All My Relations Arts, NACDI, and Hennepin Theatre Trust Announce New Artist Cohort For WE ARE STILL HERE

In recognition of Native American Heritage Month, the Native American Community Development Institute (NACDI), All My Relations Arts and Hennepin Theatre Trust have announced and will welcome the recipients of the We Are Still Here artists cohort for 2022-2023. This season's artist mentor is Thomasina Topbear who will lead the artists cohort which includes Racquel Banaszak, Summer Sky Cohen and Jearica Fountain.

For the development of the We Are Still Here artists cohort, All My Relations Arts partnered with Hennepin Theatre Trust to co-develop and implement a nine-month learning cohort featuring three Native American artists. The creation of the artists' cohort amplifies the voices and presence of Native people of Minnesota in the life, culture, art and activation of Hennepin Avenue and the American Indian Cultural Corridor.

With sage advice, mentorship, and training by an experienced artist with an emphasis in murals, artists will gain tools, expand their learning, and implement their training through a series of projects. Thomasina Topbear, We Are Still Here mural artist mentor shares, "I am excited to be working with this all-Native Artist cohort. Community is very important to me and has played a key role in my upbringing. I feel that being a part of any Indigenous community is sharing your resources and knowledge for the betterment of the whole. I am honored to have been asked by All My Relations Arts Gallery and Hennepin Theatre Trust to be a mentor and share my skill sets with those wanting to learn."

We Are Still Here is a multiyear collaborative partnership between (NACDI) and Hennepin Theatre Trust to bring large-scale, high-profile public artworks to the Hennepin Theatre District and the American Indian Culture Corridor. This ongoing and evolving initiative seeks to match emerging Native artists with established Native arts mentors in an extending fellowship that creates a variety of public art works which promote Native and Indigenous storytelling in the community along Hennepin Avenue and throughout the greater Twin Cities metro area.

We Are Still Here is a catalyst that weaves Native and Indigenous culture back into Hennepin Avenue, connecting the district's community to arts and cultural experience to its past in unexpected and profound ways.

"We're proud to partner with NACDI for the second We Are Still Here artist cohort. After the success of our two-year digital art pilot cohort," said Mary Jane Mansfield, Hennepin Theatre Trust Public Art Manager. "I'm excited to see the murals the artists create this year as we continue to weave Native and Indigenous culture back into Hennepin Avenue and the American Indian Cultural Corridor, connecting the district to its past through Native and Indigenous truth-telling and celebrating the vibrant tapestry of our community."

The cohort will get to work immediately this weekend with an orientation when the mentor, cohort artists and program organizers will meet and outline activities for the coming year. They will also visit areas featuring murals in the metro that include south Minneapolis, St. Paul's east side, the Intertribal Cultural Corridor, the Bloomington South Loop project and Chromozone.

Later this month, NACDI and Hennepin Theatre Trust will host an artists reception on Saturday, Nov. 19 from 6 to 10 p.m. to celebrate the gallery installation of last season's cohort featuring original works by Ray Janis, Missy Whiteman and Sheldon Starr. The event takes place in the Best Buy Foundation Gallery in The Hennepin (900 Hennepin Ave., Minneapolis) and will feature food from Owamni, winner of the 2022 James Bears for Best New Restaurant in the Nation, with a live performance by Talon Bazille, a Dakota/Lakota rap artist, poet and beatmaker. The event is free and open to the public.

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