Mana Bear Bolton live painting on Tower Avenue in Superior in August 2021. (Photo by Jess Morgan)
Between colorful murals, acrylic paintings of beloved pets, playful watercolors and flow arts, Mana Bear has been making the Twin Ports region and beyond more beautiful for nearly a decade. Learn more about Mana’s work in the interview below.
Taylor Rose has attended more than 100 art festivals and his murals can be found spread out in the Duluth area, througuout the United States and in Brazil. Working with a variety of mediums, he has been creating pieces since he “was old enough to hold a pencil,” starting out by drawing Pokémon and cartoons in the flavor of Calvin and Hobbes. He can be reached at rose_oner98 @ gmail.com, with his art found at divergingrosedesigns.com, on Instgram at both @rose_oner and @divergingrose, and on TikTok @drosedesigns. Rose occasionally accepts commissions, continuously seeking to do work he finds “inspiring and lets me have creative freedom.” His clothing, prints, stickers, canvas and more can be found for sale on his website. Below are words from a recent interview with Rose and some of his work.
The Chief Buffalo Mural Project is a collaboration between project manager and artist Moira Villiard alongside lead artists Michelle Defoe, Awanagiizhik Bruce, and Sylvia Houle, the Duluth Indigenous Commission, Zeitgeist Center for Arts, American Indian Movement Twin Ports Support Group, and descendants of Chief Buffalo.
An unveiling of the project is scheduled in Gichi-ode’ Akiing (formerly Lake Place Park) along the Duluth Lakewalk from 5 to 8 p.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 14, complete with food and an opportunity to meet the artists.
We’ve asked Villiard to share more about the project:
Artist Votan Ik of NSRGNTS stands before the nearly completed mural.
To me, it’s rather astounding to think that Duluth has been without indigenous representation for this long. I imagine people from all over the world have been visiting Duluth as tourists and have only gotten to see one side of this place, unaware of the precolonial history that it’s tied to. This mural is a long-awaited step toward reaffirming our presence as indigenous people. It’s unapologetically native — an unmistakable vision that grew into fruition along the stretch of West Second Street, firmly declaring the presence of a people long pushed to the side from mainstream narratives.
