2017 McKnight Visual Artist Fellowship Recipients

The Minneapolis College of Art and Design, on behalf of the McKnight Foundation, is proud to announce the eight recipients of the 2017 McKnight Fellowships for Visual Artists: Harriet Bart, Andy DuCett, David Goldes, Terry Gydesen, Jeremy Lundquist, Tamsie Ringler, Piotr Szyhalski, and Bruce Tapola all from the Twin Cities area.

Designed to identify and support outstanding mid-career Minnesota artists, the McKnight Fellowships for Visual Artists provide recipients with $25,000 stipends, public recognition, professional encouragement from national visiting critics, and an opportunity to participate in a speaker series. The fellowships are funded by a generous grant from the McKnight Foundation and administered by MCAD.

The 2017 McKnight fellows were selected from a group of 231 applicants by a panel of arts professionals of varying backgrounds whose careers intersect with the visual arts in different ways. This year’s jurors were Hasan Elani, associate professor of art at the University of Maryland; Jan Williamson, executive director of the 18th Street Arts Center in Santa Monica; and Julie Rodrigues Widholm, director of the DePaul University Art Museum in Chicago.

Remarking on the fellowship recipients, Ms. Rodrigues Widholm stated, “I am always invigorated by studio visits with artists in cities across the US and getting to know the finalists for the McKnight Fellowship was no exception. I was thrilled to visit so many mid-career artists who have a developed a mature artistic voice yet continue to push their ideas and materials. It is vital that we support artists at this stage of their development to recognize the perseverance and risk that goes into a lifelong practice. The artists we chose to be McKnight Fellows make work that is ambitiously rigorous in its craft and socially relevant to the world we live in today.”

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Harriet Bart is a conceptual artist, creating evocative content through the theater of installation, the narrative power of objects, and the intimacy of artists books. She has a deep and abiding interest in the personal and cultural expression of memory; it is at the core of her work. Bart exhibits internationally and has completed more than a dozen public art commissions. Her work is held in numerous collections, including the Jewish Museum, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Minneapolis Institute of Art, Minnesota Historical Society, National Gallery of Art, Walker Art Center, and Weisman Art Museum. Bart has received fellowships from the Bush Foundation, McKnight Foundation, MacDowell Colony, Minnesota State Arts Board, NEA Arts Midwest, Virginia Center for Creative Arts, and Yaddo. She has published eleven fine-press books and received three Minnesota Book Awards. Bart is a guest lecturer, curator, and founding member of the Traffic Zone Center for Visual Arts in Minneapolis.

Andy DuCett is from Winona, MN, and teaches at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design as visiting faculty in the MFA program. He has been featured by Artforum, New American Paintings, the Daily Beast, Art Pulse Magazine, and the Huffington Post, as well as publications in Toronto, Berlin, Tokyo, and London. He is in the permanent collections of the Minneapolis Institute of Art and Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, and on the curated registry of the Drawing Center in New York City. He has been commissioned to make work for the Walker Art Center, the Indianapolis Museum of Art, and the Philbrook Museum of Art. He received his MFA from the University of Illinois.

David Goldes explores the intersection and overlapping territories of art and science, photography, sculpture and drawing, still life, and performance to form the dynamic ground of his process and work. Physical phenomena including those associated with water, air pressure, and electricity are carefully examined while giving attention to the unexplained mysteries, resonances, and suggested subjectivities that expand simple explanations. He received his BA from SUNY Buffalo, MA from Harvard, and an MFA from the Visual Studies Workshop. The Yossi Milo Gallery, New York, represents his work.

Terry Gydesen is a documentary photographer and video artist who has documented the American political landscape for 30 years. Her projects include Jesse Jackson’s 1988 Presidential Campaign, Paul Wellstone and Al Franken’s Senate races and numerous local and national campaigns. Her work ranges from LGBTQ issues to following Operation Rescue and the rise of the religious right. She was the photographer for Prince’s European tour in 1993, resulting in a monograph of her work published by Prince, which is part of the Prince from Minneapolis show at the Weisman Museum and at the Museum of Pop Culture in Seattle. Her latest work Transitions chronicles her parents’ move from their home into assisted living and her father’s death. Gydesen has received four Minnesota State Arts Board grants, the Jerome Foundation Travel and Study grant, NEA/Arts Midwest Fellowship, three McKnight Photography fellowships. This is her first McKnight Visual Arts fellowship.

Jeremy Lundquist lives and works in St. Paul and Minneapolis. His current work addresses the cyclical and chaotic nature of modern warfare. Expanding on traditional printmaking techniques, he constructs images and texts that challenge the accuracy, intention, and effect of our contemporary information stream. He has been an artist-in-residence at Ox-Bow, Harold Arts, Spudnik Press, Kala Art Institute, the Vermont Studio Center, the University of Iowa as a Grant Wood Fellow, and most recently Highpoint Center for Printmaking as a Jerome Foundation resident. His work has been exhibited nationally and internationally. Lundquist holds a BA in studio art from Grinnell College and an MFA in printmaking from Ohio University.

Tamsie Ringler is inspired by the landscapes of culture and nature that form us and the experiences of compassion and humanity that transform our lives. She teaches sculpture and foundry at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis and leads the annual Community + Collaboration Iron Pour at Franconia Sculpture Park. Recent works include Ainavas Galds/Landscape Table at the Pedvāle Open-Air Art Museum in Latvia and River of Iron, an overnight iron pour of the Mississippi River watershed, now in the permanent collection of the Weisman Art Museum. She works internationally and is a member of the Royal British Society of Sculptors. Her work is dedicated to her late husband, Maris Strautmanis.

Piotr Szyhalski is a Polish-born, US-based multimedia artist whose works move between installation, performance, moving image, painting, photography, drawing, sound, and design to explore issues related to human ecology and extreme historical phenomena. His work has been exhibited at museums, festivals, and other events worldwide. Szyhalski’s ongoing Labor Camp project (1998–) celebrates the beauty and dignity of labor through visual art, music, posters, printed ephemera, performance, and public actions. Commissioned works include projects for Wim Mertens Quartet in Brussels, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, VocalEssence, Ingenuity Cleveland, Zero One San Jose, IN Light Indianapolis, Northern Spark Festival, and Eastern State Penitentiary (2017), among others. Szyhalski is a previous recipient of the McKnight Fellowship for Visual Artists (2009).

Bruce Tapola was born and raised in Ohio. He received his BFA from the University of Utah in Salt Lake City and his MFA from Montana State University in Bozeman. He has exhibited nationally and internationally and has been the recipient of several awards including the McKnight Fellowship for Visual Artists (1994, 2000). Tapola is an active member in several artist collaboratives including Paintallica, Free Art School, and the Northern Forest Brotherhood. He is the director and founding member of the Federation of Outlaw Creatives United (FOC-U). He teaches painting and drawing at St. Cloud State University and lives in St. Paul.

ABOUT THE McKNIGHT ARTIST FELLOWSHIPS

The McKnight Artist Fellowship Program is one of the oldest and largest of its kind in the country. Established in 1981, the fellowship program provides annual, unrestricted cash awards to outstanding mid-career Minnesota artists in ten areas, totaling nearly $1 million each year. Non-profit arts organizations oversee the administration of the fellowships and structure their own programs to respond to the unique opportunities and challenges of different creative disciplines.

ABOUT THE McKNIGHT FOUNDATION

The McKnight Foundation seeks to improve the quality of life for present and future generations through grant-making, coalition-building and the encouragement of strategic policy reform. Founded in 1953 and independently endowed by William and Maude McKnight, the Minnesota-based foundation had assets of approximately $2.2 billion and granted about $88 million in 2015.

ABOUT THE MINNEAPOLIS COLLEGE OF ART AND DESIGN

Recognized nationally and internationally for its innovative and interdisciplinary approaches to visual arts education, the Minneapolis College of Art and Design is home to more than 800 students and offers professional certificates, bachelor of fine arts and bachelor of science degrees, and graduate degrees.