Twin Ports Art Scene Will Be Lively in September

It looks like September is gearing up to be an exciting month in the Twin Ports arts scene with exhibition and openings in a whole range of locations. Let's start with...

Adam McCauley, Colin Witta, and Christopher Selleck will be featured in a show called Thread at the Washington Gallery, September 12, 6-9.  McCauley, who sent the poster here, expressed his excitement about the new work he will be showing. I mention it first only to get it on your calendar that the Second Friday Art Crawl is shaping up to be a good one. Start here, then walk downhill to the PROVE.

Next week's openings include:

Esther Piszczek's show Visions will be opening: Thursday, Sept 4 from 6-9 p.m. @ Beaner's Central. Thematically the work will be an exploration of pattern on glass and mirrors. Maija Jenson's interview with Esther about this show will air on KUMD 103.3 FM tomorrow morning, 8/29, at 7:45 a.m. during Northland Morning. Live Stream is available on KUMD and the interview will be recorded and archived.

To make an art night of it, you might want to start with Mary Reichert's opening at Lake Avenue Café from 4-6 p.m. featuring her beautiful felted rugs and scarves.


On Friday evening September 5 there will be an opening for Ed Newman's show Influences at Benchmark Tattoo. It's another great new space, located at 19th Avenue East and 8th Street, nearly across from Sara's Table up near UMD and Chester Bowl. I will share more about the theme in another blog entry. Dane and Kyle are outstanding artists themselves, with skin as their canvas. You might even be interested in having one of my drawings on your shoulder. This is the place to get it done.

"Blue Van Gogh" by Ed Newman

Ken Marunowski will be taking down his work at Red Mug tomorrow but you'll still get an opportunity to see it at The Shack for the month ahead. Marunowski is a plein air painter of the first degree. He also works in charcoal and other media.  

The September 11 Opening Reception at the Duluth Art Institute is going to be another great night for the arts. It's a triple header with an Earl Austin Retrospective, an exhibit titled Signs & Wonders featuring Jim Klueg and Faith Benzer, and Sean Connaughty's Ark of the Anthropocene. And a special surprise on top of all that will be the re-emergence of Sophronia in the Great Hall. I kid you not, this will be a night not to miss.

Can't get enough? Take a trip up to the Tweed Museum at UMD and feast there now and again. There's a new exhibit coming that may excite you.


And now, for something completely different.... Dylan will be in Minneapolis the first week of November. It's not too early to mark your calendars. More information coming soon

Meantime, art goes on all around you. Check in and check it out.

Artist Interviews: Best of 2012 (Part I)

Before coming to Duluth in 1986 I had been a publishing freelance writer for several years in the Twin Cities. A natural-born extrovert, I enjoyed the whole process of listening to and capturing people's stories, then writing about them. Some of these early pieces included a photographer who wondered if he'd captured a photo of the Loch Ness monster and a couple who met and married in their late eighties. It's been a real privilege to meet so many interesting people and hear so many interesting stories.

Gary Swanson

In recent years I began interviewing artists whom I met through social media. My motivations were several. First, to show the variety of ways in which creativity can be expressed. Second, as a mechanism for sharing their art with others. Third, to see what makes them tick.

Eventually, this led me to focus on the local arts scene here in the Twin Ports. I still reach out to artists abroad but I've taken a keen interest in nurturing our local arts community.

There's an experimental quality to all this. When I was a young idealist I wanted to change the world. It didn't take long for that to become disillusioning. Thirty years later I've decided to roll up my sleeves and see if in some small way I can make a difference here locally. I'm testing the idea that a strong arts community can be a catalyst for the betterment of the larger community, a theory I first heard proposed by the Art Works coalition that brought Richard Florida's ideas here a half dozen years ago.

Here are most of the interviews from January thru April. Enjoy.

Ten Minutes with Cellist/Artist Kathy McTavish

Ten Minutes with Artist/Cartoonist Simon Gray

The Modern Primitive

Ten Minutes with Gary Swanson, The Modern Primitive

Seven Minutes with Painter Melanie Sternberg

Ten Minutes with Annie Dugan, Curator at the DAI

Ten Minutes with Veteran Artist Martin DeWitt

Ten Minutes with Kat Eldred, an Arts-Centered Life

Ten Minutes with Kat Eldred, Part II

Five Minutes With Sandra Cragin

Five Minutes with Colin Wiita

Eight Minutes with Prøve Gallery Director and Co-founder Steven Read

Spotlight on Artist / Writer Jeffrey Woolverton


Thank you to each and all for sharing yourselves here.

Five Minutes with Colin Wiita

Colin Wiita was born in Duluth in 1974. I first noticed his art at the second annual “Love Your Local Artist” event at the Superior Library. Specifically it was his conversation with Clyfford Still, titled “Still Conversation,” that caught my attention and caused me to pay greater attention to his other pieces. He is currently married and a father of three children, ages 4 to 9, and lives in rural Wisconsin.

EN: How did you first take an interest in art? Did you study art in school?

Colin Wiita: My first experience with art was through the pen and ink drawings that my father did when I was a child. Although I have not seen these drawings in over 30 years I still have vivid memories of what they contain. I personally didn’t get into art until junior high where I had an art teacher who engaged his students in a way that stuck with me. I’ve been making art since junior high school, but did not get serious about it until 2004 when I began to study art at the University of Wisconsin Superior. I received my Masters in Art with an emphasis on Studio Art in spring 2011.

E: Who have been your biggest influences as an artist?

CW: My family has been the biggest influence on me. My father is a musician and my mother instilled in me a love of art by taking me to many art museums during my youth. My wife and children constantly support and influence my art work. There’s a long list of artists who inspire me, and as I explore the art world more come into play all the time. A few that grabbed my attention in my studies at UWS were Robert Rauschenberg, Basquiat, and Picasso.

E: What has been the inspiration behind your current work?

CW: My current work is inspired by my children. The freedom that they show in the drawings and paintings they create helps me lighten my control over the images that I create. This allows the works to develop on their own rather than being stuck in the idea that inspired them. I have found that when the idea comes out of the images it is more coherent than when I am force the idea upon the image.

E: Why is making art important to you?

CW: Making art is what makes life important to me. The constant challenge, success and failures that come with making art keep me engaged in every aspect of my life. To say my well-being depends on making art is an understatement.

E: What is your studio or work space like? Can you describe it?

CW: My studio is currently in my basement which I enjoy because it gives me access to my work at all times. The lighting is artificial, and the space is unfinished, but I have filled it with artwork and objects I plan to use for works. I always work standing up as I feel that I have a better range of motion. I work off two large tables and an easel. I have learned to work on a number of pieces at a time, some big some small. I find that having my current work out gives me time to digest the images and think about how to solve the next problem I feel lies within the work. This process overall makes the works I am creating a part of my everyday life.

E: What kind of music do you listen to when you’re painting?

CW: Music is a large factor to the artwork I create. I come from a highly musical family and the inspiration I get from music is immense. To describe the music I listen to is hard. I feel that alternative is too broad of a term, but the music I listen too is usually a tributary from the main stream. To give a reference point I have got a lot out of groups like Arcade Fire, Silversun Pickups, Muse, Band of Horses, and Wolfmother in the past few years.

E: You work full time in landscaping. How do you find time to paint?

CW: I have been in the landscape industry for the past 15 years and one of the main reasons I got into this line of work was because of its seasonal quality. I do paint more in the fall, and winter, but I have currently been in a good working habit year around. During the working season it is the afternoon espresso that keeps me up to paint.

E: When you make a painting or do an art project, do you think about how spectators will view the piece? Why or why not?

CW: Sometimes, yes. At times there is an idea I want to convey to others and if I do not think a little about the audience’s perception of the piece, I don’t feel that that the idea will be conveyed properly. My work is loose and primitive, and I paint what I feel and think foremost. If the audience finds something interesting about my work, or it makes them think, I feel like I have accomplished what I set out to do.


To see more paintings by Colin Wiita visit www.cjwiitartworks.com
This story originally appeared in Duluth's Reader weekly, April 5, 2012.
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