May 12 – June 25, 2016 • Joan Mondale Gallery
Installation by Maggie Thompson
Opening Reception: Thursday, May 12, 6 – 8 pm
Opening Reception Artist Talk in Gallery by Maggie Thompson at 7 pm
Opening Reception Parking: 2 lots behind Textile Center on Sidney Place
As an Ojibwe woman of mixed heritage, Maggie Thompson works with an intuitive hand to bridge cultures and traditions gathered from firsthand experiences. On Borrowed Time is about her experience of losing a parent—namely, her father, in 2014. Mining ideas of loss and memory, she explores how grief is a highly personal experience; every individual’s process is unique and perpetuates a person’s evolving identity.
Thompson utilizes textiles as a way to contain memory, to reflect, and to tell difficult stories. The medium of fiber helps her to rebuild a textured past and learn the history of her people through making.
Maggie Thompson is a member of the Fond Du Lac Band of Ojibwe. In 2014 she had her first solo exhibition, Where I Fit, at All My Relations Gallery. Her work has been exhibited at the Bloomington Arts Center, Intermedia Arts and the Minneapolis Institute of Art, which acquired her piece “Family Portrait” for their collection. She manages the Two Rivers Gallery.
In addition to the MSAB Cultural Community Partnership Grant, she was awarded the Native Arts and Cultures Foundation Regional Fellowship to support the new body of work in this exhibition. Through Textile Center, she garnered a 2016 Jerome Fiber Artist Project Grant for which she will be creating a new line of clothing drawing on traditional Native clothing and bead working.
Maggie Thompson on Minnesota Original
Textile Center, in partnership with Maggie Thompson, is a fiscal year 2016 recipient of a Cultural Community Partnership grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board. This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board, thanks to a legislative appropriation by the Minnesota State Legislature; and by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.
Textile Center exhibitions are generously supported by the Joan Mondale Endowment.