakker was soon spotting tunnels, lakes and other familiar landmarks of the Lake Superior city.
Austin holds live painting demonstrations, sometimes featuring his young son painting on his own canvas, Saturdays at 10:30 a.m. on Instagram.
Hoogenakker recommends visiting Austin’s open artist studio on the third Saturday of the month if you’re in the area.
Beth Bergman, former owner of the art store Wet Paint, recommends a visit to the Form + Content Gallery in Minneapolis during its 15th anniversary exhibit.“You never know exactly what you’re going to see,” says Bergman. The style and medium of art on display changes month-to-month with each show.
The anniversary exhibit includes all 36 artists who’ve been members of the artist-run cooperative since its inception. True to name, the show specifies the form but not the content to its artists. In this case, all pieces are 15 x 15 x 15 inches. The content–the subject, form and style–will vary with each artist.
“Thoughtful Dialogue: 15 Years of Form + Content” runs through May 28. The gallery is open Thursdays through Saturdays.
Minneapolis photographer and writer George Slade appreciates a current photography exhibit by Andy Richter entitled “Walking with Julien.” Richter took the photographs during walks with his young son around his Northeast Minneapolis neighborhood over the past five years.
Slade says the photography project was a way for Richter to cope with parenthood and escape the confinement of COVID. Young Julien is in some of the pictures. In others, his presence was the spark for the conversation which led to meeting and photographing neighbors.
The work is on display in two different locations: in a gallery and outdoors where the photos were taken. The photographs will be on view at Artspace Jackson Flats in Minneapolis through May 25.; The gallery is open 12-5 on weekends and on weekdays by appointment. An outward-facing exhibit will be viewable on 23 storefronts and businesses in northeast Minneapolis through mid-August.
Jill Fisher of Duluth says she plans on attending all the events for Duluth Dylan Fest, which kicks off Saturday and runs through next week. This year’s festival is a grand finale of sorts for the “Year of Dylan,” which began with the musician’s 80th birthday last year. Robert “Bobby” Zimmerman was born in Duluth on May 24, 1941 and his family moved to Hibbing when he was 6 years old.
The festival begins with a free concert by Cowboy Angel Blue at The Rex at Fitger’s in Duluth starting at 7 p.m. Fisher says the band has “honed their Dylan songs to a very fine and original sound.”
Musical performances, lectures, and other events take place through the week in Duluth and in Superior. Other events of note are a front porch birthday party on Tuesday at Dylan’s childhood home from noon to 1 p.m. at 519 N. 3rd Ave. East with music by Greg Tiburzi.
The CD release party for “Free Wheeling Duluth Does Dylan,” takes place May 26 at the Earth Rider Festival Grounds in Superior at 6 p.m. Each of the local bands on the CD will perform one song. Many of the events at the festival are free, though the CD release party is $5.
Civil rights attorney, activist and Racial Justice Network founder Nekima Levy Armstrong appreciates the work of independent photojournalist KingDemetrius Pendleton, who has long documented social justice demonstrations and events. Levy Armstrong said he’s known on the streets as the Black CNN, “because he’s always there, always documenting.”
His photography exhibit, The Movement Never Stops, runs Friday through Sunday at Block Portrait Studios in St. Paul. Pendleton’s exhibit will include photographs taken across the Twin Cities after George Floyd was killed by Minneapolis police officers.
“I think that people will be in for a real surprise, just to see the scope and depth of what he has been able to capture through his lens, and through his dedication and steadfast commitment to the fight for racial justice and pushing for an end to police violence,” said Levy Armstrong.
Dancer Erin Thompson of Minneapolis called the Riverside Park Sound Garden installation last spring a “delight for the senses,” and she’s looking forward to attending again this weekend.
The family friendly outdoor event features dance and poetry along with an immersive soundscape created by J. G. Everest.
“I just found that it kind of stopped time for me,” Thompson said. “It just combines nature and art in such a beautiful way. And it's very healing.”
The Riverside Park Sound Garden runs noon to 4 p.m. Saturday at the northwest corner of the park in Minneapolis. The event is free, but reservations are required.
Comedian Tane Danger wants people to know that there’s still time to catch Fearless Comedy Productions’ production of Shakespeare’s “Much Ado About Nothing” before it closes on Saturday.
Delayed by the pandemic, the comedy features the epic battle of wits and witticisms between Beatrice and Benedick, who are perfect for each other — if only they could stop arguing long enough to realize it. Director Duck Washington sets the play in the postwar 1940s. The production is staged at the Mounds Theatre, a renovated art deco movie theater in St. Paul.
The Mounds Theatre requires proof of full vaccination, including boosters as recommended by the CDC, as well as masks when not eating or drinking. Danger recommends checking out the themed cocktails that the theater pairs with its shows. Shows run Thursday, Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m.
Florence Brammer of West St. Paul says the newly refurbished St. Anthony Main Theatre is “absolutely gorgeous,” and she’s excited for its new life as MSP Film at The Main. The Minneapolis St. Paul Film Society has taken over operations and will now be programming all five screens year-round.
Brammer looks forward to attending in a space dedicated to independent and international film.
The society will also highlight the work of Minnesota artists through such special programming as Minnesota Made, Cine Latino and Nextwave, a youth filmmaking initiative.
The space will debut as host for the 41st annual Minneapolis St. Paul International Film Festival, with films starting Thursday at 7 p.m. The MSPIFF has a full lineup for those attending in person as well as virtual screenings this year.
The festival was fully online in 2020 and hybrid in 2021. Cheerfully titled “Shine Through,” the festival runs through May 19, with additional films at the Landmark Center in St. Paul, the Capri Theater in Minneapolis, and Gray Duck Theater and Coffeehouse in Rochester.
Sarah Larsson of the Nightingale Trio is a dedicated performer and student of the Eastern European folk music of her ancestors. She recommends the Ukrainian Village Band as “an incredibly addictive party band” playing both traditional and contemporary music.
Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the UVB has gone from party band to organizing force, and they are behind two musical fundraising efforts this weekend.
On Friday, UVB will be performing in a “Musicians for Ukraine” concert at the Dakota in Minneapolis at 7 p.m. That concert line-up also includes the Orkestar Bez Ime, who plays music of the Rom people across Eastern Europe, and the folk-rock band SlovCzech. The event is being organized by Natalie Nowytski from Okrestar Bez Ime. MCN6 will be streaming the concert online.
Then on Sunday, members of UVB will host as eight Twin Cities bands play in the “Band Aid for Ukraine” concert at the Minnesota Music Cafe from 4 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. The event will also be live-streamed through its Facebook page. Funds raised go to Stand With Ukraine MN.
Dinesh Krishnajois of Bloomington loves listening to improvisational music from around the world, and he wants to spread the word about the “ethereal voice” of scholar and vocalist Pooja Goswami Pavan. Pavan will perform "Jashn-e-Awadh,” a celebration of love ballads from the Awadh region in northern India, written during the early days of British occupation.
“Awadh was the epicenter of intense political, cultural and social activities,” Krishnajois explains, adding that “in these tumultuous times, the poets, composers, and folklorists wrote music and poetry full of hope, compassion and communal harmony.” Some of these classic songs have since entered the public sphere through Hindi film.
- More about Pooja Goswami Pavan Songs of Sufi love from a Hindustani voice anchored in Minnesota
The chamber music format will also feature Kedar Naphade on harmonium, Pankaj Mishra on sarangi, and Pavan on tabla. The 6 p.m. Sunday performance is at the Plymouth Playhouse, located within the Ramada Hotel and Conference Center in Plymouth.
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Miles Taylor of Wood Lake, Minn. is a burlesque DJ and visual artist with a particular interest in glitch art. He admires the innovative work of Autumn Cavender, a Dakota artist and midwife. Her art finds a common thread in digital media and traditional Dakota quillwork and hide processing.
Courtesy of Autumn Cavender
Autumn Cavender's artwork is of the digital form of the sounds of her son's birth.
A year ago, she recorded the sounds of the birth of her second son. Cavender turned those sounds into a digital image which Taylor says bears striking similarities to her quillwork. “Wowicakekage: Dakota Art Encoded” is currently at the K. K. Birge Gallery through May 7, and then it will travel through the summer. The exhibit will be at the Southwest Minnesota Arts Council in Marshall May 12 through June 17, then spend August at the Crossing Arts Alliance gallery in Brainerd.
Adam Wiltgen, residency coordinator and development director at the Anderson Center at Tower View, is enjoying the ongoing collaboration between Minnesota artists and poets through nearby Red Wing Arts. This year is the 21st annual juried Poet Artist Collaboration, which asks artists to illustrate selected original poems. The result, Wiltgen said, stretches visual artists outside their comfort zone to create something new.
Wiltgen recommends visitors check out Jacob Yeates’s visual response to Casey Patrick’s poem “Medusa,” where the hyper-realistic image changes and morphs; and Cole Redhorse Jacobson’s “provoking artwork” in response to Gwen Westerman’s poem on the significance of the Mississippi River for our wildlife and our collective wellbeing.
Courtesy of Red Wing Arts
Jacob Yeates illustrates a poem by Casey Patrick.
The exhibit is on display at Red Wing Arts through May 15, with Thursday night poetry readings running through that date. Red Wing Arts has created a chapbook of this year’s collaborations. A reception of the participating poets and visual artists will be held Friday starting at 6 p.m. at the St. James Hotel in downtown Red Wing and is open to the public.
Amy Garretson of the Rochester Arts Center has her tickets for the Mid West Music Fest in Winona Friday and Saturday. The two-day event offers a full line-up of artists from the region performing indie rock, pop synth, classic folk and more on multiple outdoor and indoor stages.
Garretson said it’s a great opportunity to discover the bars, coffee shops, and other venues in the Mississippi River town on a spring weekend. She’s looking forward to catching headliners Polica, Haley, and Bad Bad Hats. Proof of full vaccination or negative PCR test within 72 hours of event start is required.
Garretson offers a tip: VIP tickets to this Mid West Music Fest also include admission to a sister event in LaCrosse, Wisconsin in September.
Art aficionado Linda Tacke of Lanesboro says she plans to devote a day or two to this weekend’s Bluff Country Studio Art Tour. It’s the 21st year of the event, which grew from four artists to around 36, spread across 23 locations.
Courtesy of Bluff Country Studio Art Tour
A painting titled Country Rhythms by Joan Finnegan, one of the artists participating in this weekend’s Bluff Country Studio Art Tour.
Visitors can stop by the studios of painters and potters, jewelry makers, woodcarvers, fabric artists and more. Print off a map of artist studios here, or download the mobile app through the website to guide your arts tour across the Driftless Region. The event runs Friday through Sunday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
John Sievers, trombonist of Loud Mouth Brass is sharing the word about a new work by fellow Rochester artist and musician Becky Schlegel. “The Lullaby Collection” is an alphabet book with Schegel’s animal illustrations with poems and original songs for each.
From the book * Courtesy of Becky Schlegel
A page from Becky Schlegel's new book "The Lullaby Collection," which she wrote, illustrated and wrote music for. * Courtesy of Becky Schlegel
A page from Becky Schlegel's new book "The Lullaby Collection," which she wrote, illustrated and wrote music for. * Courtesy of Becky Schlegel
A page from Becky Schlegel's new book "The Lullaby Collection," which she wrote, illustrated and wrote music for. * Courtesy of Becky Schlegel
A page from Becky Schlegel's new book "The Lullaby Collection," which she wrote, illustrated and wrote music for.
The book includes a CD, which Schlegel recorded in the granary of her family farm. Schlegel will hold a book launch and concert for Saturday 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., with music from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at Dwell Local in Zumbrota.
Carol Jackson is a Twin Cities theater fan and blogger, and she’s looking forward to seeing the new show this weekend from Minneapolis Musical Theatre. The theater specializes in staging lesser-known musicals, sometimes in site-specific venues. Their new show, “Hands on a Hardbody,” about an endurance competition to win a new truck, is set in a car dealership.
The musical, which was briefly on Broadway in 2013, is based on a 1997 documentary about 10 Texans all vying for a new pickup truck. The rules were simple: Keep your hand on the truck; last person standing wins.
“Hands on a Hardbody” opens Friday and runs through May 8 at Luther Cadillac in Roseville. The theater offers a range of ticket and pricing options in this non-traditional venue, from regular seats to Bring-Your-Own chair to — somewhat immersive — standing room only. The show is not recommended for children under 10 due to mature themes.
Actor Gabriele Angieri of Burnsville went with his family to see the play “The Family Line” at the Capri Theater in Minneapolis. The 2-man show takes place entirely within a car, as a Jewish grandfather and his 15-year old biracial grandson meet for the first time and embark on a 24-hour road trip from Florida to Minnesota.
The grandson, whose mother has just died, struggles with a sense of abandonment as his grandfather swoops into his life to deliver him to a new life in Minnesota with a father he does not know. Set in 2020 during the unrest in Minneapolis, it's a show interwoven with family secrets and social commentary that Angieri said sparked both laughter and tears, as well as an excellent discussion with his 12 year-old daughter afterward.
“The Family Line” is the second show for Stage North, which launched in fall of 2021 with a focus on plays about urban life. Its shows are performed at the newly remodeled Capri Theater in North Minneapolis. Stage North has a partnership with Patrick Henry High School Drama Club, whose student members worked on the crew for the show.
The show runs through April 17th, with 2 PM matinees Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday and evening shows Friday and Saturday at 7:30 PM.
Fiber and textile artist Nora Rickey has enjoyed watching Cecilia Rolando’s evolving art show at the Front Porch Coffee & Tea Co. in Ely. In place since January, the show has been extended through April, and Rolando has continued to add new work as pieces sell. Rolando’s creative work is wide-ranging, from realistic watercolor florals to bold abstract paintings, from collages to jewelry to haiku. Rickey says the throughlines of the visual work on display are Rolando’s vivid colors, which add to the warmth of the popular community coffee shop. If you miss the show at the Front Porch, Rolando’s work is also on display at Art and Soul Gallery and Gift House down the street.
Courtesy of Cecilia Rolando
Cecilia Rolando and her work at Art and Soul gallery in Ely during a 2021 show.
Bassist Rob Morgan clearly recalls the massive transition he made from music student to touring performer, and he’s excited to see a theater version of that launching ground when the University of Minnesota/Guthrie Theater’s BFA students mount “The School for Lies,” starting Friday. This will be the first time in two years that graduating seniors in the acting program will take to the Dowling Stage on the Guthrie’s 9th floor. The play by David Ives is an adaptation of Moliere’s classic comedy “Le Misanthrope,” so you can expect to see larger-than-life characters and drama with plenty of witty repartee. Scenes, costume, light, and sound were all designed by University of Minnesota faculty. The show runs through April 23.
Artist, poet, and activist Dougie Padilla recommends a visit to ArtReach St. Croix in Stillwater to see the exhibit “Jim Denomie, Sweet Dreams,” which runs through May 7. Denomie passed away March 1. Padilla, his longtime friend, said Denomie was a “truly brilliant painter” and “a sweet and gentle man, a blessing to many in many different communities.”
“Jim was also the master of his own style of portraiture, and of what can only be called Dreamworld painting. With his own unique palette of blues and purples, pinks and oranges, greens and golds, Jim told stories that came out of some deep underground stream from far down inside his psyche, in the psyche of his Ojibwe ancestors,” Padilla said. “It penetrates the heart softly, even while shaking the very ground beneath our feet.”
The show in Stillwater includes portraits and character studies. Denomie painted figures with antlers and rabbit ears, riding on horseback.
“Are they leaving this world headed for the next? Are they already in the next world looking back, waiting for us? Named almost a year ago, this exhibit “Sweet Dreams” not only foreshadows Jim's leaving us here on this troubled Earth. It takes us along with him for the first mile or two of his ride home,” Padilla added.
Eric Heukeshoven, a jazz musician and composer who teaches at St. Mary’s University, plans to drive from Winona to Rochester to attend “A Tribute to John Paulson: Jazz at 70.” Paulson plays saxophone and flute, and he’ll perform original compositions and jazz standards. The rest of the quintet has musicians drawn from Rochester, Winona, and environs: Cliff Jack on guitar, Larry Price on piano, Miles Johnston on drums, and Robert S. P. Gardner on bass.
The Rochester Chamber Music Society event is Saturday at 7:30 p.m. at Christ United Methodist Church in Rochester. Masks are optional, and the show is free.
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Musician Keith Nystrom of Ham Lake says he was “blown away” by Minneapolis musician Jesse Norell’s new concept album, “Aorta Borealis.” Norell’s daughter Alyssa was born with Trisomy 21, also called Down’s Syndrome, as well as a serious heart defect. The album describes learning the diagnosis, the darkness and uncertainty of the heart surgeries and, ultimately, the love and joy of family. Alyssa is now 6.
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“Jesse has a real knack for doing very complicated things, but doing them in such the right way, that you don't really notice how complex they are,” said Nystrom.
Jesse Norell has an album release show on Friday with guests Ben Noble and Chris Mason at the Parkway Theater in Minneapolis. Doors open at 7 p.m. Music starts at 8 p.m.
Musician and educator Harry Chalmiers has admired the music and performances by Gao Hong since he first saw her in the ‘90s. Gao Hong, who teaches at Carleton College, is a master of the pipa, a Chinese instrument used for thousands of years and which is similar to a lute. The style of play is both highly technical and poetic. On Sunday, she’ll celebrate 50 years of performing in a 3 p.m. concert at the Ordway in St. Paul.
Chalmiers called her a “fabulous collaborative spirit” whose adventurousness in exploring different styles and performing with others across genres continues to produce innovative music.
The lineup of Sunday’s performance is an example of her wide-ranging collaborations. It will include rapper-singer Dessa, members of the Minnesota Orchestra and Gao Hong’s group Speaking in Tongues, whose musicians hail from Ghana and Mexico as well as the U.S.
Elementary school music teacher Becca Michaelson knows the power of video games to ignite a passion for music. She recalls transcribing her favorite “Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time” tune for flute as a fifth grader. That’s why she’s excited to attend the Video Games and Music Convention in Minneapolis, which will have listening and playing opportunities for all ages.
The three-day convention features opportunities for gamers and musicians alike. Bands will perform jazz, funk and classical, and takes on favorite video game tunes.
Michaelson recommends the orchestra clinic, open to all who want to bring their instruments and play video game music.
The conference is Friday through Sunday at Crowne Plaza Minneapolis West in Plymouth, Minn. There are online options as well. Proof of COVID vaccination is required to attend in person.
Padma Wudali of Minneapolis is a longtime student of Carnatic classical music. She loves the sound of the Twin Cities musical group, Maithree.
Maithree is Sanskrit for “friendship.” Wudali enjoys how the six musicians combine south Indian instruments like veena and mridangam with keyboard, cello, clarinet and voice to create a variety of styles of world music.
Hearing a clarinet or cello blend perfectly with Indian classical music is an “extremely endearing” image of friendship, Wudali said, where the musicians bring the best of their skills “into each others’ spaces” to make something beautiful.
“Maithree: the Music of Friendship” takes place on Sunday at 2 p.m. at the Lakeville Area Arts Center, part of their ongoing coffee concert series. The in-person event will also be livestreamed.
Dan Boyer of Virginia, Minn., who’s part of the music scene on the Iron Range, can’t say enough good things about the community of singers and songwriters in the north.
In particular, he’s a big fan of the Virginia-based band Horse Fzce, whose lyrics are twists on familiar circumstances, set to music that’s “folk-oriented” with a “pop-y drive to it.”
Two members of the band will be among the lineup of talented local singer/songwriters Thursday at the Ore House in Gilbert. The music starts at 6 p.m.
Apple Valley, Minn.-based musician Kerry Johnson recommends seeing the play “The Big Blue River” at the North Garden Theater in St. Paul.
It’s a double-debut — marking the launch of both the Mariah Theatre Company and of the play, written and directed by Mariah Theatre founder Patrick Coyle of St. Paul.
The show follows Laura Grace, a therapist who combats burnout by writing a fictional story based on one of her clients. The lines between reality and imagination quickly become blurred, and Johnson said by intermission he had no idea which way the play would go, which he enjoyed. Adding to the layers of storytelling, a short black-and-white film noir-style movie is included in the middle of the play.
The show is at 7 p.m. Wednesdays through Sundays through March 27, with a Q&A after both Thursday shows.
Sage Kiefer, a junior at Gustavus Adolphus College, says the current campus show by Minneapolis-based artist Max McInnis has been one of her favorites in her college career.
Photo by Jesse Yeakle
A sculpture from Max McInnis's exhibit “Dress Shopping at the Salvation Army Family Store and Donation Center," at the Schaefer Art Gallery.
McInnis’s exhibit at the Schaefer Art Gallery is “Dress Shopping at the Salvation Army Family Store and Donation Center.” McInnis explores the connections between design and fine art, turning furniture from thrift stores and other objects into surreal yet functional pieces — picture chairs with eyes, gemstones or chains.
McInnis upholstered logs as furniture and hung a bright rug on the wall. As an art student and avid thrifter, Kiefer says she was inspired. The show runs through April 6.
Diamond Knispel recommends checking out the work of a fellow Bemidji, Minn.-area visual artist, Tawnee Corning of Bagley. Corning is working on a series of 5 feet by 6 feet paintings that place humans in natural, yet surreal settings. The thought-provoking oil paintings are lavished with bright colors.
Conceived as a project that people could view regardless of any COVID restrictions, Corning’s work is on view both on her website and in a series of time-lapsed videos on YouTube that document her painting process.
The videos document the progression of both her paintings and her pregnancy with her third child. Motherhood is an important theme in Corning’s work, along with our connection to nature.
“Whatever our future holds, it seems that with Tawnee’s view on the world and with her paintings, it might be a more colorful one,” Diamond said.
Courtesy of Tawnee Corning
"Nature Nuture" by Tawnee Corning, oil and acrylic paint on 5 ft. x 6ft. stretched canvas, 2021.
Jex Arzayus of Minneapolis had their introduction to the Shrieking Harpies, a musical improv trio, when they attended a woman/trans/nonbinary improv class taught by one of the members, Hannah Wydeven.
Excited by the empowering space Wydeven created, Arzayus went to see the group perform and was hooked by the Shrieking Harpies’ ability to spin hourlong musical plays from a single audience suggestion.
“It was so well done that I thought, why aren't you guys on Saturday Night Live?” said Arzayus, who remembers laughing and crying at that first show.
The Shrieking Harpies perform every Friday at 7 p.m. in March and April at the HUGE Improv Theater in Minneapolis.
Michael Melrose guesses he’s been a fan of The Dollys for 15 years. Their roots-based country and Americana music make him nostalgic for the artists he heard growing up.
The Dollys cover Lucinda Williams, Emmylou Harris, Johnny Cash and — yes —Dolly Parton, exploring deep cuts as well as favorites and adding their own bluegrass flair.
He recommends checking out their Saturday brunch show at the Icehouse in Minneapolis at 11 a.m.
Puppeteer Seth Eberle is excited to see the “low-tech, high-magic puppetry effects” when “Once Upon a Winter Night” opens Thursday at Open Eye Theatre in Minneapolis.
“If there's something that Open Eye does very well, it is making fairy tales for adults with really good puppetry,” Eberle said.
The show is a new production by Open Eye co-founder Michael Sommers, whose work has explored ideas from Hans Christian Andersen in the past.
- Nicole Neri for MPR News
Puppeteers run through ha scene during a dress rehearsal of Once Upon a Winter Night at the Open Eye Puppet Theater. * Nicole Neri for MPR News
From left, puppeteers Dylan Rickard, Lizz Windnagel, and Kaillie Melvin control Little Sister and the snowman during a dress rehearsal of Once Upon a Winter Night at the Open Eye Puppet Theater. * Nicole Neri for MPR News
Lizz Windnagel, Dylan Rickard, and Noah Sommers Haas joke with each other in the green room after a run-through at a dress rehearsal of Once Upon a Winter Night at the Open Eye Puppet Theater. * Nicole Neri for MPR News
Director Michael Sommers gives puppeteers and musicians notes after a run-through at a dress rehearsal of Once Upon a Winter Night at the Open Eye Puppet Theater. * Nicole Neri for MPR News
Puppeteers Dylan Rickard and Lizz Windnagel control the snowman as Rickard sings during a dress rehearsal of Once Upon a Winter Night at the Open Eye Puppet Theater. * Nicole Neri for MPR News
Puppeteer Lizz Windnagel ducks between pieces of the multi-layered set to make her next cue during a dress rehearsal of Once Upon a Winter Night at the Open Eye Puppet Theater. * Nicole Neri for MPR News
Lizz Windnagel sings operatically during a dress rehearsal of Once Upon a Winter Night at the Open Eye Puppet Theater. * Nicole Neri for MPR News
Puppeteer Noah Sommers Haas performs a monologue during a dress rehearsal of Once Upon a Winter Night. * Nicole Neri for MPR News
Puppeteer Noah Sommers Haas pulls open the curtain during a dress rehearsal of Once Upon a Winter Night. * Nicole Neri for MPR News
Puppeteers Lizz Windnagel and Noah Sommers Haas prepare the snowman puppet for its scenes during a dress rehearsal of Once Upon a Winter Night at the Open Eye Puppet Theater. * Nicole Neri for MPR News
Puppeteer Kaillie Melvin braids her hair in the green room before a dress rehearsal of Once Upon a Winter Night. * Nicole Neri for MPR News
Puppeteers Lizz Windnagel and Dylan Rickard do their stage makeup before a dress rehearsal of Once Upon a Winter Night at the Open Eye Puppet Theater. * Nicole Neri for MPR News
Crew members watch as puppeteers prepare for a rehearsal backstage on the mostly-finished set of Once Upon a Winter Night on Feb. 16 at Open Eye Puppet Theater in Minneapolis.
Live music and original score by Eric Jensen bring this winter dream to life on a snow globe set complete with crows. The show runs through March 20.
When a friend told artist Sarah Nassif about the multidisciplinary show, “Thermal” at the American Swedish Institute in Minneapolis, she had to check it out.
In the mansion’s ballroom-like space, Nassif encountered Kim Heidcamp’s massive cut-paper sculpture that evokes a hibernating creature. Composer Josh Clausen’s soundscape, created by more than 75 MP3 players and small speakers, plays while three dancers from Arena Dances bring life and energy.
Courtesy of Kim Heidkamp
A paper-cut sculpture by Kim Heidkamp titled "Jörð, (Norse Earth goddess), part of the show Thermal at the American Swedish Institute.
“It's just one of the most original works that I've seen in memory,” said Nassif.
The performance is designed to allow audiences to contemplate the anxiety and uncertainty of climate change along with the wonder and beauty of our environment. “Thermal” runs Fridays and Saturdays through March 19.
Kris Prince, an artist and educator in the Minneapolis Public Schools said she was every bit as delighted as the children in the audience when she saw the musical “The Dragon Who Likes to Spit Fire” at the Sabes Jewish Community Center in St. Louis Park.
She said retired Temple Israel Rabbi Sim Glaser fulfilled a lifelong dream when he wrote the music and the lyrics to the musical, based on a 1961 picture book by the same name. The story follows Princess June, who befriends Darius the dragon and invites him home to her castle, on the condition that he not spit fire while inside. But breathing fire is Darius’ favorite thing.
The final shows are Saturday at 2 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m.
Duluth singer-songwriter Breanne Tepler of Breanne Marie and the Front Porch Sinners is digging the new album by Matthew French, who is based in Minneapolis.
The album is called “Two Sides,” and French digitally released the first five songs as “Side 1” at the end of January. The songs take on themes arising from the pandemic.
Tepler singles out the song “Still Got a Heart” for its call to kindness and civility amid polarized politics.
“There's just something really comforting and exciting at the same time about his music, his voice and the way he plays his guitar,” said Tepler.
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The digital launch of “Side 1,” hosted by Sarah Morris, is viewable on YouTube. “Side 2” is coming at a future date.
Visual artist Alison Price of Minneapolis admires the bold colors and geometric patterning in the works of Sheri Grube, a mechanical engineer-turned-painter.
Grube lives with dystonia, a chronic neurological disorder that can cause muscles to contract and twist involuntarily. She turns to painting as a way to calm her tremors.
Price says the fine details of Grube’s paintings as well as her “inverted” colors, magenta trees and green skies turn flowers and landscapes into something new on the canvas.
Sheri Grube * Sheri Grube
Visual artist Alison Price of Minneapolis admires the bold colors and geometric patterning in the works of Sheri Grube, a mechanical engineer-turned-painter. * Sheri Grube
Artist Sheri Grube uses painting to manage and speak about living with chronic pain.
Grube’s exhibit, “An Affair of the Heart,” is on display at the Hastings Art Center through the end of March.
Science fiction writer Rayson Lorrey of Rochester loves the theater, and he’s looking forward to an upcoming play at the Rochester Repertory Theatre about one of the great contributors to astronomy.
“Silent Sky” by Lauren Gunderson tells the story of Henrietta Leavitt, whose work at Harvard University in the early 1900s helped astronomers realize how vast the universe is. Leavitt’s discoveries created a standard measurement for determining the distance to other galaxies.
Director Philip Muehe joined the Repertory Theatre last fall from the Commonweal in Lanesboro, Minn., which staged the play in 2018.
Lorrey likes the simple set that allows the strong story to shine. At times it appears the actors are walking on the night sky.
“Silent Sky” opens March 4 and runs through March 20.
Visual artist Alison Price says she is regularly struck by the power of A. Drew Hammond’s paintings and collages. Some of Hammond’s works are fun and playful — she particularly likes his anthropomorphic frogs — while others take on Black history and current events in a way that stops her in her tracks.
Case in point, she says, is his work “Melon Colony,” in which watermelon seeds are packed in the formation of people on a slave ship. His thoughtfully layered collages always encourage a closer look, says Price.
A. Drew Hammond shares a studio with his wife, artist and dancer Beverly Hammond, in the Northrup King Building in northeast Minneapolis. His work is also on view in the Ramsey County Courthouse, the Grandview Square Financial building in Edina, Minn., and at the Community Commons at the Mall of America.
- Courtesy of A. Drew Hammond
"Melon Colony" by A. Drew Hammond. * Courtesy of A. Drew Hammond
"The World Heard Your Pain" by A. Drew Hammond.
Guitarist and vocalist Julian Manzara was a Cedar Commissions artist in 2017-2018, and he recommends checking out this year’s contingent when they perform this weekend.
This year’s six Cedar Commissions artists will each perform 30 minutes of original work, drawing upon Welsh bardic tradition, African stringed instruments, Hmong folk song and more.
“It's kind of like a musical buffet of stuff you've never tried before,” says Manzara. “I would say just go, don't worry about wrapping your mind around exactly what you're going to see. You can trust the Cedar in terms of their curation, and it will be a great experience that you can just dive into regardless of how familiar you are with these emerging artists.”
Following last year’s virtual event, artists this year will be back on the Cedar Cultural Center stage in Minneapolis.
Friday’s show features Carlisle Evans Peck, Nyttu Chongo and Maddie Thies. Saturday’s lineup is Vie Boheme, Alicia Thao and Kat Parent. The concerts start at 7:30 p.m.
Gospel singer Robert Robinson has performed at St. Joan of Arc Catholic Community in Minneapolis in the past, and he knows the strong lineup of performers who will take the stage on Sunday evening for a concert celebrating Black History Month.
The event is entitled “Oh Let us Build This Place,” and it’s an evening of music and historical vignettes that examines 75 years on the south side of Minneapolis. T. Mychael Rambo, Thomasina Petrus, Carmen Michelle and Gwen Matthews will perform with Dan Chouinard as host and band leader.
Robinson says the evening will be “education and entertainment all wound up into one,” as the artists and others reflect on the experience of African Americans in the area where the church is located. Included in that history is the building of Interstate 35W, which displaced thousands of south Minneapolis African American homes and businesses beginning in the late 1950s.
The event takes place 7-9 p.m. on Sunday. Masks are required, as is proof of vaccination or a negative COVID test result from within 72 hours.
Kelli Foster Warder of Theater Latte Da recommends going to see a musical fitting for Valentine’s Day. It’s Bucket Brigade Theater’s “Till Death: A Marriage Musical.”
The show tells the story of two married couples stuck together in one cabin. One couple is reevaluating their marriage, while the other appears caught up in that honeymoon glow. The result, Warder said, is “hilarious and insightful and a really great night.”
The 10-year-old production’s performers are all married couples in real life, including Jeremiah and Vanessa Gamble, who co-wrote the music and lyrics. Warder said she’s seen the show several times over the years and gets something new from it each time.
The final four shows of the run are Friday through Monday at Art House North in St. Paul. The production is in-person with reduced audience capacity and masks required.
St. Paul actress and writer Greta Grosch is an equity actor, but it’s community theater that she’s excited to share this week: Theatre in the Round stages “Marjorie Prime” starting this weekend.
Set in the near-future, 85-year-old Marjorie has a handsome young man in her life. That “man” is a hologram of her late husband, imbued with artificial intelligence so that he can feed Marjorie the stories of her life as she loses her memory.
The heartfelt play by Jordan Harrison is full of plot twists that take the audience on a journey. The play was a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 2015, and it was made into a movie in 2017.
Courtesy of Katie Sondrol
Actress Katie Wodele (Tess) and actor David Denninger (Jon) rehearse for Marjorie Prime at Theatre in the Round.
Grosch said she’s thrilled to see Theatre in the Round emerge through the pandemic to celebrate its 70th season this year. “Marjorie Prime” runs Friday through March 6. Masks and proof of vaccination or negative COVID test are required.
Pamela Potter Langley loves to support her local arts scene in Zumbrota, and she’s thrilled that a Minnesota musician she has admired since the ‘80s will be coming to her town for a concert.
Folk singer/songwriter John Gorka’s long career has spanned 11 albums and a collector’s edition, with performances across the globe.
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“John’s music just keeps aging beautifully,” said Potter Langley, “and some of the lyrics are, for me, as pertinent now as they were back in the ‘80s when I listened to some of the songs for the first time.”
Potter Langley said she’s traveled far to hear the iconic singer perform so she feels lucky that she can walk a few blocks to the historic State Theatre in Zumbrota to enjoy this show with friends. The show begins at 7:30 p.m. Saturday. Masks are required in the theater unless eating or drinking.
The State Theatre in Zumbrota celebrated its 100th anniversary last October.
Michael Whistler is a huge fan of cabaret, and he plans to attend the Valentine Day’s edition of Dr. Jay’s Cabaret Presents: Cabaret Amore! this Sunday. Dr. Jay is pianist Jay Fuchs who, with his musical partner Eric Schwab, runs Cabaret Camp, where they teach singers to develop their voice and performance style.
Performers in Cabaret Amore are alumni of the camp; and some will be familiar to fans as featured singers as past Dr. Jay Cabaret events. Being this close to Valentine’s Day, the focus of the show is love in its many forms.
The song covers range from Alanis Morrisette to Stephen Sondheim. Whistler says he’s excited to hear how the artists craft these songs to bring the audience into the story “the way only cabaret can.”
The show is Sunday at 5 p.m. at KJ’s Hideaway in downtown St Paul.
Visual artist Gloria Pfeifer of Starbuck appreciates the strong community of artists working in the Alexandria, Minn., area.
Among them is Lou Ann Marks, whose commitment to taking photographs on her cellphone has won her national awards, including a Reader’s Digest Road Trip Photo contest in 2019. Marks often captures landscapes of water and sky, sometimes with the aid of a crystal ball that bends the scene in interesting ways. Her work is viewable on Instagram and Etsy.
Rick Baumann of Prior Lake, Minn., says he and his wife love attending live music performances in venues large and small. He’s a particular fan of Lakeville, Minn.-based Americana musician Jud Hailey.
Hailey plays at a full lineup of bars and venues across the Twin Cities. While the musician often covers other songs by request, Baumann says he loves seeing a bar audience request – and quiet down to listen to – one of Hailey’s originals.
Find his album “All Good Things” on his website. Hailey next plays at O’Brien’s Public House in Shakopee on Feb. 9 and Steele & Hops in Minneapolis on Feb. 11.
Courtesy photo by Justin Vorndran
"The Last Time 6" by Hilary Greenstein is among the works in the eight-artist exhibit at the Anderson Center in Red Wing, Minn.
Most of us could use a dose of bright colors by this point in January. The bold palettes are what Heather Lawrenz of Red Wing Arts is seeking when “Vivid Survival” opens Friday.
The eight-artist exhibit at the Anderson Center was curated by Lindsey Cherek Waller, who has a studio at the Anderson Center. The forms vary from giant paintings to wearable creations. The strong colors allow viewers to consider survival during the pandemic.
There is a free artists’ reception on opening night from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. The exhibit runs until March 26.
Mary Fox of Renegade Theater Company in Duluth, Minn., says she was deeply affected by her visit to the “Like Me, Like You” exhibit at the Duluth Art Institute. The Twin Ports Asian Pacific Islander Desi American (APIDA) Collective mounted the exhibit.
Fox loves the way the show opens, with APIDA’s logo of a golden rice stalk transformed into a 3D sculpture strung with origami.
The show is a “cultural explosion [of] voices of Asian Americans and their lived experiences,” said Fox.
Photography gives way to poetry printed on a bright yellow wall, set alongside handmade clothing, film, podcasts, and painting. At the end, visitors can write their takeaways on a ribbon and tie it to a tree. “Like Me, Like You” is free and runs through the end of March.
Film publicist Peter Schilling of the Heights Theater plans to head to the Trylon Cinema in Minneapolis Friday for an action film from 1915 that’s getting new life with local music.
He describes the “Filibus: the Mysterious Air Pirate” as a film about an elegant baroness who dresses as a man and lowers herself from an iron dirigible into Italian Riviera mansions to steal their valuables.
While the special effects may appear primitive to an audience more than a century later, Schilling says early cinema magic creates a visceral experience. Pianist Katie Condon performs her original score to accompany the film at each of the four showings.
The screenings were organized by University of Minnesota cultural studies professor and author Maggie Hennefeld. The show runs Friday and Saturday at 7 p.m. and Sunday at 3 p.m. and 5 p.m. Masks and proof of COVID-19 vaccination are required.
Correction (Jan. 28, 2022): A previous version of this story called "Filibus: the Mysterious Air Pirate" a black-and-white film. The story has been corrected.
Sheena Janson Kelley of Minneapolis watched the world premiere of “Bina’s Six Apples” as soon as it opened at the Children’s Theatre Company.
Set in 1950 Korea, the story follows Bina on her journey to find her family during the war. On her way, the young girl encounters a number of characters — some are humorous, others have heartbreaking roles.
Recommended for audiences ages 9 and up, the play was written by Lloyd Suh, inspired by his parents’ experience during the Korean War; and directed by Eric Ting, Artistic Director of California Shakespeare Theater.
Glen Stubbe Photography for Children's Theatre Company
Lloyd Suh, "Bina’s Six Apples" playwright and Olivia Lampert, who plays Bina in the Children’s Theatre production.
“It was thrilling to see such a robust and well-cast cast of characters,” said Kelley, who is Asian-American and a freelance casting director. “I think there are moments where audiences will also start to discover new parts of themselves through this young girl … It absolutely made me laugh and cry in the same moment. I could not recommend this show more.”
The show, 75 minutes without intermission, runs through Feb. 13 at the Children’s Theatre Company’s Cargill Stage in Minneapolis. Patrons are required to wear masks and show proof of vaccination or a negative COVID test taken within 72 hours.
Artist Erica Spitzer Rasmussen of White Bear Lake loves gathering with friends around a table set with eclectic, handmade ceramics. A longtime collector, she’s planning to attend the Hot Dish pottery sale at Franconia Sculpture Park in Shafer, Minn., this weekend.
Twelve potters from Minnesota and Wisconsin — some established and some emerging — will have a range of pottery for sale, including mugs and bowls, plates and serving platters.
Outside, Franconia’s 50-acre sculpture garden will be open for exploring. Visitors can also gather around a bonfire or bring ice skates to enjoy the ice rink.
Inside at the sale, masks are required, and Rasmussen says all the potters have committed to getting COVID tests prior to the event. The artists’ work is also available online. Hot Dish runs Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Eveleth musician Thomas Frichek of the band Horse Fzce has enjoyed watching the evolving career of fellow Iron Range musician Josh Lubovich.
A Hibbing, Minn., native who now lives in Duluth, Lubovich has been a drummer for the bands Average Mammals and Heroes of Heartache, but at the end of 2021 he dropped his first solo EP of original work.
Lubovich plays all the instruments and performs vocals on the indie rock recording “ADHD.”
As a 90’s kid, Frichek loves Lubovich’s “quiet-loud-quiet-loud” song dynamic, reminiscent of the Pixies.
Choreographer Taja Will has watched performances of the Naked Stages Fellows in Minneapolis for years, and they always appreciate the innovative voices of the solo performers.
Each performance is the product of a seven month-long fellowship, which allowed the artists to learn the business side of art while developing a creative work with a director of their choice.
Courtesy of Pillsbury House Theatre
Atlese Robinson is one of six recent Naked Stages fellows.
The works are transdisciplinary, often combining text, movement, and music along with creative use of the space.
This year, both the 2020 cohort, Alia Jeraj, Atlese Robinson, C. Michael Menge, and the 2021 group, Alys Ayumi Ogura, Margaret Ogas, Ashembaga (Ashe) Jaafaru, performed for a limited audience in December. The performances are available for ticketed streaming Jan. 15-30 via Pillsbury House and Theatre in Minneapolis.
Beth Hall of Duluth recently visited the AICHO Gallery to see a new exhibit by local artist Ellen Sandbeck, entitled “As Long As the River Shall Run.” The show comprises a series of giclée prints of Sandbeck’s multicolored, multilayered paper art. Each represents a section of the Mississippi River from its watershed to the Gulf.
The exhibit at the American Indian Community Housing Organization in Duluth explains which of the species shown in the art works are endangered, native or invasive. Sandbeck includes extinct species, leaving the viewer to consider the effect of their loss on the food chain.
Courtesy of Ivy Vainio, AICHO Galleries
"Headwaters of the Mississippi River" by Ellen Sandbeck
“What struck me besides the educational aspect of it was the sheer beauty and layered colors which gave everything depth and sometimes movement [seen] when standing back,” Hall said. A closer look reveals scissor cuts intricate enough to appear drawn.
The exhibit is open to limited admissions, Tuesdays and Thursdays 4 to 6 p.m. through Feb. 25 at AICHO, with a community workshop on papercutting Feb. 3 at 7 p.m.
Visual artist K. Daphnae Koop of Brooklyn Center plans to see the Moving Company’s performance of “Anamnesis” for a third time when it reopens this month at the Southern Theater in Minneapolis. The show, subtitled “bits and pieces from a supposed previous existence,” knits together a series of sometimes-fantastical subplots under the frame of putting on a play.
What keeps Koop returning to this show is the way it inspires a range of emotions. “There were absolutely heart-rending scenes left for a moment to settle in the air, and then with a new line and a chuckle the scene was over and the moment had passed,” Koop said.
“The first time I saw the play especially, I felt like I had just been through my emotional experience of the last two years — they encapsulated it in an evening of theater.”
The show runs Thursday, Jan. 13 through Jan. 30. Masks are required, as is proof of vaccination or a negative COVID test within 72 hours.
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Andre Schü recommends checking out the work of a fellow Minneapolis glitch artist they find inspiring, John Bumstead of RDKLinc. Glitch art, Schü explains, “is using technological systems in ways that they weren't intended in order to demonstrate the expressive, creative agency of technology that we might otherwise overlook.”
Bumstead repairs laptops for a living, and uses some of those broken pieces of tech for his art. In photographing everyday objects through broken media, Bumstead creates images that offer a new way to look at both the everyday and the tech that creates and distorts it. He is currently about two-thirds of the way through a “Broken Screen of the Day” project, creating Non-Fungible Token images made from broken screens.
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If you’re in the Fargo-Moorhead area, Maija Lindaas recommends a free concert Sunday by Fargo Moorhead Spelemannslag. Lindaas was a founding member of the group but has since moved out of state. The group, made up of residents of Minnesota and North Dakota, includes new and experienced players on the hardanger fiddle, which is the national instrument of Norway.
The hardanger fiddle has eight or nine strings, instead of four, and may be ornately carved and decorated. Lindaas describes it as looking like a “tattooed violin” and sounding like “a fiddle mixed with a bagpipe because it has some droning sounds in the background.”
The tunes the Spelemannslag members play often tell stories, from tales of love to Grimm-style yarns. Lindaas says viewers will hear some of these stories recounted alongside the music.
Many in the group have built their own hardanger fiddles. Lindaas recommends reaching out to them if you’re interested in learning the instrument.
Fargo Moorhead Spelemannslag will perform 2 p.m. Sunday at the Sons of Norway Kringen Lodge in Fargo, N.D.
Former St. Paul mayor and Twin Cities Habitat for Humanity head Chris Coleman loves music, and he clearly remembers the first time he heard country singer Trevor McSpadden perform on his friend’s front lawn in the summer of 2020.
Coleman showed up expecting a dad band, but said, “all of a sudden there is Trevor and Mary Cutrufello on electric guitar, and they are just knocking it out of the park. And I went, ‘Wow, what a find. This is amazing.’” Coleman has seen McSpadden perform several times since. He appreciates the singer’s classic country voice and bluesy quality.
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McSpadden plays at Forager Brewing Company in Rochester on Friday at 7 p.m., and in Wyoming, Minn., at Smokey’s Pub & Grill Saturday at 2 p.m. He and Mary Cutrufello play at the White Squirrel Bar in St. Paul on Tuesday at 6 p.m.
At the Icehouse in Minneapolis Annie Mack performs from her new EP “Testify,” with special guest, 21-year-old R&B and rap artist Lakee.
Minneapolis artist Key Rose has watched Lakee Abner perform over the past few years since she took part in the R&B shows Rose hosted at Bullwinkle’s Saloon in Minneapolis. She's seen Lakee move from performing covers to writing and performing her own material across the Twin Cities.
“I know it's gonna be just great vibes. Great music, great voices. Great energy all around,” Rose said.
The Thursday all ages show starts at 8 p.m., 6 p.m. doors.
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If you’re looking for a fun podcast, playwright and actor Vincent Hannam recommends The Mysterious Old Radio Listening Society. Each episode features an original recording of an old-time radio drama from the 1930s and 40s. Three Minnesota actors and comedians break down the show, with an eye to its timeless quality, or not.
In addition to the podcast, the society puts on live performances, where they stage crime, horror and suspense radio dramas, complete with sound effects. There are doors slamming, footsteps, and commercial breaks.
This month’s performance is “The Mysterious Old Radio Holiday Special,” with new original material. The live show is Monday at 7:30 p.m. at Park Square Theatre, with live-streaming options as well.
Slow down and look at the beauty around you. That’s what Pacem in Terris Hermitage Retreat Center director Tim Drake is reminded to do when he looks at a painting by Joshua Cunningham. Cunningham’s oil paintings of landscapes across Minnesota capture the seasons.
“He paints places you feel you recognize, even if you've never been there,” Drake said. “They are peaceful, and peace-filled.”
Cunningham started the paintings long before he knew how to finish them. He often would complete them over the course of several visits to the same place.
The exhibit of Cunningham’s work “Further In” is on display at the Groveland Gallery in Minneapolis now through Jan 8.
Courtesy of Joshua Cunningham
"Crimson Crown" by Joshua Cunningham
“A Snowy Kiss: An Improvised Holiday Romance Movie” is Jorts Improv’s take on a romantic movie for the holidays, and Shea Roberts Gyllen can’t wait to go. They remember some of the last improv version of “A Snowy Kiss” from before the pandemic: It may have included a small-town homecoming, a meet-cute, an improbable rallying of the entire town, and sentient gingerbread — all of which they said left a warm glow afterward.
This year’s show, with a cast of five and music by Vanessa Tu, promises new takes on holiday movie tropes over its three-day run. It’s “such a ding-dang blast,” Roberts Gyllen said.
The show runs Thursday through Saturday at 8 p.m. at Strike Theater in Minneapolis. Masks and proof of vaccination are required.
Mary Ellen Mueske loves the van Daalen pipe organ at Austin First United Methodist Church in her hometown of Austin, Minn. Mueske says the low notes “rumble your backbone,” and she’s looking forward to the Advent Organ Recital at noon on Dec. 15.
By Dena Denny
Emily Coveyou (left), Katie Novak, Phil Petersen, Pam Mazzone, Ryan Vanasse and Jay Kistler hug as part of the Snowy Kiss show at Strike Theater in 2019.
Jan Van Daalen built pipe organs in many churches, colleges and private residences in Minnesota and other states, including at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, N.Y.
The half-hour concert will have boxed to-go lunches available. Guest organist Neal Erickson will play Christmas classics.
Darren Tesar of FOGSTAND Gallery in St. Paul recommends a visit to the current exhibition by visual artist Charles Matson Lume, which also celebrates light this December. The site-specific, light-based exhibition, “what opens — like a blaze of fire” is at the Catherine G. Murphy Gallery at St. Catherine's University in St. Paul. It runs through Dec. 12, with an artist talk Thursday on campus.
Lume uses humble materials such as reflective paper, hologram tape, and even dirt to manipulate and reflect light throughout the two symmetrical rooms of the exhibit.
Photo by Charles Matson Lume
Art by Charles Matson Lume entitled "what opens — like a blaze of fire."
Tesar says that Lume uses poetry as his jumping-off point for creation. In this exhibit, Lume collaborated with Minnesota’s second poet laureate Joyce Sutphen of Chaska and Minneapolis-based interdisciplinary artist Galilee Peaches.
The show is accompanied by a book created by the three artists, which allows the poems and the exhibition to continue to reverberate after the show closes.
Writer Tracy Harris is enthralled by photographer Rebecca Pavlenko’s exhibit “One that Got Away.” The show focuses on lost images or photographs that failed to come into being through mechanical failures or that were never taken at all.
To create the show, Pavlenko asked more than 30 photographers to describe one image that escaped them. These handwritten texts, written by the artists on photographic paper, become the visual representation of each image that got away.
The show includes stories from some of Minnesota's most well-known photographers, such as JoAnn Verburg, Alec Soth, Steve Ozone, and Wing Young Huie.
“What I love about this show is that in a world where we are bombarded with visual input, Rebecca gives us a chance to reflect on the relation between words and pictures and what it takes to create a memory,” Harris said.
See “One That Got Away” at Traffic Zone Gallery in Minneapolis through Dec. 31, or online.
Country and western singer/songwriter Trevor McSpadden of St. Paul is a big fan of Nick Hensley’s MN Songwriter Showcase. The long-standing event returned to performances this fall after an 18-month pandemic hiatus, and now it’s going strong with performances twice a week: Wednesdays at 7:30 p.m. at the Aster Cafe in Minneapolis and Sundays at Plums Neighborhood Grill and Bar in St. Paul, starting at 8:45 p.m.
McSpadden says he’s impressed by the range of musical styles that assemble, hosted by grace and enthusiasm by Hensley, who also performs.
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“It's always a really nice assortment of talented folks from first time singer songwriters to veterans,” says McSpadden, “but everyone is treated with equal levels of enthusiasm. And I've seen the room be silenced because somebody's singing so well. And that may be somebody that has never had a chance to sing in public or somebody that's singing, you know, a song they've been doing for 50 years.”
Susana di Palma of Zorongo Flamenco Dance Theatre is planning to attend the world premiere this weekend of “Shaamya — Of Equality.” The performance by Katha Dance Theatre is a coming-together of music, dance and poetry, inspired by the poet Kazi Nazrul Islam’s visions of equality across gender, race and religion.
Choreographed by Katha Artistic Director Rita Mustaphi, the show incorporates ballet, hiphop and flamenco along with the rhythmically complex kathak dance from northern India.
The show features music by J.D. Steele and poetry by Somali-American performer Ifrah Mansour. Taken together, di Palma says, this original work is “going to provoke thought and feeling in a beautiful way that we can all examine” on a universal topic. The show runs Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. at Park Square Theatre in St. Paul.
Michael Murnane, a lighting director and head electrician at the Minnesota Orchestra, is a huge fan of the rock band Annie and the Bang Bang. They have a new record — available in both vinyl and digital — called “Walkie Talkie.” Murnane says it's the kind of music that makes you both want to move around and sit and focus on its thoughtful lyrics.
“They're like a garage band but with 30 years of experience,” said Murnane. “It looks like they're in it for the fun, but they're saying really interesting things.”
Artist Janine Holter of Montrose drove to Lanesboro when Commonweal Theatre Company opened its first in-person show this spring. She’ll be there for the close of the 2021 season with its production of “A Christmas Carol,” which opens Friday and runs through Dec. 19. It’s the classic ghost-filled story based on the work of Charles Dickens, complete with the heartfelt transformation of miserly Scrooge.
Commonweal’s twist is to cast Scrooge and the three ghost characters as women. “[Commonweal Associate Artistic Director] Adrienne Sweeney is just a delightful actress,” Holter said, “and I know she’s going to play one heck of a nasty Scrooge.”
It’s not the first time women have played Scrooge. In 2018, the Guthrie cast both a male and a female lead, with Nathaniel Fuller playing the role 43 times and Charity Jones, in male dress, starring in 13 shows.
Sweeney developed this version of the show as she thought about how a female Scrooge might fit historically and resonate today.
Patrons are required to wear masks inside the theater. The show will also be available virtually.
The 22nd Sound Unseen Film + Music Festival in Minneapolis wraps up Saturday, with its annual focus on films and documentaries about music. Independent film critic Nick Kouhi recommends the final film of the event, “Being Bebe” about Minneapolis drag performer Bebe Zahara Benet.
Originally from Cameroon, Benet gained national attention as the first winner of RuPaul’s Drag Race in 2009. The film draws upon approximately 15 years of archival footage shot by director Emily Branham, interspersed with commentary by a wryly witty Benet. It’s an intimate, contemplative film that is “also a really powerful testament to art and the value of art and how art can express oneself,” Kouhi said.
“Being Bebe” screens in-person at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis on Saturday at 7 p.m. There will be an onstage Q&A with Benet and Branham following the screening. Tickets are currently sold out, with an in-person, night-of waitlist starting an hour before the screening. The Walker Cinema requires masks and proof of vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test taken within 72 hours.
Minneapolis actor and playwright Eric “Pogi” Sumangil is a fan of Qui Nguyen’s plays, and he’s happy to see that the University of Minnesota Theatre Arts & Dance department is kicking off its in-person season with Nguyen’s show “She Kills Monsters.”
It’s a comedy about being an outsider and finding your chosen family. The 10-year-old play, follows a young woman, Agnes, who is mourning the death of her younger sister. When Agnes finds her sister’s Dungeons and Dragons notebook, she decides to go on a D&D campaign in order to get to know her sister better.
The play is co-directed by Doug Scholz-Carlson and Annie Enneking, who Pogi says “are two really great fight choreographers and directors, so they're going to bring their brand of action and entertainment and adventure to a play that really supports that well.”
Nguyen lived for a time in the Twin Cities, and he’s known nationally for writing such works as “Vietgone” and Disney’s “Raya and the Last Dragon.” His “geek theater...blends theater with hip hop and martial arts and creates these worlds that are very grounded and fantastical at the same time,” Pogi said.
“She Kills Monsters” runs Thursday through Nov. 21 at the Rarig Center / Stoll Thrust Theatre on the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities campus.
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Photo by Amy Jeanchaiyaphum
Mistress Ginger will perform "Hollywood Blondes at Bryant Lake Bowl Theater.
Michael Whistler is a playwright and teaching artist at Interact Center for the Arts who sees as much theater as he can. Before the pandemic, he recalls being blown away by Mistress Ginger’s cabaret of Kurt Weill’s music. During the pandemic, the drag performer staged mini cabarets from her home that also featured vegan recipes.
Now Whistler is thrilled to see her back on stage this weekend to perform “Hollywood Blondes.” The show features stories of actresses including Mae West and Marilyn Monroe, with music. Jazz musician Rick Carlson is on piano.
“Mistress Ginger is a cabaret singer who brings warmth and depth to a lyric, and always lets the song shine through,” Whistler said “She moves easily from the steam of a torch song to the campy wink of a double entendre- always while holding up the classic composers and lyricists she loves.”
“Hollywood Blondes” is at Bryant Lake Bowl Theater in Minneapolis Saturday and Sunday at 7 p.m. both nights.
Dancer Molly Kay Stoltz of St. Peter has been looking forward to the winter show by Rhythmically Speaking at Amsterdam Bar and Hall in St. Paul Thursday at 7:30 p.m.
The dance group takes cues from jazz and American social dance, such as ballroom and line dancing. Stoltz appreciates how the group improvises and interacts with live musicians and the audience.
Thursday’s show is called “Riffin’: A Jazz-Danced Celebration of Human Interaction.” Hutchinson-based guitarist/composer Mike Lauer leads a live jazz combo for the performance. Amsterdam will be selling a special tap beer, a collaborative creation by Lauer and Hutchinson’s Bobbing Bobber Brewery.
Theater performer Shea Roberts Gyllen loves the work of Threads Dance Project, celebrating its 10th anniversary with in-person and virtual options at the Cowles Center in Minneapolis this weekend. Threads is a Black woman-owned company whose show “Awake. Alive. Anew.” marks a rising from the devastation of the pandemic.
The performance features new modern dance works by emerging choreographers Gabby Abram, Jennifer Pray and Elayna Waxse, as well as the premiere of the dance film “Out of the Ashes.” The dance film is about the events of 9/11, and Roberts Gyllen was struck by how the dance captures “that moment of transition from a normal day to the worst day … the things I have seen Threads produce have always gotten right behind my breast bone and made me feel.”
The show is Saturday at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m., with both in-person and livestream options available. The Cowles Center requires masks and proof of vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test from within 72 hours.
Minneapolis theater maker Candy Simmons has followed the dance company Jagged Moves Dance Project since its formation in 2016. She saw the only performance of their show “Touch Code” in March 2020 before theaters went dark, and she’s looking forward to having that same show be her first in-person experience back. The themes of touch, boundaries and personal space may take on extra weight after our experiences with social distancing.
“Choreographer Jennifer Glaws' work is always exciting and adventurous,” said Simmons. “And she supports her dancers with innovative lighting, set and sound design. The piece also features Julie Johnson, a local flutist whose work is also always exciting and outside the bounds of what you expect out of her instrument.”
“TOUCH CODE: (Re) Claiming Space” runs Thursday through Sunday at the Southern Theater in Minneapolis, with some livestream options. On-demand performances are available Nov. 6 to Nov. 14.
St. Paul poet and performance artist Hawona Sullivan Janzen has loved Ananya Dance Theatre ever since she watched them through a glass window this summer. The dancers performed inside their University Avenue studio but the audience was seated on the sidewalk outside while traffic and light rail trains rushed nearby. She remains moved by the experience.
Sullivan Janzen is planning to see Ananya Dance Theatre’s new show “Dastak: I Wish You Me” indoors this weekend. The dance performance is a collaboration with playwright Sharon Bridgforth and cellist Spirit McIntyre. Ananya is a contemporary dance theater company focused on global social justice. “Dastak” contemplates migration and loss through “four elemental journeys,” according to the dance company’s website. The Farsi term for knockings, dastak refers to the idea that global social injustice prompts a knocking at your door.
Ananya Dance Theatre’s show “Dastak: I Wish You Me” is Friday at 7:30 p.m. and Saturday at 9 p.m. at The O’Shaughnessy at St. Catherine University in St. Paul. The theater requires masks as well as proof of full vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test within 72 hours of the performance.
Teaching artist Maria Asp loves Z Puppets Rosenschnoz’s web series, “Say it, Sing it, Play it!” The three-part series is a hybrid of live-action, puppetry, animation and song, and is in Cherokee. Designed for ages 3 and up, the show follows best friends Turtle and Wabbit as they travel in their spaceship, unlocking clues to help save Grandma Turtle. Asp called it a delightful series whose pacing and repetition make it easy for all ages to learn some words in Cherokee.
It was created by Chris Griffith, an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation, as a way to answer a 2019 state of emergency call to keep the Cherokee language from being lost. The show stars Griffith and Shari Aronson and is directed by Anishinabe artist Julie Boada.
The digital show streams through the Ordway Theater’s website for the month of November. Tribal members of any nation, as well as Native American schools or organizations, may sign up to see the show for free.
Courtesy of Lisa Bergh
"Pasture," from Lisa Bergh's exhibition.
Artist Naomi RaMona Schleisman recommends a visit to the Kaddatz Galleries in Fergus Falls to see Lisa Bergh’s exhibit, “Dear Diary.” Based in New London, Minn., Bergh has worked with painting and sculptural installations. This new body ventures into textiles, using canvas and heavy plastic combined with embroidery and rivets to create a tension in each piece that invites viewers to look closer. Schleisman loves the vibrant colors of the pieces.
“It's like you're having this private conversation that Lisa has created with these forms,” said Schleisman.
“Dear Diary” runs through Nov. 18, both in-person and online, with a closing reception on the final evening.
Stan Takiela from Victoria, Minn., recommends an exhibition by fellow wildlife photographer Dudley Edmondson of Duluth. Edmondson has a passion for wild places and for getting people of color outdoors. This photography exhibit, “Northern Waters,” focused entirely on landscapes, captures the waters of Minnesota’s North Shore and its tributaries throughout the seasons.
Courtesy of Chad Brown
A portrait of Dudley Edmondson. His "Northern Waters" exhibit is on display at the Minnesota Marine Art Museum in Winona, Minn.
“Dudley Edmondson’s eye for photography and videography is, I think, some of the best in the upper Midwest,” says Takiela, who admires Edmondson’s precision and eye for color and composition that allow him to capture images that tell a story.
Courtesy of Dudley Edmondson
South Hegman Lake in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness.
Edmondson’s photography is on view in person and online at the Minnesota Marine Art Museum in Winona through Jan. 2.
Scot Froelich from New Hope recommends a one-man play that dives deep into the horror of being alone, surrounded by the unknown. “Brig” is written and performed by St. Paul actor Jeremy Motz, who often works in solo shows. He plays a boatswain who has locked himself away on his own ship to protect himself from the horror he has witnessed. Confined in a small space with the creak of footsteps above, he unfurls a ghost story that Froelich found himself discussing with friends long afterward.
“It's very masterfully crafted to make you keep questioning in your mind whether or not what you're seeing is reality,” says Froelich, “whether it's something that we should be fearing in our own lives, or if it's just this horror show that we're seeing in front of us.”
The 35-minute show is available for digital viewing through Halloween at papersoul.org.
Jill Chamberlain saw the theater production of “The Red Shoes” when it debuted at the Open Eye Theatre in 2017, and the show has stuck with her ever since. The one-act play takes its inspiration from the classic story of the same name by Hans Christian Andersen, adding a film noir mystery twist.
Chamberlain is curious to see how a show about a woman afraid to leave her apartment will take on new layers of meaning amid a pandemic. There are indeed haunted red shoes in the show, as well as manipulated objects in an intricate scene design that blur the lines of reality.
Delayed from its March 2020 reprise, the show is running Thursdays through Sundays at the Open Eye Theatre in Minneapolis through Oct. 31. The theater requires masks as well as proof of full vaccination or a negative COVID test within 72 hours.
St Paul vocalist Jennifer Eckes is heading to the historic Sheldon Theatre of Performing Arts in Red Wing, Minn., on Saturday for a concert by Guns N’ Rosenkavalier. The group is led by Twin Cities opera singer Andrew Wilkowske on electric guitar, performing a lineup that is part classic art song recital, part rock concert.
Eckes appreciates Wilkowske’s musicianship as well as his sense of humor as he mashes genres together. “It's really fun and fascinating to hear a German art song with an electric guitar.”
“It's just as exciting to hear a Bruce Springsteen tune sung by a full voice baritone. A good song is a good song, whether it was written by Strauss or Van Halen,” Eckes said. “No matter where you come from on the spectrum of your musical knowledge, I think anyone can enjoy this concert because you probably will recognize something.”
The show starts at 7:30. Masks are required.
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Adam Tervola-Hultberg is a music teacher in Pillager, in north-central Minnesota, looking forward to a performance by a cappella group Tonic Sol Fa on Saturday at 7:30 p.m. The show, along with a performance by Minnesota musician Kat Perkins on Thursday, marks the grand opening of Pillager Public School’s new CTC Center for the Performing Arts.
The four-man a cappella group based in Minnesota performs arrangements of pop music fit for young and old. Tonic Sol Fa’s tour of Minnesota in October and November includes Brainerd, Bemidji, Alexandria and Rochester.
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Brandon Henry, lead singer of the Twin Cities Americana band Art Vandalay, is thrilled that the Landmark Live concert series has returned after last year’s hiatus. The series brings top-notch musicians from across Minnesota and the country to perform on the third Friday of each month, now through December.
Friday’s show features indie singer-songwriter Mary Bue, who was named best songwriter in the Twin Cities for 2020 by City Pages. Henry loves the intimate feel of the F.K. Weyerhaeuser Auditorium in the historic Landmark Center in St. Paul, where he says “you can hear every pluck of the strings.”
Tickets include a cocktail hour at 7 p.m., where Henry appreciates the chance to hang out with other music fans and occasionally meet the performing artists. Music starts at 8. Masks are required inside the building.
Ann Etter of Northfield, Minn., recommends her favorite way to relax after a hard day of work: watching a performance by Northfield-based jazz ensemble Sweet Jazz. True to their name, the four-piece (sometimes five-piece) ensemble plays jazz standards, B-side jazz tunes that might be new for listeners and originals by pianist Peter Webb.
Etter loves the way the ensemble matches their set to the seasons: “You see them in the spring, and it’s going to feel more peppy. You see them in the fall, and it’s going to feel more crisp. It’s just an immersive experience.”
Sweet Jazz’s next live, outdoor performance is Saturday from 5 to 7 p.m. at the Contented Cow, overlooking the Cannon River in downtown Northfield.
Kasey Southwick danced ballet for years with Continental Ballet Co. in Bloomington, and now she’s looking forward to relaxing in the audience for its “Beer & Ballet” performance on Friday at 7 p.m. in the Schneider Theater at the Bloomington Center for the Arts.
Southwick says the one-night event is a chill atmosphere that makes for an excellent introduction for adults who are new to ballet. The evening features a mix of short dance numbers choreographed by the director and by members of the company, set to a mix of classical and contemporary music. And, yes, the ticket price includes one beer.
Masks are recommended by the ballet company, which has this COVID-19 protocol: “We request that if you are not vaccinated you test negative before attending the theater in consideration for the safety of those around you.”
Novelist and playwright Kathleen Anne Kenny shared about a fellow Winona artist who’s written for page and stage.
Margaret Shaw Johnson’s pandemic project was to transform her previous play “The Haunting of Potter’s Field” into an illustrated book of narrative poems by the same name. The inspiration arose from Johnson’s walks through Winona’s historic Woodlawn Cemetery and its potter’s field, where those who could not afford a burial plot were laid to rest. Based on historical research and supplemented with imagination, the poems tell a selection of stories about those whose lives ended in Winona.
There will be a book launch on Friday from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Winona History Center, including a gallery show of the book’s illustrations by Twin Cities artist Jared Tuttle and a performance of some of the original music that was composed for the theatrical production.
Updated: 3:33 p.m. Theater lover Katie Fetterly of St. Paul calls “Arla Mae’s Booyah Wagon,” a traveling musical comedy celebrating the joy of local food, “adorable” and “hilarious.” Booyah is a hearty stew —and a specialty of Arla Mae’s traveling food wagon.
The show is performed at different local farms, and most performances feature a booyah tasting. Sarah Agnew directed and performs in the show, and she also created the booyah recipe with culinary advice from James Beard award-winning chef Ann Kim of Young Joni and other restaurants in Minneapolis.
“Arla Mae” travels to Ferndale Market in Cannon Falls at 6 p.m Thursday and to Pleasant Grove Pizza Farm in Waseca on Friday. The production moves to Dream Acres Farm in Spring Valley on Saturday and Big Raven Farm in Spring Grove Sunday. The following week performances are scheduled in Oronoco, Red Wing and Northfield.
Musician Mischa Suemnig of Plymouth is excited for a quadruple album release concert by four Minnesota musicians Saturday. Justin Bell and the Lazy Susan Band, the Jonathan Earl band, Sarah VanValkenburg and Samuel J. DuBois all have albums coming out. Suemnig wants to hear new music performed live and “the pent-up anxiety and energy we all have from COVID directed in a positive way” by musicians he admires.
The show is Saturday at the Amsterdam Bar and Hall in St. Paul. The venue requires proof of vaccination or a negative COVID test from within 72 hours.
Comedian Emma Dahlenberg felt like she’d stumbled upon a real gem when she performed at the Club Underground of the Spring Street Tavern in Minneapolis a few months ago. She loves the lighting, the feeling of intimacy with the audience in the low ceiling space. The venue runs a regular Monday Night Comedy Show starting at 7 p.m.
In October, each comedy night will have a theme for the comedians to follow, starting Oct. 4 with “alien abduction night.” Upcoming themes include super villains and character night, as well as one night each of “clean” and “dirty” humor.
“I think it would be really fun as an audience member,” says Dahlenberg, “because you're seeing the comedians have fun in a way that they don't normally do,” as they try out new material to fit each theme.
Correction (Sept. 30, 2021): An earlier version of this story misstated Ann Kim's role in the production "Arla Mae's Booyah Wagon.” The article has been updated.
Musician John Sievers is looking forward to discovering something new at Rochester’s Hiding Artists Tour Saturday and Sunday in southeastern Minnesota. It’s an event created by artists, for artists and art-lovers, to explore the work of local artists in the spaces where they create.
The 17 artists in the mapped tour work in ceramics, stained glass, fiber arts, paintings and more.
Courtesy photo
Some of potter Carey Shanahan's pieces. She works in ceramics and pottery.
Squash Blossom Farm will host several artists as well as live music.
Children’s book author Tim Drake of Isanti says he was “first mesmerized” by Kelly Schamberger’s work when he saw her hyper-realistic painting of a spray bottle of glass cleaner.
Schamberger, who lives in Duluth, calls herself a representational painter. She chooses everyday objects for many of her subjects.
Drake, who also is the executive director of Pacem in Terris Hermitage Retreat Center, appreciates both the quality of Schamberger’s work and its deeper meanings. “The glass cleaner painting is about motherhood and recovery,” Drake said.
Schamberger recently participated in the Plein Air Grand Marais Competition. Her work will be among that of 70-plus artists exhibited at the Johnson Heritage Post Art Gallery in Grand Marais through Oct. 10.
Courtesy of Kelly Schamberger
"One Lily Pad at a Time" by Kelly Schamberger from the Plein Air Grand Marais Competition, on view at the Johnson Heritage Post Art Gallery in Grand Marais through Oct. 10.
Landscape painter Joshua Cunningham suggests a trip to the Groveland Gallery in Minneapolis. You’ll find a quiet and contemplative show by two St. Paul artists with very different but complementary styles. Barbara McIlrath’s show “Studio Window” is in the first two rooms of the gallery.
Courtesy of Midge Bolt.
"December-Studio Window" by Barbara McIlrath.
“Barbara has taken oil painting and broken down the world around us into simpler shapes and forms,” Cunningham said.
Stuart Loughridge’s “Prints & Paintings” mines traditional media, such as oils, watercolors and etchings, to display the world “through an older lens.”
Courtesy of Stuart Loughridge
"Beaver River" by Stuart Loughridge.
Cunningham recommends paying attention to Loughridge’s frames, handmade by the artist. The show runs through Oct.16, with an etching demonstration by Loughridge on Oct. 2.
Landscape architect Joan MacLeod loves the outdoors, and she recommends What’s Out There Weekend this Saturday and Sunday as a chance for everyone to explore public spaces with design in mind.
A series of expert-led, free walking and biking tours offer a way to learn about the architecture, design and cultural history of various parks, plazas, gardens and buildings across the Twin Cities.
Some tours focus on the cultural and historical significance of outdoor spaces to Native people and European immigrants. Most walks last around 90 minutes through Americans with Disabilities Act-accessible public areas.
MacLeod says this is the first year that the national Cultural Landscape Foundation has held an event in Minnesota. You can peruse its digital guide to the Twin Cities and register for tours.
Dancer Alanna Morris-Van Tassel wants everyone to know about Saturday’s show, “Solo: Six World Premiere Solo Dance Films,” performed by winners of the McKnight fellowship for dance. Each dancer was given the opportunity to commission a solo from a choreographer for a dance video.
“It is a real crowning achievement to master or to practice the solo art medium,” said Morris-Van Tassell, who herself was a McKnight dance fellow in 2015. “These are the best at the height of their careers right now,” performing in styles including hip hop, modern, classical and experimental. “You’re not going to see that anywhere else.”
The screenings are Saturday at 7:30 p.m. at the Cowles Center in Minneapolis. They also are livestreamed that evening, or available on-demand Sept. 19-26. The Cowles Center requires masks and proof of vaccination or a negative COVID test.
Opera singer and former Minnesota Opera resident Mia Athey is looking forward to Opera Afuera, or Opera Outdoors, on Wednesday. The 90-minute show will feature exclusively Latino vocal music, subtitled in both English and Spanish. Last year, the Minnesota Opera adapted to pandemic conditions by presenting Opera in the Outfield. This year’s event takes place at the Allianz Field soccer stadium in St. Paul.
Minnesota Opera requires masks at this event, and all attendees 12 and over are required to present proof of vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test.
Nature photographer Nicole Zempel has gone back several times already to the “8 Chapters” exhibition at the Berge Gallery in her hometown of Granite Falls, Minn. The show is a collaborative exhibition between artist-blacksmith Talon Cavender-Wilson of the Upper Sioux Community and Granite Falls City Artist in Residence Dani Prados.
Through sculptural pieces forged by Cavender-Wilson and found items like bone and seed from Prados, the two artists explore eight chapters in history, looking at the relationship among humans and between humans and nature in the Minnesota River Valley.
Don't see the video? Click here https://player.pbs.org/viralplayer/3046725570/
Photos by Dani Prados
A sculpture of a ribcage on display at the "8 Chapters" exhibit.
“I like to call this exhibit a beautiful gut punch,” says Zempel. Beautiful, because of the way these pieces work together, but difficult, as they reveal broken relationships with each other and with nature. Zempel calls the exhibition a space to spark good conversation. The show runs through Sept. 18.
Zempel’s work was featured on Art Hounds here.
Kyle Kimbllin of the Minneapolis band Butter Boys is a big fan of local rock band Jung Yeller, a four-piece rock band in which all members sing. This summer, they released an LP called “Jung Yeller’s Bitchin’ Rager,” that Kimbllin calls “a party front-to-back.”
“Every song is very energetic ... there's no pause, nothing slows down. You can play it from start to finish, and have a great time.”
Kimbllin particularly likes how the band meshes different styles, from doo-wop to R&B, with a dose of heavy metal and emo, so that listeners never know just what they’ll hear next.
Photo by Taylor Evan
"Untitled," by Taylor Evan.
Actor Robb Krueger recommends the vividly colored artwork of fellow Mankato-turned-northeast Minneapolis artist Taylor Evan. Krueger appreciates the bold color palette in Evan’s abstract paintings.
“His artwork jumps out and grabs your attention when you see it, whether it's abstract or a concrete design,” says Krueger.
Evan began working in ceramics before shifting into abstract oil painting, and his most recent work combines oils with screen printing. “I can’t wait to see where he goes next,” Krueger said.
Find Evan’s work on Instagram here.
More from Art Hounds * Art Hounds hearken back to the 60s * Art Hounds recommend a show on the future without honeybees, touring farms and parks * Art Hounds has imagination-stretching ideas for summer viewing and listening
Shari Aronson of Z Puppets Rosenschnoz is looking forward to “The Uncertainty Principle,” a show by Teresa Mock that explores, with shadow puppetry, her father’s experiences serving in the Vietnam War and the effect on their lives to the present.
“I know Teresa's work in theater as highly visual and physical, usually comic and ensemble driven,” says Aronson, of Minneapolis. “I'm fascinated to see how Teresa will transform her stories of the warm relationship with her father into a one-woman show about intergenerational trauma.”
“The Uncertainty Principle” runs live at the Open Eye Theatre in Minneapolis through Sunday. The theater requires proof of full vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test within 72 hours. The show will also be available online Sept. 2-30.
Retired art critic and musician Scott Bartell has the 1960s on his mind. He has a ticket to see the “Summer of Love”, presented by the Sidekick Theatre at the Minnesota Masonic Heritage Center’s Ives Auditorium in Bloomington.
Minnesota musician and composer Gary Rue arranged the music, which will be performed by a quartet in coordination with a 1960s-style light show, created by Ben Krywosz of Nautilus Music-Theatre. Krywosz designed and operated lighting at Fillmore West in San Francisco from 1967 to 1972. His slides from that time are used in the show. It’s Thursday at 1 p.m. and Friday at 7:30 p.m.
Greg Krauser of Austin is looking forward to the Austin Artworks Festival Saturday and Sunday. The festival is in its 10th year, though it was canceled last year due to COVID-19.
Krauser has seen the event outgrow a single building to take place over several blocks. The festival includes work by local artists, both emerging and more established, and music on indoor and outdoor stages. The genres range from classical and R&B, to country and polka. You can also help paint a Volkswagen Beetle.
Most activities will be held outdoors, and masks are required for everyone indoors.
Sarah Peters, executive director of NorthernLights.MN, is excited to see the return of Queen B, a musical designed to be performed outdoors.
Written by Minnesota playwright and beekeeper Elle Thoni, the subtitled “A New Work of Honeybee Futurism” takes place in a future when bees are extinct and humans live in artificial domed environments in order to survive. As the characters realize the problems and inequalities with their situation, they must find a new way to make a life for themselves.
“My favorite thing about work like this is that, by being set in the future, it models for us a different way that our lives could be,” said Peters. “It has music [by Dameun Strange], it has dance, it has gorgeous costumes and makeup and the actors are an incredible, diverse cast that will make the show really come alive.”
“Queen B” runs Friday through Sunday at 6 p.m. in Franconia Sculpture Park in Shafer. Other performances are Friday, Aug. 27 at DreamAcres Farms in Wykoff; Saturday, Aug. 28 and Sunday, Aug. 29 at Squash Blossom Farm in Oronoco, and Saturday, Sept. 4 at Robert’s Lot in Minneapolis.
Photographer Julia Cheng is looking forward to this year’s Duluth Superior Film Festival, which runs Friday through Sunday at the Zeitgeist Zinema 2 in Duluth. The festival has a goal of challenging filmmaking norms and making space for diverse communities.
This year, they’ve partnered with multiple local organizations to promote the films. For example, Cheng is looking forward to two films sponsored by the Twin Ports APIDA (Asian Pacific Islander Desi Americans) Collective.
On Saturday, the festival presents “Land of my Father,” by Matthew Koshmrl, a documentary addressing the unresolved trauma stemming from Japan's colonial occupation of the Korean Peninsula, and the short film “Big Happiness” by Da Hee Kim, about transnational adoption.
The three-day schedule includes Q&A sessions with the filmmakers, which Cheng says is “just really special.” Viewers can buy tickets for individual films, in blocks at $15, or $50 badges for unlimited entry.
MCAD painting student Casey Grengs is a fan of the work of the Fresh Eye Gallery in Minneapolis, which supports emerging and mid-careers artists who have intellectual disabilities. Fresh Eye Gallery’s current show, “Creature Comforts,” features 10 Minnesota artists whose work finds wonder and peace within daily life.
Grengs says the work of one of the artists in particular, Lynda Mullan, who creates brightly colored, abstract paintings, gives her joy. The show runs through Sept. 25.
Photographer Stuart Klipper loves walking to his Minneapolis neighborhood art showplace, Gallery 360, currently featuring the work of Al Wadzinski and Dick Brewer.
“Al works in three dimensions. Dick works hyper-dimensionally,” Klipper said.
Gallery * Courtesy of Gallery 360
Dick Brewer, Button Box, back carved, painted Plexiglass. * Courtesy of Gallery 360
Al Wadzinski's sculpture titled Viennese Pachyderm.
Wadzinski constructs animal effigies out of commonplace objects to create combinations that Klipper says demonstrates the artist is “preposterously witty.” Brewer carves and airbrushes designs into the back of plexiglass slabs to create “phantasmagorical” images. Klipper adds the two artists are “zany, and maybe most of all very perplexing.” The exhibition runs through Aug. 15.
Lanesboro actress Lizzy Andretta is looking forward to attending the Rhythms on the Root concert series this summer, held outdoors in Lanesboro’s Gateway Park. Next up in the monthly series is blues guitarist PK Mayo, who is originally from the Iron Range. The concert is Friday at 6 p.m. The series wraps up Sept. 10 with Iowan folk singer Pieta Brown.
“It’s just very exciting to get people out in any way they can to experience the arts,” said Andretta. Tickets are required for this outdoor event, and seating is first come, first served, in socially distanced pods.
Katie Drahos of the band Butter Boys had a shout-out to a fellow Minneapolis band, Serious Machine.
“They have such a great, ethereal sound,” Drahos said. Serious Machine’s latest EP is “Still We All.” Drahos said the band is particularly great in concert and recommends following them on social media to catch their next live Twin Cities performance.
Can't see video? Click here.
Actress Eva Gemlo is excited about the return of live theater that is weird, challenging and magical.
She describes the world premiere of the play “Aquelarres” this way: “It's like [director] Guillermo del Toro meets [Spanish poet Federico Garcia] Lorca meets [Broadway musical] ‘Hadestown,’ and it's all inspired by the works of Spanish painter [Francisco Jose] de Goya [y Lucientes]. The political fantasy is set during the Spanish Inquisition, and it follows a possible saint, a pair of nuns and a coven of witches who unwittingly collaborate to overthrow their local government.”
The play was written by Joel F. Wilshire and directed by Madeline Wall of the Birth Play Project.
“You will walk away going, oh my God, that was beautiful. Why am I crying?” says Gemlo. The play will be performed outdoors at the Edgecumbe Presbyterian Church in St. Paul through Aug. 15.
University of Minnesota art history professor Jane Blocker recommends a dystopian, even apocalyptical, contemporary art show opening Saturday, called “Everyone Has a Right to Their Own Dystopinion.”
The show contains the paintings, sculptures, collages and prints of a dozen artists, curated by Erik Farseth. The artists grapple with the stuff of science fiction novels and contemporary news: global pandemic, environmental disaster, political polarization and technology’s effects on our lives.
Courtesy Image
"Number 6" by John Sauer. Meduim: Oil on panel.
“I think seeing art and knowing that there are other people out there who are contemplating the weirdness of this time, in material, real physical ways,” says Blocker “is really, maybe not joyful, but at least reassuring that you're not by yourself. You're not alone.”
The exhibition at Artspace Jackson Flats in Minneapolis will have a free opening night reception Saturday from 7-11 p.m. The show runs through Aug. 14.
Courtesy of Mai Tran
Hallucination by Mai Tran, 2020. Medium: Woodcut.
When Sophia Hoiseth graduated from Minnesota State University, Mankato during the pandemic and got her own apartment, she looked for local art for her walls. She chose prints by fellow Mankato graduate Mai Tran.
Originally from Saigon, Vietnam, and now living in Mankato, Tran blends the two cultures in her relief printmaking in a way that Hoiseth — a transplant from Qatar — says feels like home.
“I think when you look at Mai’s work,” says Hoiseth, “you can really see the intentional strokes of lines that were chosen to be carved out of woodblock and lines that were chosen to be left behind. And that makes for a really powerful contrast between the dark and light.”
Find Tran’s printmaking and photography here.
Northfield, Minn., has a poet laureate, Rob Hardy, who recommends an interactive musical experience: The Musical Portraits of Northfield. Landmarks throughout town are posted with QR codes that, when scanned with your smartphone, play songs by Louis and Dan and the Invisible Band. Hardy compares their upbeat sound and kid-friendly lyrics to the band They Might Be Giants.
Courtesy of Louis and Dan and the Invisible Band
Landmarks throughout Northfield are posted with QR codes that play songs by Louis and Dan and the Invisible Band when scanned with your smartphone.
With their clever lyrics and rhymes, each song tells the story of a different Northfield landmark. Together, they make a techie scavenger hunt for families. Hardy says the song about Bridge Square always gets stuck in his head: “Bridge Square, it’s not a real square. It’s a trapezoid / you should not avoid.”
Archie Barbier of St. Paul discovered the music of DJ Ariesfirebomb over the pandemic, watching their Friday night dance parties on Twitch. “They are someone that's going to get the party started no matter where you are,” said Barbier.
Blending music of different styles across the decades, Ariesfirebomb creates “a black, queer, safe environment within their music, and within all of their performances.” In addition to Twitch, they are active on Instagram, where Barbier says he’s learned so much about the cultural history of music.
Ariesfirebomb has a live show Friday at the Fine Line in Minneapolis. The 9 p.m. show is for audiences 18 and over.
President of the Twin Cities Cabaret Artists Network, Jennifer Eckes is excited about a Friday show by jazz vocalist Katia Cardenas. Cardenas sings jazz infused with R&B and pop.
Cardenas suffered a vocal injury three years ago. Over the pandemic, she strengthened her voice and wrote original songs.
Eckes calls Cardenas a vibrant performer and an up and coming musician to watch. The concert is at 8 p.m. at the Granada Theater, the renovated former Suburban World in Uptown.
Can't see video? Click here
Mike Larson of Minneapolis is an escape-room enthusiast, and he loved Walking Shadow Theatre’s production of “Reboot,” an online play with puzzles.
Larson says an interactive puzzle-solving experience is the best version of this story, as opposed to one forced to fit a virtual medium. The actors are engaging and the puzzles enhance the play’s narrative, Larson says.
Participants play the role of hackers and you don’t have to act. Larson’s group of friends and strangers became so engrossed with the story that they found themselves having ethical discussions over their hacker plotline.
Unlike other escape rooms, there is no ticking clock built into the story, though there is an urgent mission to accomplish. You can buy tickets as individuals or with friends, and you’ll be interacting with other attendees to problem solve. The play and puzzles take about two hours. Ticket sales run through Aug. 31.
Shannon Riley of Stillwater, Minn., regularly checks the billboard at the Zephyr Theatre in downtown Stillwater for an eclectic mix of theatrical productions, literary readings and live music that gets people dancing in the parking lot.
The theater makes its home in the renovated Zephyr train depot, which Riley says is a cool and quirky spot to explore. This weekend, Zephyr is staging a full-scale professional production of the musical “Mamma Mia!” at North Lowell Park.
The musical about a summer wedding is set to music by the Swedish pop group, ABBA, and staged against a backdrop of the St. Croix River. The show runs Thursday through Sunday at 7 p.m., rain or shine.
Colin Bracewell recommends the music of Minneapolis singer/songwriter Brooke Elizabeth, who’s headlining at Aster Café in Minneapolis on Friday. Bracewell says the songwriter has made music since finishing high school, and has a steady performance calendar this summer to promote her new EP “You and Me.”
Bracewell, also a singer/songwriter, compared the honesty of her sound and the quality of her vocals to that of Phoebe Bridgers.
Brooke Elizabeth performs "You"
Artist Christopher Selleck of Robbinsdale, Minn., traveled to Rochester to see Preston Drum’s immersive exhibit, “Bubbles” at the Rochester Art Center. The show combines sculpture, video and paintings large and small. Selleck describes the style as “at once painterly, playful, punk rock and sentimental,” and he suggests visitors keep an eye out for “joyous little re-creations” sprinkled through the exhibit like Easter eggs.
Courtesy of Preston Drum
"Crib Piece (Elvis and Papa)." Mixed media sculpture by Preston Drum.
Drum is part of the sandwich generation that is caring for younger and older relatives at the same time. The show includes a moving meditation on caring for his mother, who has Alzheimer’s disease.
The exhibit runs through Oct. 17.
YouTube link to Preston Drum's artist talk
Roy Taylor hosts the radio show “Indigeneity Rising” at KFAI, and recommends the Mni Sota Native Music Series, presented by The Cedar Cultural Center in Minneapolis.
Artist Alex Buffalohead curated the series by North American Indian musicians, which runs each Thursday in July at 7:30 p.m. on The Cedar Public Access Channel.
Keith Secola: Mni Sota Native Music Series
The Cedar’s Indigenous Music Series has featured performers from around the world for the past decade, but this year’s virtual series is focused exclusively on North American artists, most of whom are from Minnesota. The genres include rock, blues, and alternative. You can listen back to the July 8 performance by Keith Secola, and tune in to hear The Wake Singers Thursday, Corey Medina & Brothers on July 22, and on July 29, an Artist Showcase hosted by Keith Secola. The series is funded by the Rosemary and David Good Family Foundation.
Kelly O’Sullivan of Apple Valley was in Theatre 55’s production of “Hair” in 2019, and she is excited to see the theater reprise an outdoor, music-only version of the show on this side of the pandemic. Theatre 55 puts on productions by seniors — an age group particularly hard-hit by COVID-19. O’Sullivan says the original cast formed a strong bond, and she’s looking forward to seeing members who supported each other sing songs about experiences from the past year.
Performances for “Hair! The Concert Experience” this weekend and next are at Caponi Art Park’s outdoor amphitheater in Eagan, Fridays and Saturdays at 7 p.m. and Sundays at 3 p.m.
- Read more about Theatre 55 Older actors find a stage where age is no problem
Art fan Doris Rubenstein of Richfield, Minn., is grateful for both summer and arts events. She’s fascinated by the way local artist Jodi Reeb turns one summer product — beeswax — into paintings.
Courtesy of Jodi Reeb
"Bejeweled 2," encaustic and metallic paint on acrylic disk by Jodi Reeb
Reeb’s encaustic, or hot wax, art is on display in “Structure and Connection” at the Kolman and Pryor Gallery at the Northrup King Building in northeast Minneapolis. Reeb’s work is paired with that of Maine artist Dietlind Vander Schaaf.
Rubenstein said “you can always ask gallery owners Anita or Patrick as many questions as you have about encaustic. It's an opportunity to enjoy art and learn something new — a sweet deal!”
Courtesy of Jodi Reeb
"Sunshine 2," encaustic and enamel on aluminum by Jodi Reeb
The show runs through Sept. 4.
Carin Bratlie Wethern of Bloomington, the artistic director of Theater Pro Rata, enjoys listening to the debut album “Side by Side” by the Minneapolis-based duo Champagne Drops. Bratlie Wethern said, “each song feels like a little semi-precious stone in a child's treasure box.” She loves the way the sparse instrumentals offset the voices of singers Emily Dussault and Leslie Vincent, creating an intimate album about female friendship, motherhood and childhood.
While the album is meant for a general audience, Bratlie Wethern says her 4-year-old daughter is a fan of the album, which has become a soundtrack to bathtime.
Art festivals are popping up across the state this summer after many were canceled last year due to the pandemic. Annette Block-Valdivia of Grand Marais recommended one arts festival off the beaten path along the North Shore: the 15th annual Hovland Arts Festival. It takes place this weekend from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Block-Valdivia called the small town north of Grand Marais “a gem” and said the festival is a great place to find beadwork, fiber art and leatherwork, as well as paintings, wildlife photography and more by local makers.
Courtesy of Rachel Klesser
A painting by Rachel Klesser.
The event, which includes live music, takes place both indoors and outdoors at the Hovland Town Hall on Highway 61.
Solo musician Lyla Abukhodair of Duluth, Minn., has fond memories of seeing Laura Sellner perform with her band Superior Siren shortly before the pandemic closed venues. She’s excited to share about Sellner’s new solo EP, called “Kill Your Darlings.” Abukhodair admires how hard Sellner works, the way she encourages fellow musicians and her “dreamy” music.
Sellner will be doing a Minnesota tour with her new music this summer, including a stop in Two Harbors at Castle Danger Brewery at 6 p.m. Thursday and in Minneapolis at Utepils Brewing at 1 p.m. Sunday.
Filmmaker Naomi Ko has followed the work of Yeej Moua for the past few years and looks forward to the premiere Thursday of his short film, “The Wind Always Strikes the Highest Mountain.” The film was written and directed by Moua and funded by Northern Spark as part of the final weekend of this year’s two-week festival.
Courtesy of Yeej Moua
The poster for Yeej Moua's short film.
The short film tells the story of a Hmong American teenager grieving after her brother dies of COVID-19. The family was unable to perform a traditional Hmong funeral.
Ko praised Moua as a “jack of all trades” who creates music as well as writes and directs and wants to see how Moua will bring those skills together to inject a sense of youthfulness, joy and community on a difficult subject matter. The film is in Hmong with English subtitles, followed by a bilingual Q&A. It screens online at 7 p.m. Thursday, 9 p.m. Friday and 2 p.m. Saturday.
Jon Skaalen of Stillwater is interested in Full Circle Theater Company’s upcoming virtual event, “Sharing Stories on Issues of Disability and Theater.” It’s a combination short live performance and an interactive discussion, featuring four actors with disabilities telling their stories as artists.
The show runs for 90 minutes, with English closed captioning and ASL interpretation, at 7 p.m. Friday and Saturday at 7 p.m.
Visual artists Lisa Bergh and Andrew Nordin of New London, Minn., recently took an art-themed road trip that included a stop at the Nemeth Art Center in Park Rapids, Minn. and the T. L. Solien exhibit “See the Sky.”
Solien’s large scale paintings captivated them. They described the drama of his contemporary work — its humor and pain and emotional charge — as well as his skill with color. “There's actually some subtle moments in some of the smaller pieces that I found myself kind of stuck on,” said Nordin, who was struck by Solien's use of the color yellow.
Courtesy of Nemeth Art Center
T.L. Solien, "The Renunciation 2," 2015. Acrylic and enamel on canvas, 72 by 96 inches.
“I always love going to the Nemeth Art Center,” added Bergh, “You enter into the space through the [Hubbard County] Historical Museum with tons of artifacts, which even made more sense when you walk [up the big stairs] into Solien’s work, because the show is just built on all these artifacts of his personal history of culture.”
T.L. Solien’s show runs through July 17, with a closing reception on July 10 at 4 p.m.
Claude and Laurel Riedel of Minneapolis love the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, and they recommend a children’s picture book written and illustrated by Ely residents, about a familiar scene during wildfire season.
Courtesy Legacy Bound
“Big Yellow: Firefighting Superstar,” written by Polly Carlson-Voiles and illustrated by Consie Powell
The book is “Big Yellow: Firefighting Superstar,” written by Polly Carlson-Voiles and illustrated by Consie Powell.
The Riedels have a personal connection to the story. While on a camping trip near Trout Lake some years ago with the author and her husband, they saw smoke from a forest fire. Both Claude and Laurel vividly remember the big yellow airplane that came swooping down to the lake in front of them, scooped up water, and then climbed up above the treeline with its heavy load to go fight the fire.
Immediately, they turned to Carlson-Voiles with a recommendation: “You have to write a story about this,” said Laurel. “Kids will love this. We are loving it as grownups.”
The picture book was published this year by Minnesota-based Legacy Bound. The Riedels say their grandchildren, ages 7 and 10, enjoy reading about how planes are built and used to fight forest fires. Of the Ely-based illustrations, Laurel Riedel says “Big Yellow looks just like I remember her, just a little friendlier.”
Painter Nancy Ensley of Ely, Minn., recommends a collection traveling across the Iron Range this summer. The Ancient Cedars Trail Exhibit features the work of 12 artists from Duluth and northern Minnesota, including paintings, fiber arts, weaving and bead art.
The trail — recently created through the efforts of the Department of Natural Resources, the city of Tower and a private landowner — preserves a grove of old-growth white cedar trees that date to the late 1800s.
There is no gallery in Tower to house the exhibit, Ensley said, so the works will stop in different Iron Range cities. This month, the collection is on view at the Lyric Center for the Arts in Virginia. The show travels to Ely’s Art Corner in July, the Borealis Art Guild in Hibbing in August, and Northwoods Friends of the Arts in Cook in September.
Northern Spark is back in the Twin Cities this year with a modified format. Instead of dusk-till-dawn arts events, the hybrid of live and virtual events is spread over two weeks. Musician Kashimana Ahua is excited about Dameun Strange’s Sol Soundgarden, a 24-hour interactive musical installation.
Strange’s work imagines a realm where musical flowers bloom. Visitors use a mobile device to locate and listen at locations representing different blooms, spread across the Rondo and Frogtown neighborhoods in St. Paul.
Strange composed each piece using sounds recorded in the corresponding space. Collaborator Sayge Carroll created instruments inspired by the environment. Ahua called it a “magical experience just waiting to happen.”
The installation runs Saturday beginning at 9:02 p.m. for 24 hours.
Sculptor Betsy Alwin of Minnetrista recommends Gwen Partin’s visual arts exhibit at Form + Content Gallery in Minneapolis.
The exhibit of large and small works on paper explores weaving, sewing, and textile patterns. Alwin said you may first notice the encounter large collage drawings in Partin’s “Remnants” series. The paper and fabric scraps and hand embroidery are a tribute to her mother, a quilter.
Visitors don gloves to look through hand-bound leather books containing the artist’s drawings. “I really enjoyed being able to interact with the drawings in this personal way,” said Alwin. “I could sense the amount of time in each work, and it brought me closer to the meditative process of making them.”
The show closes Saturday. Hours are 1 to 5 p.m. by appointment at Form + Content Gallery.