Many Waters: A Minnesota Biennial
Presented in Partnership with The Minnesota Museum of American Art (The M)
On View: Saturday, July 31, 2021 – Saturday, October 2, 2021
Sneak Peak: Saturday, July 24, 3:00-6:00p.m.
Opening Reception: Saturday, July 31, 5:00-8:00p.m.
Gallery Hours: Monday through Friday, 10:00a.m. to 4:00p.m., Self-Guided Experiences
To meet with NewStudio Gallery Director, Camille LeFevre, make an appointment by emailing: clefevre@newstudioarchitecture
To meet with Laura Joseph, Curator of Exhibition, the M, at NewStudio Gallery, make an appointment by emailing: ljoseph@mmaa.org
“Many Waters: A Minnesota Biennial,” presented in partnership with The M, looks into some of the imaginative and dedicated ways that artists and culture bearers from across the state are engaging with water. Featured creative practices are based in both observation and engagement; some are solitary, while others are collaborative.
“We invited falling into our new pattern of the land” - Gregory Euclide
“Many Waters” includes art in a wide range of media that, collectively, engage all the senses; foster conversation, awareness, and a sense of care; and spark new ways of thinking about water and water stories through many different lenses, including ecological, social, political, historical, spiritual, and creative.
A number of artists use found materials drawn from daily walks or other creative rituals. Some works reflect a maker’s deep engagement with a specific place. Others take a broad, poetic view. A theme running through the exhibition is a concern for the environmental impact of human activity on bodies of water.
Work included at NewStudio Gallery include Presley Martin’s sculptural installation, made up of hundreds of pieces of foam he often first mistakes for natural materials and collects from the Mississippi. Annie Hejny creates her luminous paintings—suggestive of gateways to watery worlds beyond human reach—with respectfully gathered Mississippi water and sediment. In her sculpture “Wave,” Barbara Bend weaves together zippers, neckties, t-shirt strips, curtain samples, silk necktie fabric, a sari, buttons, and shells in a kinetic gesture of force and embrace.
Works on view in The M’s windows along Robert and 4th Streets, and in its skyway Ecolab Entrance, include Aaron Dysart’s sculptural fountains, which represent the water levels over the course of one year in the history of an observational well operated by the Department of Natural Resources in Savage, Minnesota. Zamara Cuyun’s kaleidoscopic painting “Midwife” reflects on the relationship between women and water as life givers and sustainers.
Karen Goulet’s quilt honors the water journeys of her Ojibwe, Métis, and Sámi ancestors, as well as the longing the sky has to see its reflection in the water in the winter months. A selection of projects from Anthropocene Collective—an interdisciplinary group of artists, researchers, and activists spanning the Mississippi River—explore the ongoing devastations of white settler colonialism, as well as indigenous revival along the river, which runs a mere block from The M in Imni Za Ska, now known as St. Paul.
“Many Waters” was juried by a panel that includes Matthew Fluharty, a visual artist, writer, and Executive Director of Art of the Rural; Dakota Hoska, Assistant Curator of Native Arts at the Denver Art Museum; Laura Joseph, Curator of Exhibitions at the M; and Jovan C. Speller, a visual artist, curator, and Program Director at Metro Regional Arts Council.
“Vitality” - Annie Hejny
"The Wave” - Barbara Bend