Stephan Hoglund took this incredible shot of the northern lights last week and got national coverage with it. CNN featured it on its iReport site.
This has been and continues to be a very busy week in Cook County with sled dog races, art and snow sculpture events, ski and snowmobile events, theatre, music and more.
Mark Tessier took this photo of the start of the Gunflint Trail Mail Run Sled Dog race on Monday.
On Monday and Tuesday, 12 mushers and their teams set out from the Devil Track Landing for a two-day race called the Gunflint Mail Run Sled Dog Race. The teams raced to Loon Lake and back to Trail Center where they rested for five hours and then raced back to Devil Track.
Odin Jorgenson (Coville) won the race with Frank Moe (Coville) coming in scond, Peter McClelland (Isabella) third and Kevin Malikowski (Outing) fourth.
Odin Jorgenson with his winning team at Gunflint Mail Run race on Monday. Photo by Stephan Hoglund.
One of the reasons we’re including this in our arts blog is that Grand Marais photographer Stephan Hoglund was featured on CNN’s iReport Web site with a photo from the race as well as information about it. Click here to see it.
Hoglund is developing a regular presence there, which is very cool.
Other photographers were out as well.
Also this week, the Grand Marais Art Colony’sWinter Arts Festival featuring the Winter Plein Air event and the Snow Sculpture Symposium started this week, with artists painting winter landscapes at Camp Menogyn
on the Gunflint Trail and snow sculptors beginning to work on snow blocks positioned all over Cook County.
The Art Colony will feature the paintings created
Plein air painter Mary Pettis works on a landscape at Camp Menogyn. Photo by Kjersti Vick.
during the week at an art show on Friday. The opening reception is at 6 p.m. Friday, Feb. 3, with refreshments by Chez Jude. The paintings will be up through Feb. 12.
The snow sculptures throughout the county will be completed on Friday, too, and the public is invited to see them all. The snow sculptures are at the Grand Portage Lodge & Casino, Harbor Park (Joynes Ben Franklin, Grand Marais Art Colony and Grand Marais Parks Dept. ), Bearskin Lodge and Gunflint Lodge on the Gunflint Trail as well as Bluefin Bay,
Joi Electa and Shanna Hinker work on a snow sculpture. Photo by Mark Tessier.
Chateau LeVeaux, Caribou Highlands and Lutsen Mountains. The snow sculptors include Bob Fulks (Clawson, Mich.), Vic Germaniuk and Oscar Mattis (Thunder Bay), Will Tanner &Friends (Twin Cities), Joi Electa and Shanna Hinker (Two Harbors) and Cook County residents Tom McCann, Dave Seaton, Ray White and Rick Skoog & Friends.
On Thursday, there is a performance of “For the Birds“ a chamber suite with music, poetry, comedy, tragedy, artistry” with Zeitgeist & Kevin Kling at the Arrowhead Center for the Arts at 7 p.m.
The event is sponsored by the North Shore Music Association, the Grand Marais Playhouse and Community Ed, one of three events sponsored by the nonprofits in the next six weeks at the ACA.
Kling, a writer and humorist, will give a workshop for storytellers, poets and writers at the ACA from noon to 1 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 2. The workshop is $15 or free for anyone who has a ticket for the performance. For more info, call 387-1272.
On Friday, WTIP Community Radio will live stream the Cook County Pursuit Cross County Race on Pincushion Mountain at 1:30 p.m. High school cross-country teams from throughout the region participate in this race, and the program will include interviews and a chance to watch the action as it happens.
Click here to see the WTIP site and bookmark it for the Friday race.
This weekend is also the start of the Winter Tracks Festival, a two-week event featuring everything from snowmobile races to a 400K cross-country ski event, where participants work to ski every trail in the county. The Volks Ski 400 is Feb. 11.
This weekend, Grand Portage Lodge & Casino is hosting the Easter Seals Snowarama. It runs from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. with poker runs during the day and dinner and dancing to the Bed of Roses Bon Jovi tribute band at 9 p.m.
Also this weekend, Lutsen Mountains is hosting a Family Fun Festival including a day of family racing and events on Saturday. The Cook County Ridge Riders Snowmobile Club will hold a fun run on Saturday as well, with Timmy Haus playing music at Devil Track Lodge that night.
And, if you’re fascinated by Dala horses, master carver Harley Refsal will give a talk and presentation about the beloved Scandinavian carved horse at North House Folk School at 7 p.m. Free.
So there’s plenty to do this weekend. There’s lots of great live music, too. Check the schedule below for more info.
In other art news, Staci Drouillard interviewed Grand Portage photographer Travis Novitsky about his work in her series, Annishinaabe Way: Lives, Words and Stories of Ojibwe People broadcast on WTIP Community Radio. To listen to this interview, click here.
"All That Glitters," acrylic, by Aaron Kloss, a new artist at Sivertson Gallery.
Sivertson Gallery has new work by landscape painter Dave Gilsvik as well as paintings by Duluthian Aaron Kloss, a new artist at the gallery. Also, the gallery is beginning to receive new work for the Inuit Premiere and it is “spectacular,” said Sherri Moe. She also said Sivertson Gallery in Duluth will be opening this month with a new name as well as a new look. Siiviis is the name of one of the fishing boats owned by the Sivertson family when they fished out of Isle Royale, she said. The gallery will re-open this month with the grand opening set for Earth Day.
Look for the Grand Marais Art Colony’s 2012 Catalog in your mail boxes this week. Copies can also be found at the Art Colony.
The arts organization is offering lots of fun things to do for Valentine’s Day, too, including Community Ink Day, a chance to print your own Valentines (Sat., Feb. 4, 1-4 p.m.), I Heart Glass with Nancy Seaton, (Feb. 11, 9 a.m.- 4 p.m.) and Wheel You Be Mine? a romantic evening playing with clay with Joan Farnam (chocolates and wine are the refreshments), Feb. 14 from 5:30-7 p.m. Call the Art Colony to register or for more information at 387-2737 or click here for the Web site.
The key block from Betsy Bowen's "Barn Owl" print.
Betsy Bowen has been working in Texas this month, crafting woodblock prints from “Twelve Owls,” a book written by Laura Erickson which Bowen illustrated. The prints will be available when Bowen’s Studio Gallery opens this spring.
Look for this graphic on the North Shore Highway 61 Web site.
And last, but not least, North Shore Highway 61, which comes
out this week, is offering a $50 gift certificate to your favorite restuarant for participants in the 2012 Reader’s Choice Restaurant Awards. It’s a fun survey. Check it out here.
There’s plenty of live music this weekend, too. Here’s the schedule.
Wednesday:
- Pete Kavanaugh, Bluefin Bay, Tofte, 8 p.m.
- Brett Berka & Friends, Harbor Light Supper Club & Bar, 7 p.m.
Thursday:
- Bump & Barbara Jean, Poplar River Pub, Lutsen Resort, 6-8 p.m.
Friday:
- Jim & Michelle Miller, Mogul’s, Lutsen Mountains, 3;30 p.m.
- Cook County’s Most Wanted, American Legion, 7:30 p.m.
- Gordon Thorne, Bluefin Bay, 8 p.m.
- Joe Paulik and Al Oikari, Gunflint Tavern, 9 p.m.
- Timmy Haus, Papa Charlie’s, 9:30 p.m.
Saturday:
James Moors, Mogul’s, 3:30 p.m.
- Eric Frost, Papa Charlie’s, 3:30 p.m.
- The Sivertones, Papa Charlie’s, 6:30 p.m.
- Joe Paulik, Cascade Lodge Pub, 8 p.m.
- Jeff Ray, Gunflint Tavern, 9:30 p.m.
- Cook County’s Most Wanted, Papa Charlie’s, 9:30 p.m.
Sunday:
- Bump & Barbara Jean, Papa Charlie’s, 3 p.m.
- Al Oikari and Joe Paulik, Gunflint Tavern, 6:30 p.m.
We found lots of interesting photos this week.
First up is a photograph of one of Tom McCann’s vodkacolors, which will be in the show at the Art Colony this Friday. McCann is a plein air painter and likes to paint in watercolors, but the water he uses to dilute the paints freezes in winter, so he decided to try using vodka instead. He said it worked really well above 5 degrees, when it freezes. We’ve had pretty balmy winter weather this week, and McCann painted several vodkacolors for the Winter Plein Air exhibit which opens on Friday at 6 p.m. Here’s one of them.
A vodka-color landscape by Tom McCann.
There were some wonderful landscapes this week, too.
Ilena Berg took this great shot of the frozen waterfalls of the Kadunce River.
Jeremy Lopez captured the delicate colors of sea fog at sunrise.
Ann Jorgenson's sunset over the harbor is almost surreal.
A beautiful sunrise shot from Bryan Hansel.
A winter landscape on Lake Superior by Travis Novitsky.
Have a wonderful, winter weekend!
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