Portrait of Jean Matzke by Chris Felver

Early last Friday morning, fiber artist Jean Matzke went out for a stroll in downtown St. Paul with her boxer, Maya, just like she did every morning. As she crossed the street near her condo in Lowertown Artist Lofts, she was struck and killed by a passing garbage truck. The strange, sad nature of the tragic accident has grabbed a number of headlines; but not enough has been published, thus far, about the woman, herself.

Matzke was a fixture in the local art and fine craft scene — in addition to her distinguished career as an artist, she ran a gallery in St. Cloud for years and years before moving to the Twin Cities in the early 2000s. Her distinctive artwork was shown regularly at the Grand Hand Gallery and Textile Center; she was a stalwart of the seasonal St. Paul Art Crawl scene and a lifelong booster of her fellow artists’ work. In the wake of her sudden death, artists from all over the state are struggling to make sense of her loss.

One of Matzke’s friends and Lowertown Lofts neighbors, filmmaker Deborah Wallwork, offers her own tribute to Jean below.

*****

It’s our deepest fear — that your life could be over in an instant. One day you are talking and laughing with a friend in the elevator, about to take your dog for a walk; and then, the next minute, you are gone, kaput, finished.

Lowertown artist Jean Matzke was killed a week ago, struck by truck at the intersection of 5th and Sibley, close to Mears Park. There’s a memorial there, one of those ad hoc folk shrines — roses and sunflowers, photographs and news stories, all bound to a lamp post. That Jean died instantly is maybe a blessing; but it also left a hole in many lives. Here was someone who held many threads in her hands; an individual who gladly took on many roles and made many connections in the circles of her community.

Jean was, first of all, a bright smile you encountered at the Textile Center, the WARM meetings, the St. Paul Art Crawl. A can-do person, she was enthusiasm incarnate, someone who’d jump in to help out, who took up others’ ideas and ran with them. Never one to complain, she embraced life and its challenges with a little twinkle of humor, in way that was both admirable and charmingly self-deprecating.

Jean Matzke, "Tangled"

Being so warm, upbeat, engaging, she was, naturally, a light to others. A wonderful artist in her own right; she was also loved for being one who served. She ran a gallery in St. Cloud for many years, and she continued to be a resource for many artists and students from outstate who came to the Cities. After she moved to St. Paul, into Lowertown Lofts Artist Coop, in addition to showing her own work, during the Art Crawl, she organized a “theme wall,” where she curated and hung a show of other members’ work.

That was Jean, always looking around to see what she could do.

I loved her work the second I saw it. It’s deeply personal, and yet, intellectual. She was thinking, through her art, about the life she led–about being a woman, a mother, a passionate reader. Her art took the thread of her life and worked it intensely into the fabric of the world around her. Interested in the figure, in the combinations of text and image, she put her ideas in a medium that is rich with feminine history — is there a woman out there who doesn’t lust after fabric? And yet, somehow, hers is a medium that still hangs in the halls of art history under the rubric of “craft.” Jean made art: pieces that are serious, thoughtful, playful, and expressionistic.

Jean Matzke, "Fall at 5"

Stubbornly independent, full of energy and optimism and physical stamina — at 70, Jean was vital, as antsy and eager as a young teenager. At a gathering which friends recently held in her memory, there were many stories about Jean climbing up 14-foot ladders, hauling great boxes of exhibit materials to and fro in her capacious van, refusing all offers for help. She walked at least five miles a day; on the day of the accident, she was probably on her way back to Lowertown from her ritual route around the St. Paul Cathedral, arriving back home as the sun rose above the buildings at five in the morning.

We couldn’t keep up with her.

I’ve been thinking about Jean and thinking about threads–about how so many stitches, in embroidery, are circles. Each stitch is like a tiny brush stroke, in each one you have to travel into something and then find your way out.

I’m thinking now about how there’s always two sides to a cloth, the one you see, which is realized, an image created through meticulous and demanding labor; and then there’s other side, the one that is a tangle of knots and cut ends.

Paul Klee defined drawing as “taking a line for a walk”; it’s a phrase that fits if you think about embroidery as the complex elaborations of a thread.

One of Jean’s recent pieces is about tangles. Another one is about the fear of losing one’s memory–a different kind of tangling, so I’m told.

In Greek mythology, three ancient crones weave the threads of Destiny. Clotho spins the Thread of Life, Lachesis allots the length of the tether, and Atropos positions her scissors over the loom for the final snip. One by one the threads are cut in this life, almost unnoticeably. And sooner or later the garment or quilt or weaving is freed from that endless spool.

We in the arts community were all devastated by the suddenness of this loss. At the Lowertown Lofts, we held a remembrance ceremony. We all brought candles and lit them, one from another, told stories, and brought them together into a brilliant shrine of many points of light. Someone sang a Tibetan prayer, and another person did a releasing of the spirit. Improvisationally, as artists, we knew we needed to turn this tragedy, to tuck in the threads, tie up the loose ends.

Jean didn’t get a chance to say goodbye. Her thread was precipitously cut. But the embroidery of her life, her work, goes on.

–Deb Wallwork

Kristin Makholm with British artist Graham Rawle and the Cowardly Lion, the Scarecrow, Dorothy, Toto, and the Tinman in the field of poppies.

Last week, the Minnesota Museum of American Art (MMAA) announced that the St. Paul museum has hired a new director, Kristin Makholm. In addition to her duties as an adjunct professor in the Minneapolis College of Art and Design’s liberal arts department, Makholm has spent the last five years as MCAD’s director of gallery and exhibition programs, as well as being the administrator of two large artist fellowship programs, the McKnight Artist Fellowships for Visual Artists and the Jerome Foundation Fellowships for Emerging Artists. (You can see a list of the recently named 2009/10 McKnight Artist Fellows here.)

Frankly, the news that MMAA was hiring a new director at all came as something of a surprise to me–last I’d heard, the institution’s very future was in doubt. With all the misfortune hitting arts organizations in recent months, hearing about the MMAA’s plans for revival is heartening news, indeed. In spite of its recent troubles, the museum has been a valuable addition to the Twin Cities (and, in particular, St. Paul’s) contemporary art landscape, particularly for its impressive (albeit too rarely seen) permanent collection of artwork and an admirably enduring commitment to showcasing work from regional artists.

Kristin Makholm will assume her new post at the MMAA quickly, on June 22, so before she’s swamped with the tasks of settling in to her new job, we hit her up for some information and insight–about the MMAA’s new plans, her new role in and vision for the museum, and what we can expect from the institution as it regroups and moves forward.

*****

What prompted you to make this move from an influential position in a nationally known educational institution to take the helm at MMAA, by all recent accounts a struggling organization? And why now?

KM: My background is as a museum curator, and I always knew I’d want to return to the museum someday. I’ve been at MCAD almost five years, plenty of time to make my mark on a thriving college art community and to develop my knowledge of local and regional artists, especially through the McKnight and Jerome fellowship programs. Why now? Due to the MMAA’s leadership vacuum and loss of its building, it needed someone now to take the reins, not last year, not a year from now. The timing was basically dictated by these other circumstances, not necessarily my own timetable.

The MMAA has seen hard times in recent months–turmoil in the leadership, a need for space to house the museum, not to mention the loss of momentum from the MMAA’s closing several months ago. What do you see as the lingering obstacles for the museum going forward, and how do you plan to tackle them?

KM: Well, the biggest obstacle is clearly the lack of a building, so determining what will be the best space to house the next museum will be one of my first priorities. Hand in hand with that is raising support and money for the new museum and its programming. And this will mean reestablishing confidence that the museum can thrive–both fiscally and artistically–offering donors and supporters a program, a mission, a vision that is dynamic, distinctive, and doable.

Some logistical questions –

• About the location: will there be a permanent home for the MMAA, and will it remain in St. Paul?
• About the artwork: are there plans in the works for allowing the public more opportunities to view work in the MMAA collection (and how much of it will be on view on a regular basis)?
• About money: has a new revenue stream opened up, or has the museum found a new philanthropic benefactor that turned the tide and assured MMAA’s future viability?

KM: About the location: I think it is imperative that the museum stays in St. Paul. Minnesota’s capital city needs its own art museum, an art center that can be a real destination point for people across the region and beyond. A permanent home is the goal of both the board and myself. This is part of giving the museum an established identity that people can count on, year in and year out.

About the artwork: The MMAA’s permanent collection is a major asset to the city and the state and will be seen on a regular basis. Of course, how often and in what capacity this happens will depend to a large extent on space considerations in a new building. However, it is my goal to refresh the public’s knowledge and appreciation of the museum’s permanent collection as part of the overall programming of the museum.

About money: We have received an extremely positive sense from individuals, the city, local foundations, and corporations, that the continued vitality of the MMAA is important to the cultural life of the region. Many have committed funds to help us restart our operations and search for a new building. One of my big tasks will be to bring back supporters who may have committed themselves elsewhere and reignite the enthusiasm of new donors and philanthropists on both sides of the river.

Given the abundance of art galleries and museums in the area, what do you envision the MMAA, under your leadership, will add to the scene? Put another way: Do you see gaps in the area’s exhibition and arts programming where the new-and-improved MMAA can step in and offer something distinct?

KM: That was one big question I needed to answer before accepting the job, because why do something second best or as an also-ran to other established local museums? The Twin Cities are awash with great art museums, galleries, and art centers. What niche could the MMAA fill that would make it important, distinctive, and long lasting? One thing I saw missing was a museum dedicated to art of Minnesota and the region, both past and present. This is a focus that has actually marked the MMAA’s programming for a long time now. I want to ramp it up, provide more scholarly, in-depth exhibitions that focus on regional artists, consider the “state of the state” at regular intervals, offer more cross-disciplinary events and exhibitions, collaborate with other local arts organizations, coordinate with other museums from the region, that sort of thing. This doesn’t mean we will sideline the museum’s dedication to American art, which is a key component of the collection and the history of the institution. I think programming can include work of both regional and national artists; it’s all American, after all.

What is your five-year vision for the reopened MMAA? How will the revived museum’s programming and exhibition line-up differ from what the museum has focused on previously? Specifically, do you see the MMAA continuing on as a regionally-focused contemporary art museum, or do you see this as an institution with possibilities in larger national and international art circles?

KM: In five years, the plan is to have a thriving art museum in St. Paul, a center that people regularly visit to experience high quality, innovative exhibitions and events, educational opportunities, and even parties, openings, maybe even patio nights again, which were so successful at the last MMAA. My belief is that as long as you provide high quality programming, with vision, with integrity, with unique flair–whether that be more regionally centered or more broadly American–that the institution can be a model for museums and museum professionals anywhere in the world, museums that want to refocus their attentions on the talent and individuality in their own backyards. My main concern right now is reestablishing a museum that has this integrity, excellence, and commitment. At the moment, how that will be viewed nationally or internationally is not on the top of my list of priorities. I DO feel however that if you do things right, you can be a model for anyone, anywhere.

Finally, what about the 2-D and 3-D Biennial exhibitions of work by local artists the MMAA has hosted over the years–will they go on?

KM: I don’t know. I certainly feel the museum should engage recent trends and current work in the region, but perhaps there’s a better way to go about it. Nothing’s off the table at this point.

Lookbook performing in the Sky Pesher: Photo by Cameron Wittig

Join us this Thursday night for the second Sky Pesher concert as part of  Target Free Thursday Nights: Summer Edition.  Up next is electronic duo Beatrix*JAR (Bianca Pettis-Beatrix and Jacob Aaron Roske -JAR) who create fuzzy sound collages with glitch beatboxes, rewired toys, circuit-bent keyboards, and other mutant sound machines. Beatrix*JAR’s performances are high energy dance parties so come on out and move to the funky Fisher-Price driven beats, relax on the Greenspace and enjoy a drink with friends. 

If you are unfamiliar with the circuit bending process please check out this great piece for MAKE magazine’s television program featuring a demonstration by Bianca. The circuit bending movement is quickly gaining popularity and I can personally attest to the dwindling cache of old Casio keyboards, Speak & Spell’s and kiddy drum machines at local thrift stores.

If you didn’t make it to the last Sky Pesher concert with Lookbook  here is a rundown of this unique concert experience. Five Minnesota bands will venture out of the clubs for performances inside and around artist James Turrell’s meditative Sky Pesher installation in the greenspace to  the west side of the Walker.   Sky Pesher concerts are free events, however there will be two different, but equally enjoyable ways to experience these exclusive, one-night-only sets from some of the area’s hottest music-makers.

• 1. A limited audience will be seated surrounding the band inside the Sky Pesher interior. The interior seating is very limited and available on a first come basis.  Tickets will be released at the Bazinet Lobby desk at 6pm the evening of the performance.  You must be present to receive a ticket (so if your friends want to get a ticket too…they need to be here). 
• 2. There is unlimited space on the exterior of the Sky Pesher on the Walker Greenspace. Tickets are not needed for experiencing the concert outside the Sky Pesher.  There will be speakers to hear the performance while watching the sunset and enjoying your favorite beverage from the cash bar (note: drinks will not be allowed inside the Sky Pesher). Spread out, bring your blanket or lawn chairs and enjoy the beautiful summer evening to a live soundtrack.

Walker Greenspace: Photo by Cameron Wittig

After the approximately 45 minute performance in the Sky Pesher the band will emerge and gather near the Sky Pesher entrance for a short Q&A and perhaps a bonus performance. 

Event Schedule

5:00 Target Free Thursday Nights Begin – Free Gallery Admission
7:30 Bar opens on the Greenspace
8:30 Sky Pesher Concert with Beatrix*JAR
9:45 Last Call

Again…the event is FREE, however seating in the Sky Pesher is limited on a first come basis available only in person at the Bazinet lobby desk the night of the performance. Seating outside the space is unlimited. A cash bar will be available in the outdoor seating area. Blankets and lawn chairs are allowed. Another suggestion for this week is…things that glow-in-the-dark.

For this week’s Sky Pesher concert I asked Jacob and Bianca to list their favorite Circuit Bending Workshop experiences…and a few of the resulting creations.

Having recently been accused by a fan of being altruistic sound artists, we decided instead to give you a list of our Top Ten Circuit Bending Workshops. We started offering workshops to encourage others to do it to. We taught our first workshop in our old studio apartment in downtown Minneapolis – the 3 kids that came circuit bent their Talking Elmo, Wiggles Guitar and a Casio SK-1, when it was over we couldn’t stop smiling. – Beatrix*JAR

Top Ten Workshops

1. Ong King Arts Center:  Honolulu, HI
Circuit Bending in Hawaii, need we say more? We saw several different Casio Keyboards come out at this workshop and based on our experiences at the thrift stores in Honolulu, we’ve christened Hawaii – the Island of Lost Toys!

2. The Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego
One of the first places we were ever flown to for our work! We performed at the museum’s first Thursday event that included an Art Technology Fashion show – with designers from San Diego and Tijuana. The workshop took place on a beautiful Saturday afternoon at the Museum’s Ocean room which looked out on the La Jolla coastline. There is something special about circuit bending with the ocean near…

3. The American Visionary Art Museum in Baltimore, MD
“Visionary art as defined for the purposes of the American Visionary Art Museum refers to art produced by self-taught individuals, usually without formal training, whose works arise from an innate personal vision that revels foremost in the creative act itself.” That’s us – self taught with personal vision!  AVAM invited us out to host a workshop and performance for a “Couples Night” at the museum!

4. Urban Ventures Leadership Foundation 
An afterschool program right here in Minneapolis. This was the first workshop we taught in which we invited the kids to play our machines. The kids held up signs with the number 10 written on them like Olympic Judges and expressed themselves with our gear the sonic results were amazing.

5. High Mayhem, Santa Fe, New Mexico
Sunday morning Circuit Bending with a bunch of bohemian artists in beautiful Santa Fe, our “Ah ha” moment!

6. Walker Art Center Culture Camp
We worked with students to “design” their toys from the outside. A really fun and unique experience.

7. Zeum, Art Technology Museum in San Francisco
Circuit Bending with families – adults and kids working hand and hand!

8. The Andy Warhol Museum & the CAPA Performing Arts High School in Pittsburgh
Circuit Bending in the name of Warhol.

9. Wexner Art Center, Columbus, Ohio
The Wexner placed us in a room and we hosted seven sold out workshops. “You guys are HOT!”

10. Erie Art Museum, Erie PA
We made our first news appearance on the Erie Morning News and met the Mayor. We’ve been back to Erie twice – it’s a really warm and unique town with a great museum.

TOP THREE TOYS TO CIRCUIT BEND:

The funny thing about our favorite toys is that they don’t have official names, usually they just say “Made in China” – so we’ve assigned them names below:

1. GOLDEN TOY

2. ANIMAL ORGAN

3. LITTLE KEYBOARD

Mark your calendars for the remaining three concerts of the Sky Pesher series.

July 2: Mandrágora Tango
This vibrant collective is dedicated to preserving tango music as well as translating it into
fresh yet nostalgic forms.

July 23: Machinery Hill
Deftly combining ska, klezmer, Celtic music, rock, and American folk, Machinery Hill’s style
“hurtles all over the musical map with impish delight” (Star Tribune).

August 27: Solid Gold
Summer winds down in style with an experimental performance by this trio, which creates gorgeous collisions between digital and analog instrumentation by mixing heavy beats with surprising twists on Americana. This is the culminating event of mnartists.org’s daylong field day extravaganza.

It’s easy to find writing workshops and how-to sorts of roundtable discussions about the knack of putting words together to construct an effective storyline or to explore the nuts and bolts of working within various and sundry poetic forms.

You can easily check the latest offerings at the Loft if you’re looking for practical tips on honing your craft or breaking into the publishing business.

But if you’re a mid-career writer or editor, interested in specialized conversation with your peers about a life in letters, or the more philosophical questions that arise in pursuit of the craft–well, such a forum is a little trickier to find outside industry-specific conferences.  Like many in the business of words, my day-to-day work is pretty solitary. I write for editors, of course, and we do the practical back-and-forth required to buff and polish the pieces I file for publication. I do the same dance, from the other side of the desk, with our own writers on mnartists.org. But outside the editing process, I–like many others in this profession, I suspect–don’t have many occasions for a more free-ranging exchange about the art of writing. And you know what? I’d like to.

This brings me to “The Works,” a brand-new writers’ salon, hosted and created by poet Lightsey Darst. (If her name rings a bell, there’s a good reason for that: you may be familiar with her dance criticism, which appears regularly on our own site, as well as in a number of other esteemed local publications.)

“The Works” is a monthly conversation series at the Bryant Lake Bowl where writers of all stripes are welcome, whether their work is playwriting, screenwriting, fiction, nonfiction, or poetry. But it isn’t a typical writer’s workshop; and it isn’t a live reading series, either. Instead, each evening’s conversation revolves around a small group of prepared topical presentations, created by writers for writers. Darst says, “There are a lot of readings series in the Twin Cities; and there are places you can go to talk about the craft of writing. But if writing is only a craft, I’m not interested in it. I’m interested in writing as an art form.” She describes “The Works” as an effort to engender “a lively, ongoing conversation about writing–its aesthetics, ethics, poetics, hermeneutics, erotics, and just plain tics.” She’s aiming for it to be like “the best AWP panel you’ve ever seen, but even better”–better, in part, because at the BLB you can have drinks with your writerly shop talk.

The inaugural meeting of “The Works,” held in early May, turned on three presentations: Charisse Gendron talked about the ego in contemporary poetry; Greg Watson raised the question of truth in poetry; and fiction writer Joseph Laizure deconstructed the peculiar details that breathe life and plausibility into a scene. Over the course of the evening, each panelist gives a prepared presentation, about 15-20 minutes long, and then the floor is opened for a broader exchange on the topic with the audience.

For the second installment of “The Works”–tomorrow evening, as it happens–Darst has invited three more writers to offer up conversation-starters: Will Alexander will talk about “prose piracy” and the cross-pollination between writing with other art forms; poet Cindra Halm will weigh in on the notion of “art for art’s sake;” and Tim Nolan will talk about the hidden work of writing, including the revisions upon revisions that constitute the life of any given poem.

Future salon topics will depend largely on the interest and suggestions Darst receives from other writers. So, my fellow writers and editors: What would you like to talk about? (Visit “The Works” website to submit your own ideas for future conversations.)

For my part, I’d love to hear a discussion on, say, the art and intimacy of reading well. Or, how about hearing from a personal essayist on the tangled psychology involved with both living a story and documenting its events?

At any rate, I know I’m planning to be at the BLB on Wednesday night–I can’t wait to see how the evening’s conversation unfolds. If you’re someone with a passion for words and a hunger for shop talk that extends beyond the practical concerns of craft–why don’t you come too?

• What: The Works: A Writers’ Salon
• Where: Bryant Lake Bowl, Minneapolis
• When: Wednesday, June 3 at 8 pm
• Tickets are $6-$10 (pay what you can). For ticket information go to the BLB website or call 612-825-8949

mnartists.org and the Walker’s Public Programs department are teaming up for a unique summer concert experience merging music and sculpture.  Five Minnesota bands will venture out of the clubs for performances inside and around artist James Turrell’s meditative Sky Pesher installation in the greenspace to  the west side of the Walker.   Beginning this Thursday evening, the concert series will feature a mix of music from circuit-bent sound collage to indie pop to bluegrass as part of the Target Free Thursday Night Summer Edition.    

All of the Sky Pesher concerts are free events, however there will be two different, but equally enjoyable ways to experience these exclusive, one-night-only sets from some of the area’s hottest music-makers.

• 1. A limited audience will be seated surrounding the band inside the Sky Pesher interior. The interior seating is very limited and available on a first come basis.  Tickets will be released at the Bazinet Lobby desk at 6pm the evening of the performance.  You must be present to receive a ticket (so if your friends want to get a ticket too…they need to be here). 
• 2. There is unlimited space on the exterior of the Sky Pesher on the Walker Greenspace. Tickets are not needed for experincing the concert outside the Sky Pesher.  There will be speakers to hear the performance while watching the sunset and enjoying your favorite beverage from the cash bar (note: drinks will not be allowed inside the Sky Pesher). Spread out, bring your blanket or lawn chairs and enjoy the beautiful summer evening to a live soundtrack.

After the approximately 45 minute performance in the Sky Pesher the band will emerge and gather near the Sky Pesher entrance for a short Q&A and perhaps a bonus performance. 

Event Schedule

5:00 Target Free Thursday Nights Begin – Free Gallery Admission
7:30 Bar opens
8:30 Sky Pesher Concert Begins
9:15 Campfire songs with Aviette

Again…the event is FREE, however seating in the Sky Pesher is limited on a first come basis available only in person at the Bazinet lobby desk the night of the performance  Seating outside the space is unlimited. A cash bar will be available in the outdoor seating area. Blankets and lawn chairs are allowed.

Here is the Lineup….

Note: Unfortunately Aviette is unable to perform due to unforseen circumstances.  Lookbook will be performing in their abscence.

June 4, 8:30: Lookbook  can be your best friend, or your worst excuse for an enemy. This Minneapolis duo consists of Grant Cutler on beats and Maggie Morrison on vocals. Imagine Stevie Nicks singing along to a well-produced mixed tape of Prince, Phil Collins, and Baby Dayliner. They are small, armed, and not that dangerous; but you may leave their show with a permanent mark.

You still should checkout Aviette:  Minneapolis-based indie popsters Holly Muñoz, Justin Hartke, and Kyle Larson as Aviette weave catchy hooks inspired by the likes of the Cure and Aimee Mann. Their debut record, Until We Hear from Dave was selected as one of the best records of 2006 by The Onion A.V. Club and was CMJ’s #18 ADD. Songs from UWHFD were featured on IndieFeed and charted at core radio stations such as KALX, WRSU and WTCC. Aviette recorded their second full-length album, The Way We Met with Minneapolis-based producer Darren Jackson (Kid Dakota, The Hopefuls, Alva Star) and are currently in the studio working on a new album.

MP3: Aviette “Ghost Town”

Gather round and we’ll sing a song…

In preparation for the first Sky Pesher concert we asked Holly, Justin and Kyle from Aviette to listen ten of their favorite campfire sing-a-along songs. 

Justin Hartke (Bass)

Andrew Bird “Sovay”
Maybe it isn’t the most sing-along-y song, but it’s exactly the sort of sound that would lure me over to a campfire.  Plus, how cool would it be to hang out with Andrew Bird?

Cake “The Distance”
Not only would it be awesome to have a bunch of people sing-shouting the choruses and messing up the lyrics of the verses, but I would love to hear the campfire arrangement of this song.

Red House Painters “Have You Forgotten”
This is how I would want to end the night.  Such a beautiful song.  I might cry in my s’more…

Kyle Larson (Drums)

The Replacements  ”Skyway”
Not my favorite Replacements song, but certainly well known and suited for singing around a campfire.

Neil Young  ”Sugar Mountain”
Probably not a more ‘camp-firey” song in Neil’s catalog.

Big Star “Give Me Another Chance”
This is just a beautiful song.

The Replacements “Androgynous”
Since we’re in the Twin Cities I’ll represent The Replacements twice.  Classic song and it would be impossible not to have a good time singing this song around the campfire.

Holly Munoz (Guitar/Vocals)

Poison “Every Rose Has It’s Thorn”
Um, how can you NOT sing along?

Radiohead “Fake Plastic Trees”
 It’s just so beautiful.

Greg Brown “Love Is A Chain”
Imagine sitting around a campfire with Greg playing this song?? I would pass out. Seriously.

Here is another nice list to checkout.  And a video of my personal favorite.

Upcoming Concerts Schedule:

June 18: Beatrix*JAR
Bianca Pettis (Beatrix) and Jacob Aaron Roske (JAR) create fuzzy sound collages with glitch beatboxes, rewired toys, circuit-bent keyboards, and other mutant sound machines.

Mandrágora Tango Orchestra (July 2)
Machinery Hill (July 23)
Solid Gold (August 27) in conjunction with mnartists.org’s Field Day

The Walker galleries are Free and open until 9pm, so make it a night of free, hip entertainment.  Grab a blanket, your friends and come watch the sunset over the city to a live soundtrack.

Target Free Thursday Nights sponsored by Target
Copresented by mnartists.org.

Mural by Andy Nelson at Midway Stadium

Spending an evening with the St. Paul Saints Baseball has become an essential part of a Minnesota summer or at times the middle of winter.  The Northern League team is known as much for its baseball hauling pigs, and creative and quirky promotions, as the team on the field.  The Saints are also the only place to see outdoor professional baseball in the metro area (at least until next year). Throughout the 2009 season mnartists.org is partnering with the St. Paul Saints for a very unique promotion, pairing art with baseball.  The project is in honor of local artist Andy Nelson who came to the Saints during the winter of 1993 and offered to do artwork for the team. Throughout the following years Andy painted murals throughout the stadium, produced artwork for promotional materials, and become a beloved part of the organization.  Andy sadly passed away during the this off-season.  In remembrance of Andy, of whom team president Mike Veeck calls “our muse”, the Saints are partnering with mnartists.org and the Minnesota Art community. Beginning with the May 19th opener the St. Paul Saints will feature one Minnesota artist for each home game.  The “artist of the game” will be introduced on the field as images of their work scroll on the scoreboard.  In addition, each featured artist is generously donating a piece to be displayed within the mnartists.org gallery located near the third base stands.  During the game a silent auction will be held for the donated piece with proceeds going to local art education non-profits.  The artist is also featured on a limited edition baseball card available at the game, which is sure to become a very desirable collectible in its own right.

I am personally an obsessive baseball fan and jumped at this opportunity to partner with the Saints on this project.  Let me qualify my obsession.  For example, I can name batting averages from the 1980’s, but often can’t remember my zip code (like on my recent drivers license application). I have taken numerous vacations centered on baseball activities including a surreal trip to the Field of Dreams movie site in Dyersville, Iowa a few years back.  As a child and young adult I  professionally collected baseball cards, and by professionally I mean I actually made good money. After undergrad I made a living for a couple several years buying and selling baseball cards on the Internet and I actually paid for part of my first car and grad school with funds from years of researching and speculating on rookie cards.  I worked as an usher for the Minnesota Twins while in graduate school at the University of Minnesota and once I hit got by foul ball so hard that it left bloody stitch marks on my ribs. I was planning to catch it, but thought better of it at the last minute…and it smacked me. The whole incident was then replayed several times in slow motion on the scoreboard (and supposedly Bert Blyleven was having fun with it on the TV broadcast).  I returned to the break room to the collective “slow clap” of my fellow ushers.  As a young player practiced constantly, but I had much more desire than talent.   I could hit the ball for power, unfortunately contact was a rare occurrence and as a fielder I could turn any routine ground ball into a triple and made most pop flies any unintentional adventure

Over the last few months, as I was asking artists to participate in this project, I was amazed at how many artists shared my passion for baseball.  I find it interesting to get artists to talk about subjects outside of their work and sharing a different side of their personalities.  In a somewhat related note, I also recently found out Jack Kerouac was an obsessive baseball fan and created elaborately detailed fantasy leagues as a teenager….who knew.  Anyway, I was thinking it would be fun to celebrate the start of mnartists/St. Paul Saints collaboration by collecting some baseball stories from the local art community.  So here we go…

Pete Driessen

Okay, so I think it was 1967 or 1968 and I was 6 or 7 years old.  That summer I played little league in the big southern Minnesota city of Waseca. My team had the brightest, ugly yellow uniforms the world had ever seen.  So bright, that we were nicknamed the Light Brites. I played outfield, and rarely played well with any consistency.  I had no sense of team sports at this age.  I told my mom I wanted to quit baseball.

More important to me was one of my first trips to the old Met Stadium to see the hot Twins.  I remember the hard board seats, the hot dogs, the popcorn and the Cracker Jack sellers.  Though I don’t remember who was on the Twinkies at the time, the names of Jim Kaat, Louis Tiant, Rod Carew, Tony Oliva, Harmon Killebrew, Bert Blyleven, and either Jim or Gaylord Perry all still ring in my mind.  I think our Johnson CB- radio was stolen out of our old wagon at one of the games.  A very joyful time, and very impressive memory on a young lad.  As an artist, I am still “bad at sports.”

Tim Roby

My favorite baseball memory was my first Cubs game when I was 4 years old. My grandparents took me to a Cubs  game at Wrigley field and I remember getting out of the car walking down the street under the ‘EL” tracks the park. I don’t remember too much about the game, but I know we sat in the first row of the upper deck on the 3rd base side in the middle of the outfield. I spent allot of the game leaning over the railing  and staring at the black, white and yellow “Torco” advertisement on top of one of the buildings on Sheffield Ave. The thing I always laugh about is apparently I didn’t really understand the game because at one point I remember turning to my grandparents and asking why they didn’t put the dirt part in the middle of the park so everyone could see better.

In 1989, when I was older and understood baseball better,  I  also quite fondly and vividly remember sitting in my parent’s basement and watching the Cubs clinch the Eastern Division against the Montreal Expos. Shortly after that the cubs were destroyed by the Giants and I began wildly crying because the season was over and the cubs didn’t go any further. My mom had to come down and tell me that there was “always next year” and things like that. That was the start of many disappointing seasons of being a Cubs fan. Twenty years later, it hasn’t gotten any easier. You would think I have learned by now.

And by the way, the only curse that exists, is that of being a cubs fan. no billy goats or black cats…us Cubs fans place the curse upon us – the curse that keeps on giving.

Robyn Stoller Awend

I will never forget the parade downtown Minneapolis in 1991 when the Twins won their second World Series. The entire city was there.  I skipped school to madly wave my homer hanky as Dan Galdden passed by.

Jeff Reardon by Ruben Nusz

It was the summer before eighth grade and I had never played baseball in my life, mainly because of lack of talent.  My mother signed me up on a team because we had just moved and thought it would be a great way to meet friends.  I was practicing with the team and playing right field as the coach hit balls to the players for a defensive drill.  He cracked a pop fly out to me and I lost the ball in the sun and then–very quickly–the ball knocked my two front teeth out onto the grass; at first I was in shock about what had happened and thought the two long pieces of enamel-coated cementum were parts of my brain.  But after putting my glasses on and feeling my mouth I realized what had happened.  It took what seemed like an eternity for the coach to have my mother pick me up because I couldn’t really talk to tell him my phone number.  Fortunately, when my mother arrived my little brother knew to put the teeth in milk, and after some emergency dental surgery, my Swedish dentist was able to salvage my smile.  Needless to say, I never played baseball again.

Suzy Greenberg

Growing up in New York City my sportiness was limited to gym class where we learned poplar “sports” like kickball & dodge ball.  My friend invited me to come to the park with her family to play a game of baseball.  They explained the rules to me…including that you could tag out a player.  So I got the ball and threw it at the runner…. dodge ball style… I hit him in the back and everyone laughed….. that’s how I learned the difference between baseball and kickball…..

Witt Siasoco

One of my most memorable baseball experiences involved the Iowa Cubs, Huey Lewis and the News, and a Swedish Foreign exchange student named Marie.  For a year I had wanted to ask Marie on a date, and as a shy teenager it took the last week of school for me to ask her out on a date.  Anyway, I wanted to make sure that she had the opportunity to experience America’s Pastime, so I bought two tickets to the Iowa Cubs game.  Little did I know that I would be awkwardly dancing to “I Want A New Drug.” I tried to explain to her that I wasn’t a big fan of Huey, but I’m sure that this is the story that gets relayed to her friends in Gothenburg

Michael Fallon

The first essay, and second piece of writing, I ever published was about baseball. (The first piece, oddly, was a short fictional tale about a beekeeper’s nephew, but that’s another story.) The essay was about Steve Garvey, the All Star First Baseman for the L.A. Dodgers during my childhood growing up in Southern California. This was a long time ago. Sports heroes in the 1970s, even in the wake of Jim Bouton’s Ball Four, were still not fully understood to be human beings, with flaws and warts and character defects and so on. As a nine-year-old member of the Steve Garvey Fan Club, I was ignorant of cocaine and barbiturates (the scourge of the 70s), and I had no idea that the scourge of the 90s and 00s would be a different kind of drug, and I most certainly did not know about out-of-wedlock children. Well, actually I did know about that last thing, having been one myself, but I never would have expected Steve Garvey, my hero, would be revealed, after his playing days, as a deadbeat-dad-slash-adulterer not just once over but twice simultaneously with two different women who were not his lovely and popular wife (and early Regis Philben co-host), Cyndy Garvey. (True story.) Even worse perhaps, the guy bolted from my beloved Dodgers in 1982, eventually leading the cross-state rival Padres to its only World Series (at the time) in 1984. Garvey left behind, as his hapless replacement, Greg You-Gotta-Be-Kidding-Me Brock , a guy I once saw make two errors on routine plays in a single inning!  And this was all because apparently Garvey wanted more money (probably to pay for all his future paternity suits, when it comes down to it).

As you can see, it was inevitable I’d turn the eye-opening truths about adulthood that I learned from my boyhood hero into a disheartening come-of-age welcome-to-the-real-world musing that would be published in a small literary journal called Mosaic. And if you’re wondering why a 23-year-old, nascent essayist on baseball ended up becoming, some years later, a writer on art (with several hundred publications to his credit; so many publications, in fact, that I couldn’t find a copy of my essay on Steve Garvey, buried as it is under too much muck and old newsprint I’ve saved), I think it all comes down to that flawed human thing. I wrote about baseball then, just as I write today about art, because it is the imperfection of our athletes and artists, and the struggle of both to rise above our own natures, that interests me. Or else it has something to do with the 19th-century yeoman roots of both, but that’s another story.

I invite you to share your own story in the comment section below and to join mnartists.org and Art Happy Hour at

“Stuck in Right Field” - a celebration of art and baseball and whatever intersections there may be between the two.

What: Minnesota Twins vs. Cleveland Indians

Where: The plastic confines of the Metrodome.

When: Wednesday, June 3. Game time, 7:10 pm.

How: Artsy sorts are asked meet up at the main Twins Ticket Office – near Gate G – no later than 6:20 pm. (!!!!!) (Be there on time, or miss your chance to sit with the gang!) Everyone will pitch in to buy general admission tickets for themselves (for cheap! – only $8), and we will all enjoy Hormel Dollar Dog night together. And out in the fabulous Right Field Nose Bleeds!

And for those of you eager to catch your favorite local artist out at the Saints game this summer….here is the full lineup of featured artists.  Play Ball!

The Minneapolis of College and Design has announced the four artists selected to receive the 2009-10 McKnight Artist Fellowships for Visual Artists:

Michael Kareken paints urban landscapes filled with metal scraps, rusted debris and piles of recyclable goods. He received his MFA from Brooklyn College in 1986 and is an associate professor of Fine Arts at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design.

A 1982 and 1987 McKnight Artist Fellowship recipient, Aldo Moroni’s current focus is his Babylon Project. A five-year process piece created in ceramic, performance and video, the Babylon Project explores the volatile history of destruction and rebuilding of the ancient city. He is a 1976 MCAD graduate.

Carolyn Swiszcz creates paintings, prints, drawings and collages that explore her hometown of West St. Paul. She holds a BFA from the Minneapolis College of Art and Design and received a Bush Foundation Fellowship in 2002.

MCAD Media Arts Professor Piotr Szyhalski’s interactive designs have been exhibited worldwide. Known for his Labor Camp and Theater of Operations projects, he received two MFA degrees from the Academy of Visual Arts in Poznan, Poland.

The fellows were chosen from a field of 231 applicants. The selections were made by a panel composed of Carla Hanzal, curator of Contemporary Art at the Mint Museum of Art in Charlotte, N.C.; Maria Makela, professor and chair of Visual Studies at the California College of the Arts in Oakland, Calif.; and Roger Shimomura, an artist and professor emeritus at the University of Kansas at Lawrence.

Designed to identify and support outstanding mid-career Minnesota artists, the McKnight Artist Fellowships for Visual Artists Program provides recipients with $25,000 stipends, public recognition, professional encouragement and a catalog and exhibition at MCAD Gallery in the summer of 2010. The fellowships are funded by a grant from The McKnight Foundation and administered by the Minneapolis College of Art and Design.

You can see work by the 2008-09 winners’ work this summer-the 2008-09 McKnight Artist Fellowship for Visual Arts exhibition opens July 8 at MCAD Gallery

Reproduced under Creative Commons license (Photo: sxyblkmn's Flickr photostream)

I have a feeling artists and other self-employed creative folks know the pain of rising health care costs even more intimately than most, since they often work without the safety net that catches people working for larger employers.

But thanks to the efforts of area arts advocates and civic-minded health-care providers, help is on the way–and for a population of artists too seldom reached by these sorts of programs.

Thanks to a new initiative by Artist Relief Fund and Lake Superior Community Health Center (modeled on a very similar program in the Twin Cities area spearheaded by Springboard for the Arts), artists without health insurance who live in the Arrowhead region and in the Douglas and Bayfield counties of Wisconsin now have access to a fantastic program intended to offer critical health services at very low (and often no) cost.

Here are the basics:

Beginning March 25, 2009, individual artists may apply to the Artist Relief Fund for a voucher to be used at the Lake Superior Community Health Clinics located at 4325 Grand Avenue in Duluth or 3600 Tower Avenue in Superior.

“Health care is a major concern for the artists we serve. Many are self-employed and have little or no insurance,” says Erika Mock, President of the Artist Relief Fund board. “We are very excited to partner with the Lake Superior Community Health Center to provide artists with a new option for affordable healthcare. Helping artists connect to options for healthcare, especially preventative care is an important goal of the Artist Relief Fund. This program is a perfect start towards that goal, and we hope that the partnership will be able to grow to provide even more healthcare for area artists.”

Wende Nelson, Executive Director of the Lake Superior Community Health Center (LSCHC) adds, “At the LSCHC, we also believe that our country should provide affordable health care for its artists. For years our clinic has provided medical care on a sliding fee scale basis for working artists (full and part-time) who do not have health insurance, so we are very excited about this partnership with The Artist Relief Fund.”

Visit the Arrowhead Regional Arts Council website for more information or the Artist Relief Fund site to download a voucher form.

God knows, every little bit helps.

As we’ve mentioned in the newsletter recently, beginning this year, we’re putting our two literary series under one big umbrella, mnLIT. For those of you unfamiliar with our poetry and fiction series for local writers, here’s the skinny: mnLIT is a competitive literary program presented by mnartists.org, in collaboration with Magers and Quinn Booksellers, which consists of the What Light Poetry Project and the miniStories flash fiction competitions.

mnLIT showcases original work by Minnesota poets and writers and is sponsored, in part, by The Decider and its parent company, The Onion. (You can read a nice bit of local coverage on mnLIT by MinnPost’s Amy Goetzman here.)

We’re in the midst of a call for submissions from local writers; the deadline for submissions (both for poetry and flash fiction) is April 30. Click here for the full call for writers, eligibility, submission, and publication details.

Just this week we got our two panels, one for poetry and one for fiction, nailed down. And, I have to say, this year’s line-up of jurors is a powerhouse mix. Read on for the full list of jurors for 2009.

For this year’s What Light Poetry Project competition our panel of readers is:

Dobby Gibson (Skirmish, Polar)
Deborah Keenan (Willow Room, Green Door; Kingdoms)
Leslie Adrienne Miller (Resurrection Trade, Eat Quite Everything You See)
Joyce Sidman (Red Sings from the Treetops, This is Just to Say)
Connie Wanek (Hartley Field, On Speaking Terms, which is forthcoming from Copper Canyon Press)

For this year’s miniStories flash fiction competition our panel of readers is:

Barth Anderson (The Patron Saint of Plagues, The Magician and the Fool)
Leif Enger (So Brave, Young, and Handsome; Peace Like a River)
Lise Erdrich (Night Train)
Jon Fasman (The Unpossessed City, The Geographer’s Library)
Diana Joseph (I’m Sorry You Feel That Way)

In addition to these fine folks, Geoff Herbach will be returning for a second year as the lead juror for miniStories; and Chris Walters and Jay Peterson of Magers and Quinn will be taking over at the helm of the What Light poetry competition.

So here’s my pitch: If you’ve ever entertained dreams of writing fiction or poetry, this is your shot to get your work in front of a full complement seasoned, talented authors–no strings attached, no “reading fee” necessary to have your work considered. Just a meaningful opportunity to get your work carefully read and, perhaps, published. What are you waiting for?

You can read through previous years’ winning stories and poems by Minnesota writers–terrific, diverse stuff–on mnartists.org: here are several years’ worth of winning What Light poems and an archive of our inaugural year’s winning flash fiction from the new miniStories series.

This program has proved a fantastic way to bring local readers and writers together. Speaking of which, keep your eye out for some announcements about a couple of live readings by this year’s mnLIT winners this summer. Details and dates for those events will come in June. The call for submissions ends April 30. mnLIT winners will be announced in June and, at that time, publication of this year’s victorious short-short stories and poems will also commence.

Still from "Sugar," (2008) the festival's closing night film, directed by Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck (courtesy of Sony Pictures and BBFF)

If you’re a fan of indie film and global cinema, take heed: Beyond Borders Film Festival, sponsored by the Rime Foundation and hosted by the Parkway Theater in Minneapolis, begins tomorrow (March 25) and runs through Sunday, March 29.

I first ran across a mention of this ambitious little global film festival when I heard they’d be screening Nina Paley’s brilliant Sita Sings the Blues, a gorgeously animated, very personal reimagining of the Indian epic, Ramayana. And when I looked through the full line-up of films, well, I was a goner.

Twin Cities Daily Planet has a nice write-up on the festival today if you’d like a bit of background (“Beyond Borders Film Festival brings world cinema to Minneapolis”).

According to TCDP, festival organizers have snatched up some terrific festival circuit favorites from around the world, and will screen the world premiere of a new documentary chronicling a Tibetan monk’s search for the next incarnation of the Dalai Lama, Unmistaken Child.

See their whole, impressive line-up of films on the BBFF website.

Watch the trailer for Sita Sings the Blues that first grabbed my attention. (As an aside, the DIY effort behind the making of this film is a triumph of artistic perseverance, if ever there was one. It was mostly animated in Flash, on a home computer, if you can believe it.):

Seriously. You should go. I’ll see you there.

Related links:

Star Tribune “From Tibet and beyond far beyond” by Colin Covert

MPR’s own “Movie Natters” blogger, arts reporter Euan Kerr: “Going ‘Beyond Borders’”

KFAI’s coverage (one of the festival programmers, Jim Brunzell, is a host of the weekly show “Movie Talk” for KFAI)

Getafilm blog post on BBFF (and my source of a number of the links above)