Kim Eslinger
Editor
612-321-8040
kim@millcitymedia.org

Brianna Ojard
Associate Editor

David Tinjum
Publisher
612-321-8020
dave@millcitymedia.org

Claudia Kittock
Columnist / Non-Profits
Email Claudia...

Becky Fillinger
Small Business Reporter
Producer / Milling About
Email Becky...

Michael Rainville Jr.
History Columnist
Email Michael...

Doug Verdier
River Matters

Mill City Times is a not-for-profit community service. We do not sell advertising on this site.

Community Partners

Thanks to our community partners, whose support makes Mill City Times possible:

MILL CITY FARMERS MARKET

With over 100 local farmers, food makers and artists, MCFM strives to build a local, sustainable and organic food economy in a vibrant, educational marketplace.

Visit their website...

HENNEPIN HISTORY MUSEUM

Hennepin History Museum is your history, your museum. We preserve and share the diverse stories of Hennepin County, MN. Come visit!

Visit their website...

MEET MINNEAPOLIS

Maximizing the visitor experience of Minneapolis for the economic benefit of our community, making Minneapolis the destination of choice among travelers.

Visit their website...

MSP FILM SOCIETY

Promoting the art of film as a medium that fosters cross-cultural understanding, education, entertainment, and exploration.

Visit their website...

GREAT RIVER COALITION

Enhancing the Minneapolis riverfront environment—for people and pollinators.

Visit their website...

Cultural Cornerstones
Search Mill City
Recent News
Front Page Archives
Friday
May122023

You Can Contribute Materials For the Public Art Installation at the Stone Arch Bridge Festival

The Stone Arch Bridge Festival has announced a collaborative public art installation project that will be featured at the 2023 festival, made possible through a St. Anthony Falls Heritage Board grant.

The project is a collaboration between Stone Arch Bridge Festival, Mill City Museum (MCM), a local textile artist Jorie Ann Kosel and school age children who attend Mill City Museum and Mississippi Park Connection field trips during the months of April and May 2023. Mill City Museum facilitated the collaboration by inviting the students to create a piece of art that will become part of "Reflecting the River" installation. MCM provided the students with pieces of recycled outdoor banners to use as the “paper” to write, draw, color, paint, what they felt and thought when they saw the powerful waterfall and river during their visit. These submissions, as well as other donated recycled textiles, come together under the artistic directions of artist Jorie Ann Kosel to become an impactful and inclusive temporary public art pieces to be displayed during and after the Stone Arch Bridge Festival.

The art piece will be located just outside the Mill City Museum courtyard entrance on West River Parkway.

Jorie Ann Kosel

Description of Reflecting the River Art Installation by Jorie Ann Kosel

Reflecting the River is a piece of textile art. I wanted to use textiles to paint this picture for two reasons. To begin with, it is impossible to reflect upon this stretch of the Mississippi without considering the impact industrialization has had on these banks. A number of the mills that dot these shorelines were textile and wool mills. The power of this river was harvested to produce the very materials we’ll be weaving its portrait with. The second reason is impact. Modern textile production requires an enormous amount of water and leaves millions of gallons of polluted blackwater in its wake. My goal as an artist has always centered around bringing new life to something old. In this case, I get to use the donated clothes and old household textiles of my neighbors and community members to paint a reflection of the Mississippi along its banks.

Collection barrels will be at Pryes Brewing, La Dona Cerveseria and Mill City Museum for the next few weeks. Examples of Helpful Materials You Can Contribute:

Denim - Especially those jeans that are too worn to donate / Sheets, kitchen rags, towels, blankets / Tarps, Shower Curtains and Liners / Plastic shopping bags / Old IKEA bags / Tee shirts and pajamas / Any blue, purple, green, white or neutral colored clothing

Jorie Ann Kosel Artist Statement:

I have long been mesmerized by the inherent duality of water; the serenity of its stillness against the power of its motion, its ability to bring vitality and / or destruction to everything it touches. I grew up along a river on the other side of the state, most known for its incredibly rich topsoil and the catastrophic flooding that makes its valley so suited for farming. Much like the Mississippi, the power of the Red River drove the development of the community surrounding it.

In this piece, I aim to capture and honor the vitality of one of Minnesota’s most incredible natural resources. When you stand along this fence, you are standing atop the history of the twin cities. The power of the Mississippi fed these mills, the waterways allowed for transcontinental trade, the watershed fed the land and the swirling waters beneath the falls gathered the Dakota people for hundreds of years before colonization. The power of water is what has brought all of us to this place for generations, and it is my goal to capture and honor that power with this tapestry.

I am a textile artist. Textiles were always going to be my medium, but it feels particularly applicable to this piece because of the role water plays in modern textile production as well as our proximity to the former wool and textile mills of Minneapolis past.

Using community-sourced textiles (old clothes and household linens), organic materials (grasses, flowers and woven baskets) and recycled vinyl banners I will render a reflection of the Mississippi River onto the fence at the base of the Gold Medal Flour Grain Elevators. There will also be space for others to leave their own reflections: dotted along the shores will be clusters of artwork created by local students after their classroom visits to the Heritage Zone. Folks that visit during the Stone Arch Bridge Festival will have the opportunity to create and leave their own impressions behind as well. In the end, we will have a community-created tapestry, telling the story of what this river means to us now while honoring what it has meant to us for generations.

-  -  -  -  -  -  -

2023 marks the 27th Stone Arch Bridge Festival. It is one of the Twin Cities largest and longest running festivals with a strong tradition of bringing art, music and community to the Minneapolis Riverfront on Father’s Day weekend. 

Stone Arch Bridge Festival Schedule:
Saturday, June 17, 10am - 7pm
Sunday, June 18, 10am - 5pm
.
Location: Along West River Parkway from 4th Avenue N and 11th Avenue S
Admission: FREE! 
« Douglas Dayton YMCA at Gaviidae Announces June 15 Rooftop Opening Celebration / Member Appreciation Party | Main | Minneapolis Park and Rec Board Announces Extensive 2023 Programming »