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Original Green Opens at Mill City Museum
June 1, 2010
By Sheila Regan
Original Green the new exhibition now on display at Mill City Museum showcases the extraordinary visions of four Native artists interpreting the past, present and future of the St. Anthony Falls area. The show is collaboration between the Minnesota Historical Society’s Mill City Museum and All My Relations Arts which recently became an official initiative of NACDI. Curated by Heid. E. Erdrich, and highlighting the art of Gwen Westerman, Bobby Wilson, Carolyn Lee Anderson, and Gordon Coons, the exhibit takes stock of the St. Anthony Falls area’s changing character and relationship to land and people.
The exhibit is part of a year-long series of programs at Mill City Museum called Greening the Riverfront, funded by the Saint Anthony Falls Heritage board. The series will examine how the Minneapolis riverfront has transformed, beginning with the Dakota and Ojibwe people and their relationship to the land, their removal by Euro-Americans, the rise of industrialization in the area, and the recent steps to embrace sustainability as a goal, as well as a look toward future initiatives.
At the opening of the exhibition on May 20, NACDI Executive Director Justin Kii Huenemann said that as an organization, NACDI is about community building, and that people’s relationship to the arts is a part of that work. He said the four artists represented in Original Green are “just a small example of the many artists in our back yard.”
Curator Heid. E. Erdrich said that she chose the four artists because she thought their art would look good together, but also because of the way the artists’ visions would complement each other. She said Gordon Parks has a historic vision because of his love for traditional styles such as the Woodland Arts style. Gwen Westerman, Erdrich said, has a universal vision in her attention to detail and awe-inspiring quilts and textile work. Carolyn Lee Anderson has a personal vision, according to Erdrich, examining the urban landscape in a natural world. As for street artist Bobby Wilson, Erdrich said he has a present vision, “electric with currency.”
Utilizing the two-dimensionality, bright colors and thick lines of the Woodland Arts style, Gordon Coons’s paintings in Original Green jump out at the viewer. His painting Looking Toward the Future (Kakabikah) depicts vibrantly painted animals such as an eagle, fish, and a loon in a circular display embracing the natural world of the St. Anthony area. Another painting, European Landscape with Woodlands Style (Kakbikah) contrasts a western style of painting with bright figurative aspects of the Woodlands style in a Mississippi River scene. His Spirit Island also utilizes the bright colors, although the painting also has an abstract expressionist quality: thick textured blue and white paint cover the canvas while hints of brown hint their way to the surface, representing the land emerging from the water.
Gwen Westerman, who has shown her famous quilts all around the country, has three pieces in the exhibit, which reflect how the Saint Anthony Falls have changed over time. Otokaheya (At the Beginning) is a quilt that shows how she imagines the Mississippi originally looked. Using found objects such as dryer sheets incorporated into the fabric, Westerman creates a poignant and reflective work. In Owaniyomni (Whirlpool) Westerman shows how Saint Anthony Falls might have looked during the presence of the Dakota people before the European arrival. Using embroidery to create the ripples in the waves, the piece emanates the calming tranquility of the water. Finally, Apetu Sapa Win (Dark Day Woman) reflects a contemporary scene, complete with the Minneapolis skyline in the background.
Carolyn Lee Anderson presents mixed media pieces incorporating paper, fabric and leaves and work with graphite, watercolor and acrylic. Her largest piece, Stories from Saint Anthony #1, is sprinkled with drawings of Pillsbury Best Flour, Gold Medal Flour, and Grainbelt Beer signs. In the bottom corner, what looks to be Father Hennepin raises his arms in prayer. There is also text displayed in the work, telling the story of two friends climbing to the top of the Gold Medal Flour building when they found out that one of them was dying. As Erdrich said in her opening speech, the work is extremely personal, but at the same time expansive, showing the multiple layers of history that serve as a backdrop for the human stories that happen in a given place.
Bobby Wilson, who practices graffiti art as well graphic design and painting, uses three different mediums to show his different visions of the river. Our World uses wood to reflect the simplicity of the grain and of a world untouched by industry and pollution. Their World, in contrast, uses spray paint on canvas. Tunnels, smoke stacks, and a pink and orange polluted sky show the ugliness of modernism. Finally, in Their World, which is painted in black on aluminum, shows what appears to be a mutated enormous hand grasping for life as it emerges from the water. The disturbing piece offers a post apocalyptic portrayal of what the river could become if pollution and industrialization continue.
While each of the artists has their own unique style, they share a love for the land and people reflected in their work. All of the artists grasp the importance of the river, and its history, and in their own ways use their art to send a message of how important it is to preserve the valuable resource.
Following the run at Mill City, the exhibit will then be presented at AMRA and NACDI’s new space, located at the former Open Arms building (1416 E. Franklin Ave.) AMRA will open the new gallery space sometime at the end of 2010 or beginning of 2011.
