The Minneapolis Arts Commission steps out of the shadows

The Minneapolis Arts Commission is looking in 2020 to become more visible and more accessible for artists and residents across the city. With new goals around engagement with artists and arts organizations, making connections with City Council members, and increasing education about what the Commission is and does, the government body you may have never heard of is taking small steps to become more of an understood player in the city’s public art system. 

The City of Minneapolis first chartered the MAC back in 1974, with initial funding at the time coming from the National Endowment for the Arts. The group of seventeen commissioners — five artists, five arts administrators, and seven laypeople — are appointed by the Mayor and the Minneapolis City Council for up to three consecutive three-year terms. They work closely with the Long Range Planning Division of the Minneapolis Department of Community Planning & Economic Development (CPED) and vote on a range of different arts issues — including public art projects as well as art policies. 

That being said, the Commission doesn’t have veto power. “We shepherd the process through,” says commissioner Robyne Robinson, who has served on the Commission for about a year. “From my experience, we get information on a project and we discuss it, and we decide whether it should be shepherded through, but it really is an advisory role.” 

Right now, Robinson says, the board is trying to bring in new members and help the public understand what the role of the MAC is. “We really need to brand our identity,” she says. 

The MAC is looking toward ways it can be more inclusive and equitable. Robinson, a jewelry designer and former news anchor, caught the public art bug while working at the Minneapolis St. Paul International Airport as their Art Director, where she had a chance to look at the bigger picture of art in a community. Now with her consulting firm, five X five art consultants, she is interested in creating emotional equity in a community around art. “We all talk about the things that are most central to our lives, and identify them as ours — ‘Our church, our grocery store, our school. That’s my library. That’s my department store,’” she says. “It’s kind of how we define who we are. Any public art should have that emotional equity invested in it.” 

Public art installation at Bde Maka Ska to honor Mahpiya Wicasta ("Cloud Man") and celebrate the history of Heyata Otunwe, a village located on Bde Maka Ska from 1829-1839. Artwork by Angela Two Stars, Sandy Spieler, and Mona Smith, in conjunction with landscape architects and a design team comprised of Wicasta's descendants, Dakota advisors, Minneapolis Parks and Rec, and Minneapolis’s Art in Public Places program. According to Public Arts Administrator Mary Altman, the Minnneapolis Arts Commission "was instrumental in getting the City’s public art funding ordinance adopted."

Toward that end, the commissioners are going to be venturing out more around the city for their meetings, according to Joan Vorderbruggen, another commissioner. Like Robinson, Vorderbruggen does plenty around public art outside her role with MAC, as the Director of Hennepin Theatre District Engagement for the Hennepin Theatre Trust. In the past, the Commission has mostly held their meetings in the Crown Roller Mill building, where CPED has their offices. “In 2020 our plan is to host our meetings at different arts organizations and try to get to every ward,” she says. Just last month MAC held a public meeting at Squirrel Haus Arts, a local arts venue in the Howe/Longfellow area.

Meanwhile, Vorderbruggen says, the commission wants to deepen its relationships with different members of the City Council. “We are getting in front of each of the City Council members and finding out their agendas and what type of budget lines they are looking at,” she says. 

Some work has already been done in this area, Vorderbruggen says. For example, the state’s Percent for the Arts program was led by the Commission. “We are seeing the benefit of that when there are investments in development by the city,” Vorderbruggen says. “A certain percentage goes toward public art.” For example, the new city administrative building in downtown Minneapolis will have art on every floor of the building, much of which will be by local artists like Witt Siasoco, Marlena Myles, Angela Two Stars, and Christopher Harrison. “That is a really big achievement,” Vorderbruggen says. “That’s definitely supported by the Arts Commission.” 

Mock-ups of mural designs for one of several conference rooms in the new Public Service Building, at left by Marlena Myles, at right by Witt Siasoco.

Still, both Vorderbruggen and Robinson say there are limits of what MAC can and can’t do. “You get started and you are eager to make change, and you realize things take time,” Vorderbruggen says. “I feel like right now, I’m happy with where we are at. We are going to meet at different arts organizations throughout the city so we can have more interaction with small, medium, and large arts organizations. It’s a good time right now. It’s not being super ambitious. It’s beginning steps.” 

Crystal Brinkman, the Executive Director of Kulture Klub Collaborative, who, like Robinson, has been on the Commission for a year, says one of her goals is to advocate for citizens and residents who don’t often have a voice in decisions or access to opportunities. Brinkman is on MAC’s Access and Engagement team, which, besides organizing the roaming meetings in different parts of the city, is also soliciting feedback from artists who have worked within the city to see what their experience has been like. “With the hope that we will have gained insight in how to improve those processes and make them more accessible,” she says. “We’re hoping to make opportunities more open, and the options for those opportunities more accessible,” she says. 

Brinkman notes that MAC is active on social media (@MPLArtsComm on Facebook), so watch out there for public meetings, new opportunities, and news on what the Commission is up to. They meet every third Wednesday of every month at 5:30pm, but the location of their February 19th meeting is not yet set.

You can also read more about MAC, including profiles of all seventeen current commissioners, at their city website.

Banner image: One of several recently approved utility box wrap designs, this one by local artist Kao Lee Thao.