Art meets the realities of life

In a bit of fortuitous timing, the Fond du Lac Head Start building got the gift of communal art right after it was the center of a dramatic shooting incident last week.

Artist Karen Savage-Blue had been painting the mural on parachute cloth in her studio on Big Lake for three months. She'd been working to get a grant (from the McKnight Foundation) and approval from the Fond du Lac tribal council for months before that. Looking at the weather forecast, she knew the mural needed to go up this past weekend or it might not happen until next spring, as the adhesive requires moderate temperatures.

The mural depicts the seven clans, Savage-Blue explained Sunday as she and her helpers - her sister, Wendy, and Joe Kitto - finished laboring to adhere the mural to the wall of the building.

"The seven clans are animals the Ojibwe clans break up into: the bear, the weasel, the crane, the fish, the eagle, the loon and the deer," Savage-Blue explained. Each of the animals is painted onto the mural. In the corner, an Ojibwe man (modeled after her brother, Brad Savage) holds up an offering with smoke swirling up and into the circle of life and clan members pictured above and beside him.

"You never know what family members she's going to put into something," Wendy said wryly.

Savage-Blue said the idea for the mural was approved by the Head Start staff and the tribal council.

Using parachute cloth instead of painting the mural directly onto the building is a relatively new technique in the Northland, Savage-Blue said, and said it is supposed to last longer, and meant she could do the painting in her studio instead of standing on a scaffold all summer.

"Then again, if I'd done it on the building, I probably would have just set up a tent here for three months," the artist said. "That might have been kind of fun."

Savage-Blue said she still needs to apply a sealant over the mural to help it last longer, and to add some some finishing touches.

Currently on the faculty at Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College, Savage-Blue teaches drawing and painting, introduction to art, American Indian art, and design.