Is it possible that the heart of our rural towns isn’t found on a map, but in the spaces where we create together?

Central Minnesota community art centers are proving that creativity isn't just a hobby, it's the heartbeat of our hometowns.

It's a place to learn, a place to create, and most importantly, a place to belong.

This is Up North Arts.

Production Funding for Up North Arts is made possible in part by First National Bank Bemidji, continuing their second century of service to the community.

Member FDIC.

Hug Hydronics, committed to making in floor heating simple providing in floor heating solutions for both commercial and residential.

More info at HugHydronics.com.

Closed captioning of Up North Arts is provided in part by Renaissance Hearing Center.

Committed to enhancing your hearing, allowing you to enjoy life's most important moments.

It's a place of gathering of all demographics, all age groups about education, about arts.

No matter if you're a teacher or you’re a learner, a performer, you could be anybody and you're just welcomed to this place to come in and be a part of it.

And that's the coolest thing about this, because there is no hey, you have to be.

You just have to be.

So MacRostie Arts Center actually started in the 1960s, and at that time it was known as the Itasca Art Association.

It kind of began as like an informal, more informal group of painters that wanted to find ways to exhibit work and kind of grow in their own learning about painting.

And so that began in the 60s.

And in the early 1990s, the building that we currently are in was donated to the Art Center by Ruth MacRostie.

And then in partnership with the Blandin Foundation, they sort of set up the art center, as it's known today.

And that really, I think, propelled the Mac into another level of community arts center because we had a dedicated space and we’re able to do a lot more with our programing and really kind of become the hub of the creative community that we are today.

When I first moved to New York Mills in the 80s, I moved there in 1987 and, you know, started a nonprofit organization, in 1989.

I'd have conversations with farmers, where I learned, you know, dinner isn't at, at night.

It's at noon.

And had conversations about their hopes and dreams for the future.

And they involved arts and culture.

There just wasn't any access to it.

So the city at that time contributed $35,000 in 1991, which is a pretty significant amount of money, you know, especially on a per capita level.

Our population was about a thousand at that time.

And so this place was renovated and opened in 1992 as what we're in today.

It can be challenging for, for any area, but maybe particularly for a smaller community to get excited about new ideas.

And so as the story goes, and in fact, I have an old New York Mills Herald, which is the local newspaper, that they did a survey when the Cultural Center was first being renovated, and they surveyed the community and said, like, how many people think this should be, we should do this?

And it was like 67% of people said no.

And so it was like, that's kind of, okay, well, we're doing it anyway, so here we go!

But then the good part of the story is they surveyed people like a year after it opened, and it had flipped completely.

So 70% of people at that point said, this is a great idea.

I heard about this opportunity in Warroad that folks were looking to, build a new arts and cultural center.

And I was intrigued.

So I reached out and had a series of conversations and thought, well, this could be a really cool, project.

But what what got me hooked was the vision of it and the vision of this project in Warroad was all about access to the arts.

Right?

How do you connect community to arts and culture, and how do you create a space that's inviting to everyone in the community?

So we actually did a tour for the entire third grade class.

And they had their hard hats on, and, you know, the safety vests were like way down to their knees.

And, it's a lot to wrangle third graders.

So we had them divided up into different groups.

Right?

And, but but it was, it was amazing because then they would go home and talk with their parents about what it was, right, and their teachers like, oh, this is what this is this, we're going to have plays here.

We're going to have classes for kids.

And so again, you're, you're starting to get that, this is for me, like, this is what it can be.

And, you know, right over there at the performance hall door, one of the third graders looked up at the at the mezzanine seating and said, oh, is that where the VIP sit?

And the construction manager Carly, who is absolutely amazing, she said with like no hesitation.

At River Place, everyone's a VIP.

I spent a lot of my days as a kid here because we'd come fishing.

So Warroad was kind of my backyard.

But it was only fishing.

It was only fishing.

We’d kind of skirt the town and head to the lake, so I really, really didn't know much about Warroad.

And, when I heard about the building being put up, I still was was, I didn't have any concept of it.

And then I got to come, I think I was part of the same show, but it was like, wow.

Oh, this is just so cool and beautiful.

This venue is going to offer so much to our community.

A place for wedding receptions, school programs, community plays.

You know, we have a pretty active or a very active summer theater program.

So it's good for that.

And our classrooms here, offer the ability to do all kinds of things.

Coupled with, a first class commercial kitchen as well.

We're really fortunate that we have this space in downtown Grand Rapids.

It's, it's really become a hub of our creative community.

And one of the ways that that shows up is every month we have a First Friday Artwalk that's throughout the downtown.

There's usually, 8 to 12 different stops and MacRostie is usually an anchor event in that because each month we have an opening reception for one of our exhibits, and we get a great turnout for those events.

It's always fun when we have visiting artists from, metro areas that come in and are surprised to see that, you know, we have 100 people attending a reception instead of, you know, a dozen that they might get at some other location.

So I've been here for about 14 years and we've done a lot of growing over that time.

The space itself, has expanded a little bit.

We've added the, Giinawind Creative space and the gallery there.

But also just with in terms of our programing, we've, kind of broadened our exhibitions.

We also, collaborate with the Reif Performing Arts Center and curate exhibits in their space as well.

Just about everybody in the community has walked through these doors for one reason or another.

And, the community here in Grand Rapids is stronger because of the arts, because of the Reif.

As soon as I started participating in it, I realized how many different things go on.

Like there's art festivals, there's art walks, there's lots of live music going on.

We have the Reif, which has a lot of music and performing, and I feel like that this town has grown and grown into a more arts focused town, which is really awesome to see.

We had not lived here very long and wanted something fun to do and and just get to see people and kind of see what's happening in Grand Rapids.

And so we came and, started checking out the place.

We had gotten some free tickets from a friend who said, you need to check this out.

So we came for, I think it was a concert.

I don't remember.

Absolutely fell in love with the place and started volunteering right then and there.

The art scene in rural areas is really something that is really unique.

And I've talked with a lot of other, directors and folks that work at art centers in other rural spaces.

And there's a lot that we have in common that I think isn't necessarily universal across, you know, more metropolitan areas.

So in rural spaces, we, there's a lot more I just feel like the community involvement can sometimes be a lot more significant just because there's, you know, a smaller town, people know each other more and there's just a lot of, it feels like more of a community process and a community experience.

And particularly when we're featuring local artists, there's just a lot of support that comes with that.

And it's just nice to see that, that sort of the back and forth that comes with that, where it's not somebody is not just kind of plopping in and sharing, but there's a give and take as well.

So we've had International artists from, from a number of different countries.

Finland is what pops into my head right now, but we've had lots of other artists from the Ukraine, from Czech Republic.

So people are coming from all 50 states all over the world, and they're bringing different perspectives and different ideas, and then they come and they talk to people here in New York, Mills in the surrounding region, and they hear different perspectives and different ideas.

We had an artist here from the Czech Republic, and he had lived in a lot of different places, including, you know, the coast, New York, LA, Chicago.

He was in the Czech Republic, and he came to New York Mills.

He’s a poet And people are so used to visiting artists in New York Mills, and we're still pretty small.

We're about 1300 people.

And so oftentimes artists are recognized like it's somebody who looks a little different.

They walk everywhere.

They hang out at the cafe and at the, at the bar a lot, you know, so they meet people.

And so as he was meeting people, they would be like, oh, are you the artist?

Yup.

I'm the artist.

Well what do you do?

I'm a poet.

And they'd be like, oh, that's cool.

And then they just keep talking about whatever else they were talking about.

And after several weeks of this, Tim came to us and he said, I have to tell you guys something.

This is literally the only place I've ever been in my life where people ask me what I do, what I am, and I say I'm a poet and they just accept that at face value.

And he said, everywhere else in the world that I've been, people say, okay, well, what do you really do?

Or like, what do you do for money?

Like how do you make a living?

But here people just accepted him as a poet.

And I think that's such a beautiful story of the impact of 35 years of people being here, being ingrained into the community, community members welcoming them, and then just that cultural exchange and the idea of, you know, we all have something to offer and we can all find ways to to communicate and connect and get along.

The Smokey Hill drum group was here, and they taught us how to make a Native American hand drum.

And then after we made it, we went on stage and we got to be part of a Unity Circle, they sang the songs, thank goodness.

But we got to learn the different beats to the drum and what they mean.

And during that, the, the kids were dancing around the circle and there were elders in the audience that were also doing the dances.

I was like, wow, in Warroad.

I think part of making arts accessible to everyone is listening.

You know, finding out what their hopes and dreams are, what interests them, and how you make art and culture relevant in people's lives.

I don't think I ever set foot in the art center when I was growing up.

I always found it a little intimidating, and I thought it was the kind of place you had to, like, tiptoe around and whisper.

And, I think I did probably come in a few times, but, since so but since, moving back as an adult, I was able to be much more involved in the art scene, and that was, that's one of the things I always think about with the Art center is trying to make it a really welcoming space where kids can come in.

We had a dog in today, you know, everyone's welcome.

We are a space for everybody.

We added to our vision statement that we focus on celebrating the local and being a window to the world.

And so we talk about both of those things being equally important.

So about half of our programs, we want to make sure we're celebrating the local culture, local artists.

This gallery show is a really great example of that.

So we this is always a wildlife and decoy show which goes with our Fish House Festival theme.

So we have decoy artists that, honestly a lot of these decoy artists didn't necessarily think of themselves as artists.

They absolutely are.

They're carving these fish, they're painting them, they're amazing.

They're beautiful.

We find these wildlife painters or outdoor art painters.

It's really this is a fun show to celebrate the local.

And then being that window to the world comes out in a lot of different ways too, part of it can be celebrating, learning more about our Finnish heritage as that world, bringing in artists from other areas for concerts, for classes, for education series, just to learn about other perspectives too.

It wasn't until we started volunteering here that we started seeing there is so much to do with the arts.

I mean, even just the things on the walls that there is, there's such a variety.

When you say the arts, it's I didn't realize before, all the avenues that really just branch off of the word, the arts.

and the array of people that can be involved, from little tiny, to barely can talk, to the elderly, you know, that have so much to offer to the arts.

We have a lot of different exhibits.

And sometimes it appeals to people, sometimes they don't, and people don't always find something they resonate with.

But because we have so many different artists that we feature, it, you know, each month it's something new and there's just a wide variety of artwork.

So there's usually something for somebody to connect with.

It's really important to know that art is for everybody it’s not exclusive, you know, we have our center here, but we also try to look for ways to bring art out into the community so people can encounter it in their everyday lives.

You know, we've put up some murals around town.

We've been involved with other public art projects, and we just think that it's, that art is an important part of everybody's life.

I've also gone out and taught, art workshops at Empowering Kids, which is a program for children with autism or young adults, people with autism, and then also at facilities that work with, adults with disabilities.

And that is another area of education and art that is really near and dear to my heart.

So, being able to take arts to everybody at all ages or have them come in here, I'm a big believer in taking art outside the walls.

So getting out to teach everyone just fulfills that mission of making sure everybody has access to quality arts.

So we talk about the arts.

You know, there can be culinary arts or there can be the arts of civic engagement.

Like, how, We really are broad in our definition of the arts, but I just think there's a lot of really cool examples of people being out there doing things that maybe they don't necessarily consider to be art, but we think that any creative practice can be considered art.

So metal smiths that are creating sculptures or more functional pieces, whatever that might be.

Again, not necessarily thinking of themselves as artists.

Some of them, we've had like fishing spears or knives, a lot of different, more functional pieces.

But we'll put them on the wall in the gallery and suddenly it's art, or it feels more like art.

Right?

So it's been really fun to work with different groups of people like that and be able to just embrace this idea of arts and creativity in rural spaces.

There's too many people who think, well, I can't do art, and so I'll never draw.

And so arts aren't for me.

And it is so wrong.

Because arts are all encompassing, and I think there are cultures who don't have, like a word for art.

Art is not separate.

Art is part of their entire being.

Entire, their entire way of living.

It's just.

It just is.

I believe at its core, the arts bring folks together.

I think people just disagree on a lot of things.

And, sometimes it can be really hard to find connections.

And I think art is a way for people to connect.

So whether that's coming together for concerts or comedians or, you know, all, all different types of performing arts coming together to, to look at, you know, look at art on the walls or to create art together.

These community festivals are one of my favorite things that we do because it brings people from all walks of life, and especially the Fish House Festival, because you're getting, you know, ice fishing, ice fisher people, ice fishermen, anglers, you know, you're getting all different kinds of people, that come together.

And it just it's beautiful.

I've gotten to know so many different people that I never would have otherwise.

I think it's, they talked about food deserts.

You know, I think, there's such a thing as an art desert.

And, so just having that accessibility for people to just come in here and maybe they're up fishing for the weekend.

Maybe it's raining, they can come in here and look at the artwork for free and, and, attend the, the musical and, drama and all.

It's making art relevant in people's lives.

And by inviting farmers into the process, it creates that welcoming sense that, oh, this is for me too, because a lot of times people think, well, that's not for me.

But if you're inviting everyone in and it's like, oh, well, this is for me too.

Or, Oh, you know, I know Bob.

He's got that, you know, combine down the road and he's doing something as well.

I watch people come in and they're happy.

They're excited about what's going to happen.

They're, thrilled to have the next door neighbor be here.

And I didn't know you were coming.

I mean, it just is so many things.

It it brings so many people together and people I don't think you would see together in any other place, to be honest with you.

Maybe the grocery store, but it just it brings out a, this feeling of camaraderie.

This, my neighbor, you know, people hugging.

I love hugging.

And you see a lot of that when people come in and it's like, wow, I didn't know you were coming, you know?

So I really like that because it's almost like getting around, grandma’s dinner table many years ago.

A sense of belonging.

Everybody belongs.

And that's what I mean, this is a place that everybody belongs to.

It's not for somebody or something.

It's for everybody.

And so it gives you that sense of belonging.

One of the most important things you can do is bringing your youth up and that is huge up here into bringing the youth into the arts, into giving them self-confidence and into doing whatever they want to do right here.

It's a place for people to come together and community, but then also to have these conversations with artists and learn more about their work.

And just to be really curious about other people's perspectives.

I think that's a great thing that art can do is just bring a lot of different ideas together, and you might encounter something that you wouldn't have necessarily encountered before or understood, but it gives you another way of looking at the world through other people's eyes.

You don't do art at people, you do it with them, and you listen.

Providing access to the arts, builds community.

You know, the thing about the the arts and culture and education is that sometimes you don't know the impact of that work until years later when a kid grows up, it's like, well, you know what?

That's what that did for me, that experience.

And so seeing, you know, those third grade kids come in in a construction zone and then seeing them here, that can be transformative.

And so that's the, to me, that's the power of arts, and culture is that that possibility for inspiration and possibility for creating ripples that you don't even know what they are.

The thing about Minnesota that is really amazing, and I think the whole country ought to realize is just how supportive of the arts Minnesota is, and that's a real attraction.

And I would say that for any artist anywhere who is thinking of where can I go?

What can I do?

Is to really look at Minnesota, because you won't find support like this just about any other state because of the Legacy Amendment that supports the arts.

So it's actually sort of like a legend among urban or among rural arts centers.

And that is that within the first five years of the Cultural Center opening, New York Mills had 40% job growth and 17 new businesses opened.

So I don't know that we can take credit for 100% of that.

But certainly there we were a very positive factor.

And there are several businesses that have told us, like we're here because of the Cultural Center.

I feel like the arts are going to constantly grow.

And I feel that places that are smaller are starting to get more into the arts as time goes on.

And I'm seeing smaller towns begin to flourish with more arts communities and bands, music, just all of that.

You look at the history of Warroad and you look what it's known for, right?

You're talking about, a community that's based off of industry and manufacturing and hockey.

Right?

And then you bring a place into that.

That brings in creativity.

It brings in art.

It brings in performance, and it just brings in education and it thrives.

Well, it was needed.

It was needed for a long time.

And it's going to thrive for a very long time because everybody belongs to it.

You know, no matter who you are, no matter what this is about, about what you want to bring to it, it's going to thrive.

My thoughts for the future are connecting this even more with the community.

Like it's just scratching the surface of possibilities.

So my hopes would be there's, you know, a dozen new ideas for different programs that could activate the outdoor spaces, you know, to connect with, the water, you know, docks and boat access are like, one of the next steps.

A lot of the work that's happening here, it's planting seeds of possibility.

Right.

And so to me, the exciting part about planting seeds is, you know, some of them are going to grow some of them you have no idea what they're going to turn into.

But you have to plant the seeds.

And that's the the magic of possibilities.

So we're trying to be as sustainable as we can with our choices, make all of our systems more efficient.

And then the, the big dream portion is to expand so we can serve more people.

And that really exciting part is about going backwards and growing the building, putting in an elevator so we would be fully accessible to everybody, adding a drive through coffee shop.

That's a big thing that a lot of people in this community have talked about for a long time.

Thinking to the future and just our goals day to day too are just trying to, connect as many people as we can with the arts.

So there's always we're never going to get there.

We're never going to get all the way there and have every single person in our community experiencing art, but we just try to find new ways to get art out, you know, get it out there, bring people in, and just create opportunities for people to, express themselves, experience other people's art.

What really inspires me is seeing those long term ripple effects.

Right?

Where it can start to impact, policy, where it can start to impact kids lives, you know, and whether it's a smile on a face or someone's like, oh, that's what it could be.

To allow kids to experience their first, you know, movie, or their first play, or their first art class and give them that encouragement and support.

That's where the magic can happen, you know, years later because creativity is something that, not everyone is going to be an artist in life or a musician.

But if you have a creative spirit, you can start looking at creative problem solving and the work that you do differently.

And so that's where that relevancy comes into everyday life too, is if you present, arts and culture that way, it just you're opening up your playbook of possibilities.