Hello! I’m David Swenson, please call me Swen! I am a ceramic and sound artist from Clearwater, Minnesota. I am also a ceramic instructor at various institutions around the Twin Cities area. I have been working with clay since 2002 and teaching since 2009.
Artist Statement: My work is about nostalgia and play. These pieces are meant to evoke feelings of times past, and to revere the motifs and patterns from historical decorative arts. They offer a contemporary perspective of those traditions while re-contextualizing their content. These objects are meant to embellish the home and daily practices, as well as to provide their services and entertainment.
Ty Olson trained for his ski trek across the top of Minnesota on Ten Mile Lake near Walker, where his family has a cabin. The Grafton, North Dakota, native is skiing 250 miles across the Minnesota-Ontario border, from Rainy Lake to Lake Superior, to raise money for a Lakota nonprofit.
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Duluthnews: Ty Olson left the Rainy Lake Visitors Center at Voyageurs National Park on Thursday, starting a 254-mile ski trek across the top of Minnesota. It was 20 below zero at the time. He was alone. He won’t be indoors again for four weeks or more.
Olson expects to end up at Grand Portage, on Lake Superior, sometime in early March, having followed the Minnesota/Ontario border the entire route — retracing the path that Native people used for centuries and European voyageurs after that.
But they usually went that way in summer.
“I know it sounds pretty crazy. But I’m actually thinking it’s going to be fun,’’ Olson said last week while preparing for his ski trek.
He’ll spend time on the frozen surfaces of 35 lakes and nine rivers and cross land along 26 portages as he skis through Voyageurs and the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness.
Olson, 32, will be unsupported on the solo trip, meaning he’s taking all of his food, white gas fuel (for cooking and melting water, he has no heat source) and gear with him for the entire route. The Grafton, North Dakota, native will be pulling 150 pounds of gear spread out on two sleds behind him as he skis.
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Updates: As of Thursday, Ty Olson was making steady progress on his 250-mile ski trip across the top of Minnesota.
He is breaking trail on his solo journey that is aimed at raising awareness of Native American issues and is raising money to provide firewood to needy people on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota. He’s now raised more than $22,000.
Olson left the west end of Rainy Lake on Feb. 11. A week into his trip, Olson had skied the length of massive Rainy Lake and Namakan Lake and was crossing Sand Point Lake, heading east to his destination at Grand Portage, according to a GPS transponder he is carrying. The trip could take 30 days or more as he skis along the Minnesota-Ontario border.
Late Tuesday, Olson posted this report: “Hopefully my final morning in the -30°s. Last night I woke to a pack of wolves howling bloody murder just outside my tent. It felt surreal as it was already still, eerie, and moonlit. This morning I found their tracks only a hundred feet away on the island over. I was too cold to be scared. And they almost never bother humans. But it feels like I’m following them. I don’t go an hour without crossing tracks.”
To follow his trip, or to donate to the cause, go to: skiforfire.com
RUNWAY: How did Thom Browne dress as a kid? “Pretty much like this,” he says: Gray suit, gray knit, gray shorts, tie, and oxford shoes. There’s something reassuring in the fact that many years and successes later, Browne hasn’t changed much—and not only in his wardrobe. A sense of childlike wonder and fantasy pervades his work, making his shows, whether IRL or URL, some of fashion week’s most magical experiences. (Who else would turn their dog into a spaceship or create a full zoo of animal-shaped leather bags?) It’s a delightful and welcomed quality in fashion, especially during the bleak and too-serious times of 2020 and 2021.
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Now, instead of just dressing adults with a childlike sense of mischief, Browne is adding a full range of kid’s clothing to his offering. He’s launching the collection on the official calendar of Paris Men’s Fashion Week with a comical short film by Cass Bird that sees a group of six-ish- to ten-ish-year-olds enter Browne’s office and get to work. “I don’t think any of them had actually ever seen a typewriter. Shocking,” the designer deadpans. “They looked at it as if it was a foreign object.”
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Photo: Courtesy of Thom Browne
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Office machinery aside, he assures me that the children had a blast in their miniature suits. “What they have on is very tailored, very strict, and you would think that they would have acted differently than they normally do as kids, but they were exactly the same,” Browne says. “They were playing and running around just as much as they would’ve been in any other clothing. It was great to see.” The designer’s rigorous construction is every bit as precise in his childrenswear as his adult clothing, but instead of shrinking proportions as he does for ready-to-wear, Browne made sure the children’s clothing is “more true to size.”
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Parents should know that while a Thom Browne kid’s kit is still certainly an investment, Browne is proud that the collection offers more than just style. “The kids [in the campaign video] are all wearing the exact same thing, but the individuality of each one of these young kids is so strong and so unique and so special that it stands out beyond their clothing. I think that is the most important message,” he says. “There’s something really charming about their true personality really coming through, as opposed to the clothing being what dictates what type of personality someone has. I think when a lot of people go to buy clothing, they want their clothing to make them individuals as opposed to themselves being the individual.
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”That’s not the only wisdom Browne has for a younger generation of fans. Having tuned in to President Biden’s inauguration—and dressed Katy Perry for the evening’s virtual celebration—Browne was struck by poet Amanda Gorman’s recitation. “The way she spoke, I want people to see that quality, see someone that is just so good at what they do. You see the work that goes into creating important moments and important people. That is so important for kids these days to see and to really aspire to.” He continues: “The most important thing is putting the work in, not just expecting it to happen overnight, because sometimes it does take longer.” The good news is that no matter how long it takes someone to really hit their stride, be it 10, 20 or 50 years, Browne now has a complete range of clothing to dress them along the way.
Minnesota is emerging as one of the best places in the U.S. to lean into pitch-black skies and take in the stars — and, if you’re lucky, the northern lights, too. You might just need access to a boat.
Minnesota’s Voyageurs National Park, a 218,000-acre oasis mostly on water just south of the Canadian border, has been named an International Dark Sky Park by the International Dark Sky Association (IDA). The designation, which has also been bestowed on the Grand Canyon, recognizes efforts to prevent light pollution and preserve dark skies. To earn it, an area must have “an exceptional or distinguished quality of night sky, view of the stars, and nocturnal environment,” according to the IDA.
Voyageurs joins a list of more than 80 places around the world that have been recognized by the association. Among them are Glacier National Park in Montana, the Grand Canyon in Arizona, and the island of Kozushima in Japan.
Earlier this year, the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness was named a Dark Sky Sanctuary. At the time, local resident Joel Halvorson described it to Minnesota Public Radio as an area where “the Milky Way just fills the sky. It literally is a river of stars.”
Meena Thiruvengadam is a Travel + Leisure contributor who has visited 50 countries on six continents and 47 U.S. states. She loves historic plaques, wandering new streets and walking on beaches. Find her on Twitter and Instagram.
[Pictured: Kwame Brathwaite (American, born 1938), designer: Bob Gumbs, Untitled (Black is Beautiful),
1970 (printed 2018), archival pigment print. The Shared Fund, 2019.67]
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Black is Beautiful on Sunday, February 14! Learn more about the extraordinary Black artists who created art to document and honor the beauty, struggle, and resilience of Black people. Create portraits of people who inspire you using various techniques drawn from African American artists like Wadsworth Jarrell and Elizabeth Catlett. Watch a shadow-puppet show by local artist and activist Ty Chapman, and make your own shadow puppet. Sing along and hear tales affirming love from Nothando Zulu, founder of the Black Storytellers Alliance, and create your own love letter for Black Lives this Valentine’s Day. Find all activities on February 14 → link here.
Families can also pick up a free Family Day Artist Tote at Mia’s Third Avenue entrance February 13-14 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., available until supplies last. You’ll find materials to make a shadow puppet, colorful portraits, and collages to celebrate Family Day.
The materials in the kit complement the Virtual Family Day program’s activities but are not essential to enjoying the activities. Click here to learn more about the items and activities featured in this month’s tote.
