Piecing Together

Community created mosaics - with teaching artist Mica Lee Anders

Like all passionate creators, our love for art spans far and wide. It seemed appropriate, therefore, to unveil the Art for All mosaics on the day of love, February 14th. COMPAS teaching artist and staff member Mica Lee Anders worked with Greater Twin Cities United Way members to make this vision happen. Rise, Inc., one of the member organizations that participated in creating mosaics, revealed their part of the project at their Spring Lake Park location. The mosaic is a giant five-piece display pieced together by community volunteers - people Rise serves, and Rise employees and supporters - who dedicated hundreds of hours in the past few months. This collaboration made something truly spectacular. Check out a video of the process.

“The overall goal was to bring people together at the table to work, talk, and create a piece of beauty for years to come.” –Mica Lee Anders

See more of Mica and her artistic process in her Artist Spotlight.

Full(est) House

Nokomis Public Library was the place to be on February 11th. Siama’s Afrobilly performed their rhythmic journey through the Democratic Republic of Congo, East Africa and much more. With almost 70 people in attendance, and generations young and old, it has become one of our most popular and diverse events!

Discover more about Siama’s work

Round the Clock Inspiration

Award-winning Lao American poet and COMPAS artist Saymoukda Vongsay explains her work in this month’s blog, Using Art to Explore Culture, and the inspiration that drives her.

She is also gracing our ears with a poetry reading on March 12th at Golden’s Lowertown in St. Paul from 2-4pm.

Celebrating Culture and History Through the Arts!

In honor of Black History Month, we took a walk down memory lane and revisited this great blog post from COMPAS artist T. Mychael Rambo, about his residency, “My Heart Sings so That My Spirit Can Fly”.

“My goal is that students come away from this residency with a better knowledge of African American culture and heritage.” –T. Mychael Rambo