Conversations from the Barn

Cori Nakamura Lin (she/her) is a Japanese, Taiwanese, Okinawan-American multimedia visual artist based in Chicago. By painting, documenting, and weaving, Cori is finding her way to a world that prioritizes ecological and community care.

Descended from East Asian island peoples and born and raised in the midwest, Cori’s art practice is an ongoing self-archive where she examines her own multiple identities as a story of self. 

Cori’s work asks: How do we dream beyond our fears in the face of climate collapse? How do we carry multiple legacies, multiple ancestors, through the generations? How do we honorably re-root as unmoored people on occupied lands?

Primarily using gouache, watercolor, and paper-cutting when making images, Cori layers fluid washes with sharp paper edges to create dreamy, textured paintings that investigate liminal spaces in the natural world and her cultural identities.

She is inspired by Japanese records of yōkai, kawaii visual culture, and Okinawan textile practices, and she is currently learning basket making practices to help her process her relationship to the lands that she lives on. Learning from the work of Black and Indigenous feminist abolitionists — like Mariame Kaba, Kelly Hayes, and Ruth Wilson Gilmore — and Afro-diasporan and Indigenous futurists —like Octavia Butler, NK Jemisin, and Grace Dillon—Cori Nakamura Lin aims to create art that will outlive her into the next seven generations. corilin.co

 

Tori Hong (she/they) pursues an interdisciplinary art practice expressed through illustration, textiles, printmaking, and installation. Positioned within queer theory and praxis, her work explores the concepts of ritual, pleasure, self-determination, and political resistance. Hong endeavors to bring the past into the present — and the present into the future — by incorporating Hmong and Korean aesthetics into their practice. Expressed through repetition, saturated colors, and confident lines, Hong’s art embodies and expresses their authentic self, encouraging her audience to do the same.

Born in 1992 in Minneapolis, MN, Hong is currently based in Providence, RI working toward her MFA in Illustration at the Rhode Island School of Design. Hong has been awarded the Everwood Artist Retreat (2024), Springboard for the Arts Hinge Arts Residency (2021), MRAC Next Step Fund (2020), Forecast Public Art Early Career Research and Development Grant (2020), and more.

Ntxoo Art reclaims the name Hong shares with her mother and sister: Ntxoo [“un-Zong”] meaning “shade” or “shadow”. ntxoo.art

LESLIE VINCENT is a prolific songwriter and jazz vocalist. Equally at home singing the Great American Songbook, musical theater, and contemporary rock and pop, she has quickly become one of the most notable voices to emerge in the vibrant Minneapolis music scene, being hailed for her joy-filled performances and her “fun, human, beautiful interpretations” (Levi Weinhagen).

 Born into a military family, Vincent spent childhood moving along the East Coast and United Kingdom, where she spent her spare time singing along to Frank Sinatra and the Les Mis soundtrack. The one constant was music.

Today, Vincent has become an accomplished bandleader, playing 50+ shows a year across the Midwest, using her theatrical chops to bring drama, comedy and poise to the stage.

In 2020, she released her debut album These Foolish Things, which garnered much critical attention from fans and music critics in the Twin Cities, especially from Jazz88 FM, where she’s become a regular in-studio guest. She’s recorded with the band Viewers Like You and performed alongside Twin Cities legends including jeremy messersmith, Joyann Parker, and Patty Peterson. With the release of her new album About Last Night, Vincent is poised for the national spotlight, mixing jazz standards, vintage blues, and her own fresh originals.

lesliedellavincent.com

Molly Beth Griffin is the author of four picture books: Ten Beautiful Things, The Big Leaf Leap, Rhoda’s Rock Hunt, and Loon Baby. She has also published a young adult novel, Silhouette of a Sparrow, two chapbooks of poetry, and a series of beginning readers. Two more picture books are forthcoming in 2024: Rings of Heartwood: Poems on Growing and Just Us.

Silhouette of a Sparrow (winner of the Milkweed Prize for Children’s Literature) was a finalist for the Minnesota Book Award, the Lambda Literary Award, and ForeWord’s Book of the Year, and was featured on ALA’s Rainbow List and on the Amelia Bloomer List of Feminist Literature. Ten Beautiful Things received four starred reviews and was a Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection. Rhoda’s Rock Hunt won a Northeast Minnesota Book Award and a Jeanette Fair Book Award, and was a Star of the North nominee. Molly was the recipient of the 2014 McKnight Artist Fellowship in Children’s Literature as well as two MSAB Artist Initiative Grants. Molly is represented by Jennifer Flannery of Flannery Literary. mollybethgriffin.com

 

Juliet Patterson is the author of Sinkhole: A Legacy of Suicide (Milkweed Editions, September 2022), finalist for the 2023 Minnesota Book Awards and named one of the best memoirs of 2022 by Library Journal. She has also published two full-length poetry collections, Threnody, (Nightboat Books 2016), a finalist for the 2017 Audre Lorde Poetry Award, and The Truant Lover, (Nightboat Books, 2006), winner of the Nightboat Poetry Prize and a finalist for the 2006 Lambda Literary Award. A recipient of the Arts & Letters Susan Atefat Prize in non-fiction, and a Lynda Hull Memorial Poetry Prize, she has also been awarded fellowships from the Jerome Foundation, the Minnesota State Arts Board, and the Minneapolis-based Creative Community Leadership Institute (formerly the Institute for Community and Creative Development). She teaches creative writing and literature at St. Olaf College and is also a faculty member and director of the college’s Environmental Conversations program. She lives in Minneapolis on the west bank of the Mississippi near the Great River Road with her partner, the writer Rachel Moritz, and their son. www.julietpatterson.com

 

 

Carlisle Evans Peck (they/them) is a genderqueer composer and singer-songwriter of Northern European settler descent based in Minneapolis. Their work is focused on the power and magic of song and the human voice, rich with queer narratives, magical realism, and mythic symbolism. As a singer-songwriter and a music-theater composer, they consider songs as vessels for forgotten stories, landscapes of emotion through which to wander, and spells and offerings. www.carlisleevanspeck.com

Elle Thoni (they/them) is a queer femmebeast playwright and public artist from the banks of the Mississippi River on Dakhóta land in Minneapolis, MN. In search of wildness amidst this great unraveling, they write plays about shapeshifters, emergent ecologies, and unlikely kinship. Drawing from a divergent background in ensemble-devised performance, large-scale street puppetry, and documentary theater, Elle creates pieces that are as lush and dynamic as the living systems they are inspired by. www.ellethoni.com

As a multi-instrumentalist and songwriter, Vinnie has dedicated the majority of his life to making sense of the world through melody, rhythm, and verse. From, picking up the violin at age 12 and later busking on the streets of France, to learning to play the upright bass to set out on the road with the Last Revel, to finding the guitar as a tool to reimagine his process and find joy in playing with his indie-rock project Friend Dog, he's always felt that the song has been his only way to process his experiences in the world. He's found that a beginner's mind in his work is the only path to authenticity, and authentic, earnest expression, is really, the whole point of his music.

TheLastRevel.com

 

Ondara offers a unique take of the American dream on Tales of America, his debut album. By Eric Danton  

Ondara grew up in Nairobi, Kenya, listening to American alt-rock and making up his own songs for as long as he can remember. After moving to Minneapolis in 2013, he began making his way in the local music scene, continually writing songs about what he saw, felt and experienced in a place far different from home. From a stockpile he says is hundreds of songs deep, Ondara chose 11 for Tales of America. They’re captivating tunes built around acoustic guitars and adorned with subtle full-band accompaniment for an openhearted folk-rock feel. He sings in a strong, tuneful voice well-suited to the gorgeous melancholy he expresses on the wistfully lovelorn “Torch Song,” or his steadfast infatuation on “Television Girl.” Ondara sings rueful lyrics in an anguished tone on “Saying Goodbye,” and leaves plenty of room for interpretation on “American Dream,” the first single.“ I knew I wanted a song called ‘American Dream’ on the record, but I didn’t have that song,” Ondara says with a laugh. “I couldn’t find it. I wrote like twenty songs called ‘American Dream’ before I found the one that ended up being the record.” His persistence is evident throughout Tales of America, which is indeed a classic American tale. It’s the story, told in song, of an immigrant seeking a new life, who dedicates himself to achieving his vision through hard work and determination. See his website.

Ben Noble is a Minneapolis-based artist and producer. Noble’s serene, innocent melodies drift lithely along sonic textures that range from sleepy-time folk to intrusive, experimental hyper-synth scapes. Through any aural difference, the heart is the same: Noble wants to embody his truth and experiences in his music. bennoblemusic.com

Chris Bartels is a producer, musician, husband, and father from Minneapolis, Minnesota. He has spent hours upon hours of his life crafting textures, melodies, emotions, soundscapes, and stories through music. Bartels' musical obsessions are varied, plentiful, and often. anthemfallsmusic.com

Allison Vincent is a performer, director, writer, and teacher known for devised work, physical theatre, and gender-bending performances. She has been honored to collaborate with companies and theaters across the Twin Cities, including The History Theater, Jon Ferguson Theater, WLDRNSS, Theater Forever, The Four Humors, Mainly Me, The Illusion, The Guthrie, Frank Theatre, Sod House, Strike Theatre, Transatlantic Love Affair, the University of Minnesota, and Walking Shadow. Allison has received two Ivey Awards for her work creating performance in ensembles and three Golden Lanyard Awards from the MN Fringe as a director. 

In addition to performing, Allison is a co-artistic director and founding member of Transatlantic Love Affair, a teaching artist at the Guthrie Theater and Loft Literary Center, and has collaborated as a writer on over twenty produced scripts. In 2022 Allison wrote and performed a solo storytelling show about caretaking for her father succumbing to dementia as a Pillsbury House + Theatre’s Naked Stages Fellow. Recently she’s had her scripts published in The Empty Room, Rejection Letters, Dirty Girls Come Clean, and Roi Fainéant Press. She teaches at the University of Minnesota in the Writing Studies Department’s First Year Writing Program. LinkedIn

 

Taja Will (they/them) is a non-binary, chronically ill, queer, Latinx (Chilean) adoptee. They are a performer, choreographer, somatic therapist, consultant and Healing Justice practitioner based in Mni Sota Makoce, on the ancestral lands of the Dakota and Anishinaabe. Taja’s approach integrates improvisation, somatic modalities, text and vocals in contemporary performance. Their aesthetic is one of spontaneity, bold choice making, sonic and kinetic partnership and the ability to move in relationship to risk and intimacy. Will’s artistic work explores visceral connections to current socio-cultural realities through a blend of ritual, dense multi-layered worldbuilding and everyday magic.

Taja initiates solo projects and teaching ventures and is a recent recipient of the Jerome Hill Artist Fellowship, in the dance field, awarded in 2021. Their work has been presented throughout the Twin Cities and across the United States. Including local performances at the Walker Art Center Choreographer’s Evening, the Red Eye Theater’s New Works 4 Weeks, the Radical Recess series, Right Here Showcase and the Candy Box Dance Festival. They were the recipient of a 2018-’19 McKnight Choreography Fellowship, administered by the Cowles Center and funded by The McKnight Foundation. Will has recently received support from the National Association of Latinx Arts & Culture, the Minnesota State Arts Board, and Metropolitan Regional Arts Council. Website Link

Rachel Moritz is the author of two poetry books, Sweet Velocity (Lost Roads Press, 2017), and Borrowed Wave (Kore Press, 2015), as well as five chapbooks. She’s also the co-editor of a collection of personal essays, My Caesarean: Twenty-One Mothers on the C-Section Experience and After (The Experiment, 2019), which won the Foreword INDIES Award in Silver.

Rachel’s work has appeared in American Letters and Commentary, Aufgabe, Colorado Review, DIAGRAM, Iowa Review, Tupelo Quarterly, VOLT, Water-Stone Review, and other journals. Her poems and critical writing have been featured in Academy of American Poets Poem-a-Day, Verse Daily, and in the anthologies Queer Nature, Rocked by the Waters: Poems of Motherhood, Uncoverage: Asking After Recent Poetry, and Jean Valentine: This World Company. She’s received a 2019 Best American Essay Notable mention as well as awards, grants, and residencies.

Rachel teaches creative writing with the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop, Unrestricted Interest, and CommonBond Communities. She lives in Minneapolis with her partner and son. www.rachelmoritz.com

 

M. Ahd grew up moving frequently. They have resided in New Jersey, Iowa, Texas, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the Czech Republic. M has worked as a software company recruiter, sports camera operator, reader to the blind, and arts magazine writer, among other jobs. After teaching high school English and coaching Quiz Bowl for a decade, they now write from home full time. M has been the recipient of the 2016 Barnes and Nobel Regional My Favorite Teacher Contest, named the 2018 National High School Quiz Bowl Coach of the Year, and a finalist for the 2019 Loft Literary Center Mentor Series. M lives in Minneapolis with their spouse, two dogs named Zero and Eleven, and a rotating cast of teens and young adults in need of a spare room.

John Noltner is a freelance photographer based in Minneapolis. For 25 years, he has created images at home and around the world for national magazines, Fortune 500 companies and nonprofit organizations.

His images have appeared in National Geographic Traveler, Smithsonian, Forbes, Health, Midwest Living, New York Daily News and more. 

He is the author of two award-winning books from his series A Peace of My Mind. His work exhibits regularly across the country and he leads lectures and workshops around the idea that art and storytelling has the ability to transform hearts and communities. www.noltner.com

 

Darren Garvey is a multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, and record producer best known for his extensive touring and session work as a drummer and percussionist. He has written and released records under his own name (Under A Common Ceiling, Heart Attack Sleeves, Social Distance), co-written with the likes of Daniel Rodriguez (Elephant Revival) and Jimmie Linville (Daniel and the Lion), and appears on 200+ albums as a session musician and sideman in his 25+ year career. 

Garvey’s latest single No Love Is Wrong is a song of acceptance and possibility inspired by and dedicated to the LGBTQ+ community. Followed up by the release of his cover version of Friday I’m In Love, Garvey is currently putting the finishing touches on his third full-length studio album. A member of Colorado transcendental folk sextet Elephant Revival since 2016, Darren is widely regarded for his creative and collaborative work in the folk and indie music communities as a cross-pollinator. As a drummer Darren has worked with Daniel Rodriguez, Cameron McGill & What Army, Shook Twins, Courtney Hartman, Steve Poltz, John Craigie, Bonnie Paine, Andreas Kapsalis Trio, Danny Barnes, Lindsay Lou, Chicago Farmer, Daniel and the Lion, Miles Nielsen & The Rusted Hearts, Sandra Bernhard, Danny Burns & The Defectors, Ernie Hendrickson, and Cory Chisel and The Wandering Sons. www.darrengarvey.com