Programs at Homewood Studios
Homewood Photo Collective
The Homewood Photo Collective meets on the first Wednesday of every month at Homewood Studios and provides photographers with creative and technical support through critiques, feedback and camaraderie.
HPC meetings start at 7:00pm. All are welcome. To be included on our email list or for more information about the Homewood Photo Collective please contact Jack Mader or Todd Donerly through Homewood Studios.
Classes at Homewood Studios
Homewood Studios, in collaboration with area artists, offers a series of classes that explore a range of artistic endeavors from drawing and writing, to printmaking stained stained glass making. For further information, see our class schedule.
Community Dialogue Series
By a happy confluence of events, we were given a copy of video artist Debora Bolt’s, “Fresco” just about the time our Gallery was ready for use. The film celebrates the design and installation of Minneapolis artist Mark Balma’s dramatic fresco, The Seven Virtues of St. Thomas Aquinas, at the University of St. Thomas building in downtown Minneapolis.
About two dozen neighborhood folk gathered, one evening in December 1999, to view the film, to discuss those seven virtues, along with the seven principals of Kwanzaa, and to translate the ideas surfaced in our conversation into art with the help of St. Paul muralist Gustavo Lira. Thus the Community Dialog Series was born.
In December 2000, during the run of the Home Sweet Home show, sponsored by the Familyk Housing fund, we hosted a second dialog event. Again, a gathering of neighborhood friends and neighbors entertained a significant question, “What is the meaning of `home”? The show provided the impetus for the conversation and St. Paul artist Sandra Memefee Taylor lead the group in casting our thoughts into art. Each of the participants carved rubber stamps of images pertaining to the idea of home. We then shared the stamps as we created pages for a book Ms. Taylor bound for us.
In December 2001 we entertained thoughts about the intersection of art and health, both topics of considerable in our community. For a full description of this conversation, please see our archives connection on the Calendar page.
Northside Teachers Art Show
As a way to thank those dedicated adults in our community who work all day with our children and then find the time to make art—be they clerks, biology instructors, volunteer coordinators, principals, bus drivers or art teachers—Homewood Studios sponsors an annual show for these artists. Dates for this energetic and surprising show change from year to year, but it is usually in the spring and is always one of our best-attended events.
Homewood Tai Chi
Photo by Maury Landsman
Homewood Tai Chi is a good example of how a community vision energizes Homewood Studios. One day our neighbor, Mae Ruth Brooks, dropped in and asked if we might have Tai Chi classes in the gallery. She knew of an instructor who also lives in the community and who might be willing to offer classes in the gallery. Homewood Tai Chi was born a couple of weeks later, in early January of 2001.
The class meets every Saturday from 9 a.m. to 10:30 in the Gallery. Our instructor, Bob Colbert, has been a student of Tai Chi for over thirty-two years. The thrust of Bob’s teaching revolves around the notion inviting the lessons into our daily practice of living is more important than perfecting the form.
Lessons occur in 3-month cycles. Fees ($30 per cycle) are due on the first Saturday of each cycle. New members of any skill level are always welcome.
For more information or to have your questions answered, please email Bev Roberts or phone 612 587-0230.
Northside Writers Group
Meetings are on the second Thursday of the month, from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. Usually the first half of the meeting is given over to members reading and workshopping each other’s writing. In the second half of the meeting, a member conducts a writing exercise or lesson. If there is time, we write together for a while, and more often than not we leave with some homework for our next meeting.
New members are always welcome. Any level of skill is acceptable. We are interested in your enthusiasm, in your story, in your willingness to write.
In 2007 NorthSide Writers Group members published their first chapbook, The Truth of Myth, featuring artwork by Chicago artist Joyce Owens and writers group members writing on themes of identity Owens’ work evokes. Six writers offer work ranging from poetry to essay to post modern story telling. The chapbook sells for $10 and can be ordered by contacting Debra Stone c/o Homewood Studios.
For more information about the NorthSide Writers Group, please email Debra Stone or call 612 964-8583.
Gallery 1x1xOne
Young artists on the Northside, please take note. (Or perhaps, adults artists on the Northside who know young artists – and what child is not an artist?, please take note.) Homewood Studios maintains a space – called Gallery 1x1xOne – to offer the work of our young people (up to age 18) to the community. One piece of art, for one month, by one artist. The space can manage both two and three-dimensional work and anything up to 36” x 36” in size.