My Night is a feature that lets you create a customized list of the projects you want to see at Northern Spark. You can add (or remove) projects using the "My Night" button — look for it on the Artists & Projects list (below each project image) as well as on individual project pages. Your "My Night" list can be printed, shared, or transferred to the festival’s mobile app.
Cloudy Waters is a multimedia piece that depicts the Mississippi River from the perspective of the Dakota, using ambient nature sounds interwoven with Dakota voices and projections of video and still images onto the Washburn Crosby West Engine House.
The river has been a site of both loss and strength for the Dakota community, connecting people yet serving as a boundary. It embodies the core Dakota belief “mitakuye owasin” (we are all related), signifying the profound connection among humans (and their thoughts, dreams, and ideas), other creatures, and the land we all share.
An audio version of Cloudy Waters plays every day in the Mill City Museum Ruin Courtyard, free and open to the public during museum hours. For the one night of Northern Spark, Cloudy Waters will be enhanced with projections of video and still images.
Cloudy Waters was developed by award-winning Dakota video producer and director Mona Smith in collaboration with the Minnesota Historical Society’s exhibit media team. It was first exhibited at the Minnesota History Center in 2004 and has been adapted and expanded for the Mill City Museum Ruin Courtyard.
Mona Smith
Mona Smith (Sisseton–Wahpeton Dakota Oyate) is a media artist, educator, and the owner of Allies: media/art. Her work has been broadcast through PBS and other networks and shown at festivals, conferences, and museums in Europe and North and South America. She has received multiple awards from Native and non-Native film and video festivals, and in 2007 she was named Community Artist of the Year by the National Museum of the American Indian. Recently she has turned to new media, developing art pieces for the Internet, creating sites for web distribution of Native-focused media, and making multimedia installations. She and her family live near the Maka Cokiya Kin (center of the earth) in south Minneapolis, overlooking Wakpa Cistinna (Minnehaha Creek).
tuning the sky is a pop-in, illuminated cyclorama. It is a “surround-yourself-with-light” environment inspired by subtle and dramatic shifts of color in the sky.
Sometimes energizing sometimes calming, we respond to the changing light of the sky. Do you ever stop to watch the purple cast of a storm cloud approach, pause as blue sky turns to flame orange before daylight becomes twilight, or wake up just as the night sky is suddenly saturated with the warm amber hue of a fair weather sunrise?
Pop into one of the suspended islands of sky and tune the light of this miniature atmosphere to the sky of your dreams. When you enter one of these floating worlds you immerse yourself in a single color, a halo of light that fills the horizon all around your head. Feel the changing light as you bask in a dusk to dawn glow that you can tune to match the spirit of the moment that most inspires you.
Sponsored by the Weisman Art Museum and the Department of Art at the University of Minnesota.
Diane Willow
Multimodal artist and creative catalyst Diane Willow works among disciplines and media: “by any medium necessary” best describes her process. Focused on art as experience, she invites people to engage in multisensory explorations as participants and choreographers. She is associate professor of experimental and media arts at the University of Minnesota and shares her work internationally.
Chances are that not only insects will visit our gleaming fabric but so will bats. These furry fliers will be on a hungry search for food. We will have a bat detector, which will let you hear the ultrasonic sounds bats make converted into a symphony of clicks and whirrs audible to human ears.
Located at the Weisman Art Museum on the East River Road Lawn
Presented bythe Bell Museum of Natural History with support from Gary Smaby. The Bell Museum is part of the University of Minnesota’s College of Food, Agricultural, and Natural Resource Sciences.
The solitary sensation of swinging takes on a new dimension in Keetra Dean Dixon’s collective, high in the sky, swing installation in the skywalk on the MCAD campus. For a full, even swing, all swingers must be in sync. Out of pace swinging results in playful collision.
Keetra Dean Dixon
Keetra Dean Dixon, an MCAD alumna with a BFA in design, teaches full time at the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) in Baltimore, Maryland. Her 2D, 3D, and experimental projects have gained notoriety for their friendly, sincere absurdism. Her objects and installations aim to involve the viewer as an active participant. The pieces create or exemplify heightened emotional moments and often rely on context or unique interactions to complete the work’s narrative.
Christine Baeumler’s tamarack wetland restoration project on the roof of the main entrance to MCAD calls attention to these fragile and unique ecosystems and presents an artistic reimaging of green roof infrastructure. The project intends to remind residents how we might “reconstitute” the landscape by capturing water where it drops. An adjacent outside wall features a large-scale video projection of spectral tamaracks, and “field stations” are set up in the second floor galleries where the rooftop is especially visible through floor-to-ceiling windows. Visitors can look at the installation through binoculars, learn about the animals that inhabit this unique and often inaccessible landscape, and record their own observations. Maps of local remnant tamarack ecosystems and information on how people might explore these unique places will be available. During Northern Spark a naturalist will be on site to answer visitors’ questions.
Presented by MCAD Gallery at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design with support from the McKnight Foundation, Barr Engineering, and the Mississippi Watershed Management Organization
Christine Baeumler
Christine Baeumler, the recipient of a 2011/12 McKnight Artist Fellowship for Visual Artists, is associate professor of art at the University of Minnesota. As a public environmental artist, she explores the power of art to increase awareness about environmental issues and to facilitate action. She approaches her art through the combined perspective of art and the natural sciences, and her concern lies not only with diminishing ecosystems but also with the extinction of the human experience of these environments and the species that inhabit them. By portraying places remote from our daily experiences, yet impacted ecologically by our actions, her work offers the viewer a glimpse into these compelling, fragile, and often invisible worlds.
The Kuramoto Model (1000 Fireflies) will distribute 1000 interactive blinking LED devices to bicyclists who attend Northern Spark 2012. The devices are outfitted with microcontrollers and radio units that allow them to mutually and observably synchronize with others, as do certain species of firefly. In isolation these devices look similar to conventional LED cycling safety lights, but in groups they exhibit an immediately noticeable phenomenon. To maximize the visual impact for all festival attendees, organizers will encourage participating cyclists to gather together in a large group to tour various festival sites.
This project owes much to the research of Yoshiki Kuramoto, who in 1975 first articulated a mathematical model that describes why, how, and when large systems of similar oscillators (things that cycle automatically and repeatedly) can mutually synchronize, without any single coordinating force or leader. With Kuramoto’s legacy (as well as the earlier work of Norbert Wiener and Art Winfree) as a starting point, 1000 Fireflies aims to activate and transform the social networks and urban dynamics associated with cycling by fusing this existing system with one biased toward synchronization. Grafting this artificial system of synchronized blinking lights onto a real-world urban transportation system does two things: first, it calls attention to the individual act of cycling as a component of a larger dynamic system with its own unique patterns and qualities, and second, it momentarily transforms that system through a subtle but pointed intervention in urban social space.
The Kuramoto Model (1000 Fireflies) is documented and published on a project blog. The software and hardware implementation details are published under an open-source license, allowing others to reproduce the designs or use them for new projects. Through an open process and significant outreach, organizers receive input and participation from members of the Minneapolis/St. Paul cycling community.
How can I get one?
A limited supply of Kuramoto lights will be available free of charge at the beginning of the festival at the two Info Tents near the Stone Arch Bridge and the Info Tables at these partner sites: American Swedish Institute, Midtown Greenway Coalition, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis College of Art and Design, and the Weisman Art Museum.
Avoid waiting in line and guarantee yourself a light by making a pledge of $10 to the project’s Kickstarter campaign by June 1. Kickstarter supporters are invited to pick up their “fireflies” prior to the festival at this event:
Saturday, June 2 Pre-Spark Bridge Lighting 7-10 pm Mill Ruins Park, 103 Portland Ave, Minneapolis Pick up your reserved light and watch us “flip the switch” at dusk on this year’s signature artwork, THINK AND WONDER, WONDER AND THINK on the Stone Arch Bridge.
Kickstarter supporters who don’t pick up their lights prior to June 9 must retrieve them at the Information Tent at Fifth Avenue SE on the night of the festival.
Ride with all of the Kuramoto Lights
On June 9 meet in Father Hennepin Park at 11:45 pm for an midnight ride across the Stone Arch Bridge with all the Kuramoto lights.
The Ride Before the Ride
Want to join the blinking mass in a ride leading up to the Stone Arch ride? Nice Ride staff will be leading a group ride departing from The Walker at 10:30 pm. The group will then progress to Loring Park, stop at Hennepin and 4th Street, and then continue on to Father Hennepin Park to arrive at the Stone Arch Bridge by 11:30. If you can’t make it to the 10:30 departure, feel free to meet the group at any of the stops along the way! They will be stationed at Loring Park until 10:45, and Hennepin and 4th until 11:15.
Don’t have a Kuramoto light yet? Have no fear! The Nice Ride ride leader will have about 25 lights to give out along the way. Join in early if you want to grab one!
David Rueter
A former software engineer, David Rueter holds a BA in politics from Oberlin College and is an MFA candidate in art and technology studies at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
A peloton is the pack of cyclists in a race. In this project, visitors to Northern Spark are invited to mount a group of bicycles rigged to a stage. These participants pedal, affecting the show through the electricity they generate. The show, visible to the public, will take the pack of cyclists on a ride through a strange neighborhood of characters. Leading the pack of the Peloton will be a wooden marionette cyclist, who guides the ride. The Peloton creates a hilarious, implausible scenario as a way to reflect on how we manage the almost miraculous act of sharing streets, sidewalks, and neighborhoods with each other.
When the Peloton is not in “show” mode, it is available for ad hoc dance parties: just plug in an MP3 player. Not only can you generate tunes for passersby and friends; by pushing through the bike pedals, you can feel the effort required to amplify your music. It’s an opportunity to experience what it takes to generate electricity. The shows occur once an hour. Sign up to ride at the site of the Peloton.
Presented by Northern Lights.mn with support from Forecast Public Art, The Playwrights’ Center, Red Eye Theater, and the Jerome Foundation.
Janaki Ranpura
Janaki Ranpura believes in making it fun to live cheek-to-jowl. She builds nomadic structures that promote enjoyment of human density. As a designer, she values intimacy and mobility. She unites technology with the traditional stagecraft of puppet theater. Projects evolve from her experience as a performer, community artist, writer, and designer for parades and stage.
Water Works Temporary is a convergence of multiple art and design projects at the proposed Water Works park site—the area from Third Avenue to Portland Avenue and from the Mississippi River to First Street. This site will feature Night Blooms, commissioned by Northern Spark from artist Wil Natzel; a horticulture exhibition among the mill ruins; and a landscape lighting scheme of the proposed Water Works Park.
Horticulture Exhibition
Making waves. Changing course. How landscape architecture is influencing the way we understand water.
This year the American Society of Landscape Architects–Minnesota Chapter (ASLA–MN) is focusing on protecting, enhancing, and celebrating our regional waters. Changes in climate and increased human pressures on our resources are difficult to predict. What is certain is that our complex connection with water will continue, as will our constant effort to understand and improve that relationship. The waterways we take for granted here in the Midwest create environmental, social, and economic ripples that can be felt across the country and around the world. Similarly, innovative projects have the power to alter the course of industries, fields of research, and the way we live. In 2012 ASLA–MN is showcasing the influence of water—one of the most powerful and important elements of our landscape—as well as the work it inspires and the legacy landscape architects will leave.
On the evening of June 9, ASLA–MN will demonstrate the confluence of innovative twenty-first-century water treatment, art, horticulture, and entertainment with floating islands and a giant outdoor living room in Water Works Temporary, located at the banks of the Mississippi River near the Stone Arch Bridge in downtown Minneapolis. The plan includes design and installation of a floating island in Mill Ruins Park that will improve water quality, attract beneficial plant and animal species, and help restore the river to a livable fishing habitat. These islands, known as floating treatment wetlands (FTWs), are powerful tools in water stewardship. They mimic natural floating islands to create a concentrated wetland effect. Constructed of durable, nontoxic postconsumer plastics and vegetated with native plants, the islands float on top of the water, providing a beautiful habitat for birds and animals, while underneath the surface they aid in cleaning the water by attracting microbes that are responsible for breaking down water-borne pollutants.
Join us as we celebrate our greatest state resource: water.
Night Blooms
For 2012, we commissioned Wil Natzel to create an architectural-scale installation just below West River Road Parkway near the Stone Arch Bridge from the humblest of materials: cardboard. Using a specialized CNC cardboard knife, he will make eight blooms ranging in height from 15 to more than 20 feet, assembled into a cluster. Each bloom has a round ten-foot diameter top that forms a permeable enclosure—an environment that can be explored throughout the night.
Natzel is interested in the history of architectural ornamentation, as well as its expression today using contemporary tools in unexpected ways with unusual materials. He has produced and assembled large architectural constructions of cut cardboard (giant domes with squids) at the Soap Factory in Minneapolis. Night Blooms is his first outdoor cardboard installation. This whimsical bouquet, reminiscent of sunflowers stretching toward the moonlight of nuit blanche, contrasts with the surrounding historic structures in the community. The ephemeral materials, like a memento mori, remind us of the passage of time and the resourcefulness necessary to survive and prosper.
Natzel comments on his work: “With Night Blooms, I construct structures where pattern and decoration can thrive in architecture. I am creating spatial graffiti as a purely decorative enhancement to the built environment.”
Infrastructure as Habitat
The Minneapolis Park Foundation, with the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board and the College of Design at the University of Minnesota are sponsoring five installations at the Water Works site. University students created large scale cladding systems—as part of the RiverFirst project of proposed Knot Bridges—using drift wood and recycled industrial wood. Each cladding system is designed to provide habitat for a diversity of species along the river.
Electricity, which powers almost all technology in the twenty-first century, first became a useful energy source around 1800 with the invention of the battery. Since then, wires, switches, light filaments, transformers, motors, and floods of inventions (diodes, vacuum tubes, speakers, microphones, telephones, radio, TV, transistors, thermostats, and in our contemporary era LEDs, LCDs, CCD sensors, PCs, motherboards, chips, Ipads, and Siri) chart a history of dazzling innovation and miniaturization. In the process, however, electricity as something elemental and wondrous has become invisible. Our project is to reassert electricity’s essential mystery and to exteriorize and celebrate its properties along with its function as sign and symbol.
We will construct THE Northern Spark, an iconic electrical spark generator installation near the St. Anthony Falls hydroelectric plant, the only waterfall-driven hydroelectric plant on the Mississippi River. The installation will consist of a centralized rotating electrode arm from which electricity will jump across a spark gap to approximately one hundred terminals along a twelve-foot-diameter steel circle. Adjacent to the arcing power circle will be a video projection of closely related imagery, including the spark machine in operation, tonally reversed images of it, shadow images, close-ups, and other aspects.
David Goldes
David Goldes received an MFA from the Visual Studies Workshop at SUNY Buffalo; he also has a BA in chemistry and biology and an MA in molecular genetics from Harvard University. He has been awarded grants from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, McKnight Foundation, and the Bush Foundation. His work was featured in the exhibition Midnight Party at the Walker Art Center. Since 1986 he has been a member of the media arts faculty at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design. http://www.davidgoldes.com
Jonathan Bruce Williams
Jonathan Bruce Williams received his bachelor of fine arts degree in photography from the Minneapolis College of Art and Design in 2008 and was awarded a 2009/2010 Minnesota State Arts Board Artists Initiative Grant and a 2010/2011 Jerome Fellowship for Emerging Artists.
Using sparklers, create works of “word art” that will be captured by camera and projected on walls and bridges in the Greenway.
At the Experimental College of the Twin Cities anything can happen . . . like sparkler conversations. Have you always longed for the chance to follow an entomologist? Or academically bask in your love of New York here in Minnesota? Or perhaps teach that strange party trick you picked up in Canada to a group of eager participants?
The experimental college movement started in the late 1960s as a reaction to mainstream education. During the spring of 2006 a group of students created our own ExCo here in Minneapolis–St. Paul. In the spirit of the ExCo movement, it strives to offer the Twin Cities community the opportunity to teach or learn in a space open to alternative education and all kinds of knowledge, including and beyond academics. Anyone can teach or take a class, and every class is free! For more information, check out our website, www.excotc.org, where you can find a class list or sign up to teach a class.
HOTTEA is the tag name of artist Eric Rieger, a critically acclaimed installation artist and designer who creates street art with skeins of yarn in the Twin Cities and internationally. For Northern Spark, HOTTEA employs yarn and recycled materials on an installation project that will add colorful warmth to Target Park and complement Palace of Wonder, the community project undertaken by Patty Mitchell and Robert Lockheed. Come by to see what they’ve done! Stand back to see it all, or move up close and get lost in the details.
Eric Rieger
Eric Rieger (HOTTEA) is a well-known street artist. His stunning typographical installations are both beautifully elaborate and simple. His works have been displayed by invitation throughout the United States and internationally, with recent exhibitions in London, Berlin, and Poland. HOTTEA has exhibited at Minneapolis Future Presence Gallery and HAUS Salon, and he contributed to a series of European television commercials for a Converse shoes campaign. He was invited to design and execute his work prominently at the 2012 Minnesota State Fair, and in 2013 he will exhibit new work with a solo show at the Burnet Art Gallery in downtown Minneapolis. He received his BFA in graphic design from the Minneapolis College of Art and Design.
Join us on the Mississippi River road below the Weisman Art Museum as we set out spectacular glowing lights designed to draw both the people and the insects who call this river gorge home. Using large lights and bright white fabric panels, we will draw in the insects from the surrounding river and trees. Here is a chance to view these ephemeral creatures closeup, even magnified. Learn to these local insects and observe a collection of pinned insects from around the world.
Located at the Weisman Art Museum on East River Road Lawn
Presented bythe Bell Museum of Natural History with support from Gary Smaby. The Bell Museum is part of the University of Minnesota’s College of Food, Agricultural, and Natural Resource Sciences.
Throw your body into this game of Pong! Using your silhouette instead of paddles in this interactive projection, you will experience the game like never before.
The research and development of Body Pong was supported by the Learning Technologies Center (LTC), a department within the Science Museum of Minnesota (SMM). The project came out of LTC’s work with computer games and game programming, especially related to its strong interest in software that makes programming and sensors more accessible to the public. Aaron Heidgerken, an exhibit programmer at SMM, and Asia Ward, an education program specialist for LTC, developed Body Pong with a hacked Kinect sensor and creative open-source software. Aaron was the key programmer, and Asia modified the game to enhance visitor interaction; she also exhibits and represents the game during events.
Body Pong was developed with the Xbox Kinect sensor, libfreenect, as the open-source driver, Openframeworks and Xcode as the application and programming languages, and OpenKinect as the community support and example library. All these tools make it possible for participants to have touchscreen functionality from 10 to 15 feet away and to interact with the Body Pong ball simply by moving their body. Players can pick up the ball or bump it away. It’s easy to play the game: walk within ten feet of the screen and suddenly you are in it, represented on the screen by your own silhouetted image.
Asia demonstrates Body Pong during Northern Spark to encourage participants, artists, and game designers to learn more about interactive game development and projection programming. Body Pong is an easy, fun, and entertaining way to engage in new creative game technology and programming.
Get in touch with your night owl. Explore the different owls found in Minnesota and their role in the environment. Participants learn the three key features of all raptors and why they are different from other birds. We discuss the positive and negative impact of humans on our environment. Finally, we learn about the Raptor Center at the University of Minnesota and its important work in protecting raptors and the world we share.
Established in 1974 as part of the University of Minnesota College of Veterinary Medicine, the Raptor Center rehabilitates more than 700 sick and injured raptors each year, while identifying emerging environmental issues related to raptor health and populations. An internationally renowned education facility, the Raptor Center trains veterinary students and veterinarians from around the world to become future leaders in raptor medicine and conservation, and also reaches more than 200,000 people annually through its unique public education programs and events.
Presented by the Weisman Art Museum and the Raptor Center
Acoustic Campfire Walker Art Center, 1750 Hennepin Avenue S, Open Field 8:58 pm – 1 am Gather around the campfire for a series of intimate acoustic concerts by The Prairie Fire Lady Choir (9 pm), The White Whales (10 pm), Dear Data (11 pm), and closing with Brian Laidlaw and the Family Trade (12 midnight).
Presented by Walker Art Center
Bedtime Stories Walker Art Center, 1750 Hennepin Avenue S, Open Field Grove 2 am – 3 am Wind down your Northern Spark experience with surprise readings by local authors within the intimate space of the James Turrell Sky Pesher. Dreamlike visions await!
Presented by Walker Art Center and Rain Taxi Review of Books
Pizza/Calliope—a pizza oven combined with a steam-powered musical organ or calliope, the thermal energy produced by the prior utilized to power the latter. The concept is explored by University of Minnesota students led by associate professor Tetsuya Yamada and assistant term professor Clive Murphy. Pizza/Calliope will feed visitors’ stomachs and ears throughout the night on the Weisman Art Museum Plaza.
Lighting and projection artist Michael Murnane attempts a rare and sometimes frightening glimpse into the living world under ice. After ice has formed on the surface of a lake or river, it becomes an eerie ghostly environment of darkness, with fleeting images of life, and of silence, broken only with an occasional thundering crack.
Using high-resolution projectors, live multilayer playback technology, and stage lighting, Murnane will project massive images on the historic Pillsbury A Mill on Main Street in Minneapolis. These images were collected through the ice and reveal his reflections and feelings from years of ice fishing with his father, as he wondered what was going on through the hole as well as in his own life.
Michael Murnane
Minneapolis lighting designer Michael Murnane loves to point lights and projectors at just about anything in an effort to create a unique environment. A thirty-year veteran of theatrical lighting design, he has lit hundreds of shows in the United States, Canada, China, Tanzania, Kenya, and several countries in Europe. He works in a wide range of theatrical genres, including theater, opera, concerts, galas, architecture, television, and corporate events, and his designs consistently win praise for their powerful emotional tone.
Celebrate honors the majestic maple on the grounds of the Minneapolis Institute of Art at the corner of 24th St. and 3rd Ave. Rising more than 60′ into the sky, this tree is a wondrous specimen. For Northern Spark it will be adorned with multiple mirrored balls and lights, gifting this tree with its own celebratory party. The reflected light will bring the normal dappled light that drifts through its canopy to the nighttime. Stop by to marvel at the sight and think about how quickly our celebration of the natural can turn artificial.
Aaron Dysart
Aaron Dysart studied at The University of Minnesota, receiving his MFA in 2002. In 2007 he received a Jerome Fellowship through Franconia Sculpture Park and was awarded a fellowship for sustainable art making through Public Art St. Paul in 2008. Later he engaged with Public Art St. Paul leading walks with scientists along the Mississippi river. Recently Aaron was awarded a Public Project Grant through Forecast Public Art to make a rowboat out of soap and row it on the Mississippi. Aaron has exhibited nationally and is now producing work and living in Minneapolis and is an adjunct professor at Anoka Ramsey Community College.
The Stone Arch Bridge, overlooking St. Anthony Falls and connecting the east and west banks of the Mississippi River in Minneapolis’s historic milling district, is a primary site of Northern Spark.
University of Minnesota graduate Robin Schwartzman came up with the concept to light the bridge with a short text by Theodor Geisel (better known as Dr. Seuss). THINK AND WONDER, WONDER AND THINK has become the 2012 festival theme and Robin will create the phrase in large, illuminated letters that will hang between the spans of the bridge on both sides. Visible for miles, the project will be mounted a week before Northern Spark’s nuit blanche as a clarion call to think and wonder — not only about the upcoming event but about the art of the world around us. As one participant in Northern Spark in 2011 wrote:
“Art is everywhere. The night of Northern Spark transforms your consciousness. Yes, you read the brochure and move from installation to installation, but you’re also always on the lookout for what might be new or different. Suddenly, everything becomes art: the lights under the 35W bridge; couples stealing a kiss under an archway; even spaces that you had never previously considered as anything other than no man’s land. The next morning, the sensation continues, and your senses are heightened for hours.”
Robin Schwartzman
Robin Schwartzman is the CNC Router Technician and an Adjunct Instructor at the University of Minnesota. She was Northern Spark’s Volunteer Coordinator in 2011. She received her MFA from the University of Minnesota and her BFA from Syracuse University. She grew up in eastern Pennsylvania, where she spent her summers working at a local amusement park; seduced by the bright lights and moving colors, she has continued to work at carnivals and theme parks during the past ten years. Her experiences in these whimsical environments provide a basis for her sculptures, installations, and puppetry.
