e e e they have to be closer yep so it's going to be on this TV so she's just forward e e
e e e e e I wasn't sure what that was you get Swedish or you can get a a little yellow construction hat squeezy thing
or I just I was driving here in a circuitous path and I saw the sign I went and I was already passed and I circled around sign yeah that sounds like fun because I couldn't remember how long it lasted I was like they stop at 4
I won't get to yeah I think till 6 I think yeah amazing awesome had it long enough to see what time on Thursday yeah it shows how out of the it's like cool it's something3 it's either
10:30 or 1:30 I don't know awesome are they like putting the beam in ground oh so we get to be loud for a little bit longer I love when they're doing the underpass you can hear all over town the thrilling of the the Beamon
ah my studio used to be on Center Avenue um where there's half a building there but it was a full building one point and um they I had to move because they they were tearing down the building and so now every time I go I'm like and now
it's really cool because you have the um Armory star oh was all that cool stuff there I'm sure they would find another space for you if you really wanted to get back in that area a little too late
for that but no so where did you end up e e e e e e e e
e e e all right it's 4:30 so we can start the meeting right I call the March 17th 2025 arts and culture commission meeting to order Ethan roll call please Jonathan
Rudder here Allison Coster present Carrie Rogers present BR Triad here Brandon batty here Paula and Chuck Hendrickson
here is there a motion to amend or approve the March 17 2025 agenda to approve seconded all in favor I I is there a motion to amend or approve
this January 27th 2025 minutes move for approval second all in favor I I are there any CI citizens to be heard on items not on the
agenda there does not appear to be um Tanya Blan executive director of the Arts partnership will be providing the commission on an annual update related to recent projects initiatives and events thank you for joining us today
Tanya thanks for inviting me um some of you probably know a lot about the Arts partnership and you will be rehearing all of that uh but we do have a couple of new things uh and I just
thought since there are new people on the commission that it would be good to take you through some things so um I think that oh I did it uh as you probably know
the Arts partnership is the local Arts Council our mission is cultivating community Through the Arts and as the local Arts Council we represent and support all forms of Art and we work with Arts
organizations and individual artists in the Metro and we help connect them uh to the rest of the community um I will say that we take a very broad is that
me I don't know how to um we take a very broad view of what art is um and we are very supportive or try to be as supportive as
we can with both organizations and artists on all levels meaning brand new entities or emerging artists to those that are very established we have four core values
um support local art and the artists who make it advocate the Arts role in a vibrant economy promote a creatively enriched community and Advance Equitable access to an inclusion through the Arts
um everything we do falls under one of one or more of those things uh so that really keeps us focused on our mission um sorry this is the second talk I've given
this afternoon so I'm trying not to talk about my mother who co-founded the FM Community Theater so I'll stick to the Arts partnership um their Arts partnership is called the Arts partnership because we have Partners in
the Arts sector um dozens of artists and nonprofit organizations and arts related businesses and partnership to us is a two-way street uh our partners are really boots
on the ground uh about what's going on in you know are you having trouble as a theater trying to get a venue what what are the issues facing you as an
organization Etc um and in return we give hopefully some support uh I mean we I'll get to that we get financial support of course but for example um tomorrow night I'm going to
be speaking to a board of directors that's undergone a big transition on their staff to try to help them understand um they've been a very hands on board but now they have staff so they can back off a little and uh um they
should not be micromanaging you know what the executive director is doing so hopefully I will be helping them to understand a little better their role now that they have um somebody who can do the work so as I was saying we do give
financial support and I think all of you are probably very familiar with that um we started a relationship with the city of Fargo I want to say in
2009 um Morehead and West Fargo started uh quite a bit later than that and Fargo does give the Lions share of the money of course they have the Lion Share of the Arts organizations um but that doesn't mean
they have the Lion Share of the audiences because really it's a very uh fungible border and uh so we also so we give 20 more than 25% of our
budget um to arts groups to artists and we started a new uh program in 21 called the art for all
grants where we give very small grants up to $1,750 to Health and Human Services nonprofits to incorporate the Arts into their mission related work some of them
may have programs but we've helped uh others to establish programs the point of keeping it you know these grants small these organizations have uh more important work to do than figuring out
how to keep an art program growing going and growing so we want to make make sure that they have something that they can use um that can serve some of their clients you can take a look at all the you know how we divvy up our money um
the bulk goes to our city arts partnership grants those are the uh midsized and largest organizations our smaller organizations get community cultivation grants they're often doing great work
uh and reaching entities that others might not but they aren't they're either small or they're volunteer run uh so we just separate it out so they uh can still get funding but
it's not quite as uh dramatic and when I say dramatic our grants are not that big um we give up to $10,000 to our tier one um I think the average is just under
5,000 for our midsized and largest um but we you know it's actually kind of a lot on the North Dakota side um the the Minnesota side beirs better because they have more options and more money to
give away so I should say by the way if anybody has questions and you know just interrupt um we have 19 artist Studios out at West
Acres if you look at Best Buy the door is immediately to the right uh it doesn't look like it should lead anywhere but it does um down a long hallway to these 19 Studios actually 18 because the Arts partnership moved out
there a little more than a year ago um I kind of love that I get to to talk to artists when I'm there I'm not always there because I'm at places like the arts and culture commission uh but I
it's a really great way for me to have um really direct access to some artists they're not all fine artists there are a lot of crafters and virtually I guess H three people there make their
livings fulltime as artists but most of the people who are there are really just um you know creating because they kind of need to they want to uh but not
because they're going to quit their day jobs one of the things that the Arts partnership does that is actually highly unusual for an Arts organization is to write for the local newspaper so we write the the Monday daily article for
the Forum um and that's been a long lived partnership that we've had it allows us as I say here it's it's really Arts advocacy on a grand scale because we get
to talk about all sorts of things and give people a often an Insider's view to what's going on in the art sector so um I happened to rate the I did an
interview with John offet the glass blower who's turning into a glass artist and you know most people wouldn't have questioned what's the difference between glass blowing and glass fusing and so it's just a way to sort of give
people behind the scenes looks um and to draw attention to the work that's being done in the community whether that's an organization or an individual artist and we have a pretty robust
uh social media and electronic media I'm very proud that our Monday newsletter has like a 49% open rate which is really good so you know
we're we we do get engagement there so that is very gratifying um I'm going to move to something that is a brand new initiative and we haven't really promoted this uh because we're in
the middle of our first cohort and I kind of uh feel strongly that we should kind of get through it a little bit so we have launched a program we did
started in January to Mentor emerging artists of color um that can be working in any medium there are three people uh right now participating and this was born out
of you know a lot of Dei work was done by our board and it was was frustrating that it was a lot of talk and no action in a way so
this program came because we wanted to be able to do something to show that we were trying to support artists of color in our community um I will say that we have often given grants to people of color um
but our reach was not quite what we wanted um and so this program hopefully will be kind of the ripple effect so there is
a and I'm not meaning to be koi but I'm I I do kind of want to wait until we've uh publicize it but there's a a recent graduate of NDSU In classical
music but she's also a poet um she's of irri descent that is on the east coast of Africa for those of you who would like me had to look it up I knew it was in Africa I just didn't know where kind
of that northeast corner uh we have a poet and theater person um who's a little probably in her in their late 20s uh and we have a native artist who is an
established nurse and she's been doing that for years but she does traditional bead work and paintings with Native imagery but a a kind of contemporary take and so it's
an interesting cohort different kinds of artists and they have one-on-one mentoring um we have three mentors uh they get to have group meetings with guest speakers uh we have
a Jay Evans of off color media has offered professional videos so each of the artists will get a little video that they can use and we can use for social media on their websites uh Etc um head shots they'll get some
networking and they also get a $1,000 Grant they'll have to work for it they have to write the grant might have to write sections of it over but they will get $1,000 at the end um I'm I'm quite proud of the program I it's not uh my
idea and we based it very heavily on the Lake Region Arts council's uh artist of color cohort um but I'm proud that we're doing it and may be especially proud in this time
uh we have two programs that connect art and audiences community supported art and some of you could recognize the background of the picture on the left which is the RAR uh what community supported art is is
like community supported agriculture people buy a share and they get three events at which they get take-home art a performance and food basically by local
chefs like Luna chefs um it is a it's a very fun event I will say but um in the 13 Seasons that it's been going artists have gotten nearly
$120,000 in stiens so they get paid to participate to create the work or to perform um and we know anecdote totally that a lot of those artists Have Ended up selling additional work to people in
attendance um and that you know it it is a way for us to help people connect um and by people the artists and the consumers and finally we do a program called artworks uh that is about
rotating exhibits of local art we're in 23 venues right now from Banks to hotels to restaurants to the airport um there about 12 Works in each
exhibit uh so it's a lot of art that gets moved every quarter um 90 plus local artists have participated uh they get stiens
and we do many concerts at the airport as well which is really fun because people come we they perform right at the top of the uh escalator and people come up and they don't realize that the music's live and then they see the live
music and they get all excited it's really kind of the best part of some of my days um so without even trying uh because we're not we're not not an art gallery we're not you know at all of these venues trying to sell art but
again a little anecdotally artists have sold about for $50,000 worth of art uh since July of 2017 um I say anecdotally because we don't take a cut of that all the money goes to the artist so sometimes we
know because we'll be contacted and put them in touch with the artists but often uh they will just be in touch with the artist directly so we we don't we just kind of know because we talk to people um so that's us in a nutshell
um are there any questions then I will run to my next thing because I'm not done today uh thanks for having me again and I hope that was a little useful I hope you might have learned a couple of new
things about us um so thanks you tel you're welcome thank you for all you do all right project update time um first project uh the indigenous sculpture and historical video series um
Ethan can you kind of provide us an overview yeah so just some updates on these projects um for the sculpture after approval by city council at the February 10th meeting uh City staff has been working with the selected artist Dwayne Goodwin uh to finalize the agreement for the proposed sculpture
installation work uh will begin this spring and it's anticipated that the sculpture installation will be completed towards the middle of the summer um so staff is going to continue working with Dwayne uh as this project continues to progress um and I also just wanted to provide a
brief update on the video series um coordination between City staff the historical and Cultural Society of Clay County and Morehead Community Access media has been amping up again to begin the development of a pilot episode um so we'll have more details to come at some
future meetings please let me know if you do have any questions questions um next project the sidewalk stamps Ethan can you please provide us an overview yes so with the construction underway for the 11th Street underpass uh the commission has expressed an
interest in using sidewalk stamps in certain areas um certain walkways surrounding the 11 Street underpass um last year staff coordinated with the state to approve the stamp installation locations Long City RightWay and we got nine new stamps installed along First
Avenue um this year there are various other sidewalks within the project area that will be reconstructed um and this timeline is approximately from April all the way to November um so staff is going to continue coordinating with the state to install and ENT well identify
appropriate locations and install new stamps um with available funding from the 2015 sidewalk art and poetry project um staff has been looking for ideas to expand the existing inventory um previous discussions from the commission have identified an interest in cating
local art to be used for new stamps staff has identified and has been working with a local organization that is willing to make new sidewalk stamps um and there were a couple missing stamps that we are working on getting
replaced um so staff is just looking for any ideas or guidance on the possibility of requesting stamps for the 11 Street project um is there a desire to consider CommunityWide requests for art um or is there an interest in
developing or finding thematic stamps or artwork for the 11 Street project similar to what we did on Center Avenue with the Leafs I think it'd be wonderful to put out a request I have a question for you when
you say you um are working with the state do you know is it mindat specifically or is it another department it's mindat okay it is mindat and how's that been going um it's worked out out well um pretty much anything in city right away they're okay with us
replacing the stamps on so our engineering department has been working with them to clear that up okay and um second thing sorry FKS the 11 Street uh separate yeah I think we should go Citywide that's a historical uh infrastructure project
that we worked on for quite a while and we you know we worked and got a Federal grant for that which we started that one out when I was on the council like 10 11 years ago so it is an achievement for the city of Morehead and I think we can celebrate it with these sidewalk stamps
so yeah I think I'm just um to reach out to the citizens of Morehead would be great just a quick question on funding um you said there's funding available is that like new funding or that was existing funding that we kind of knew we had all along um yeah this is
existing funding it was solicited for the project that was originally done back in 2015 and so it has to used to create sidewalk stamps so been allocated specifically for that y great do you know what the Balan is on that um it's
approximately 5,000 okay and does it say the area be reconstructed from this April to November the area along um the 11th Street underpass yep yeah
the sidewalks I spoke with our Engineers they estimated that they could be re installed anytime from April to November so there's kind of a pretty wide timeline um so if we're looking earlier this year we'll probably have to use some of the existing stamps but definitely have something on the
timetable for later this year and into the following year like I said there was about $5,000 in the budget do we know kind of the price per stamp yep we received a quote um we're work we've been working with
sign Badgers um and they provided us with an it so it's roughly $300 a stamp to create a new template like a new art what does that mean sorry the $300 per stamp yeah it' be to create a brand new stamp
okay so the 5,000 would have to cover the creation of the stamp plus is is there installation charges like it's just the creation yep the 5,000 would just cover the creation of the stamps so I'm not at math how many
stamps is that uh it would 16 or 17 okay great thank you there any other questions regarding the sidewalk stamps knowing that that means 16 or 17
stamps does that give I mean for the area that's going to be receiving them is that give adequate distribution compared to how they're distributed currently or I mean yeah I think that's something
we could work with so there may be some duplicates but when we did the previous project which was pretty expansive um there were some duplicates as well so okay would we do a search for artists similar to what we did previously were
were those just like voluntary submissions I'm trying to remember the 2015 project was just submissions based off of a request for art um and and that's what we would look at again yeah if that if that's something
you guys are interested in I like the variety that it um Turned Up you know from just young artists to adults yeah poetry and pictures and yeah yeah I I agree I think having the
community submit different different stamps would be great sorry but also um so we're spending down like our goal is to spend down this 5,000 in this season for this
project um not necessarily I think there it could be used elsewhere as well so I think as submissions come in we'll kind of analyze it from there and see what could be spent and what doesn't need to be
spent so there's no like limit on the this amount like we have to get it done before this is this uh season is over and then we lose it or anything like that there's nothing like that in that okay thank you using it elsewhere I mean it is designated for stamps we just would need
to use it on new all the new stamps this year correct okay yep got it right is there any other questions regarding the sidewalk Stamps no right uh the 2025 election of officers Ethan
please provide us an overview yes so the art and culture commission is holding the 2025 annual meeting for the election of officers to designate representatives for various groups including a chair Vice chair two representatives for the Artist review team a representative for
the moreart review group and a representative for the Morehead sculpture walk working group I want to thank the 2024 officers and representatives um as you're going through this please let me know if you do have any questions all right is there a motion to recommend members as chair and vice
chair of the arts and culture commission I recommend you continue as chair second we have to do this forever forever I'm fine with that maximum [Laughter]
of how about for vice chair make a motion for carry to continue to Second all in favor Hi I hi I is there a motion to recommend two members to serve on the Artist review
team for 2025 I know Jonathan is one who's the other is Jonathan and br br oh I can continue on that that's good for me Havey to too wonderful um all in
favor I I I is there a motion to recommend a member to represent the arts and culture Commission on the moreart review group I'd be willing to step forward for that I'll make that motion second all in favor
hi hi and is there a motion to recommend a member to represent the arts and culture Commission on the Morhead sculpture walk working group who is that currently I'm happy to continue doing that unless someone else wants it motion
for br to continue second all in favor I I right um reports um does anyone have any reports or information to share
anything I have a bunch of things because it's that time of year uh so uh mime who speaks Bill Bowers will be um he he's a national artist uh will be uh
doing a presentation at concordia's Francis fo Francis comto theater on Thursday March 20th at 7 : uh also at Concordia is lend meia soprano uh perform uh theater production
April the weekend of April 10th through the 13th at 8:00 p.m. and 2 p.m. for the Sunday MAA uh the while you're there check out the Concordia art Department student jured show which opens tomorrow uh in the running Gallery which is between the
art building and the theater building and then MSM has a student jured exhibition uh now through March 26th and then uh msum spring BFA exhibition opens March
31st lots of things is there any other um information to share yeah uh former uh arts and culture commission member Dennis croll just opened a new exhibit over at the r on
Sunday so that'll be up through through April 20th it's lovely I uh do want to highlight one more thing we have a representative on our commission that was awarded the moreart award um and I just wanted to highlight um Jonathan Rudder at a
previous council meeting was given that honor and we thank you for all the work you do in our community so thank you Jonathan ping [Laughter] again all right is there a motion to
adjourn so moved second