Local artist Tia Keobounpheng is currently preparing a new temporary art installation in Sister Cities Park.

The piece called “Unweaving” will be on display from September to October and “explores the ways tradition, culture, communities, and individuals are unwoven when we are disconnected from our foundation of ancestral history”.

Keobounpheng took inspiration from her own life, mainly a grandmother she didn’t know who was part of the Karelian Red Exodus.

The Exodus took place in the 1930s and saw near 6,000 Finish North Americans leave the Upper Midwest and Lake Superior region to start a Finnish-speaking utopia in Russia.

The society failed, but Keobounpheng’s grandmother made it back to America after three years.

Keobounpheng said what happened to her family there has been lost to time since they never talked about it.
 

To see the original report and related arts reporting, follow this link to the WDIO-TV website.  https://www.wdio.com/duluth-minnesota-news/unweaving-art-installation/5843961/?cat=10335