‘Echoes’ of Nordic art and tradition across the U.S.
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A collection of Nordic art and crafts — papercuts, textiles, wood furniture, metalworks, ceramics, bonadsmålning, animal hides — traveled from the Upper Midwest to New York and back again in 2025.
Curator Sally Yerkovich of New York says “Nordic Echoes — Tradition in Contemporary Art” is the first major traveling exhibition of contemporary Nordic folk arts and cultural traditions from the Upper Midwest. (This comprises Minnesota, North and South Dakota, Iowa, Wisconsin and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan).
“Nordic Echoes” opened in April at the Scandinavia House in Manhattan and ran through Aug. 2. On Oct. 4, it reopens at South Dakota State University’s South Dakota Art Museum in Brookings, before travelling in early 2026 to the American Swedish Institute in Minneapolis.
“There are lots of people in the Upper Midwest who are carrying on traditions that have their beginning in the Nordic countries but are carrying on the traditions in a special sort of Upper Midwestern way,” says Yerkovich, who is also the director of educational exchange and special programs for the American-Scandinavian Foundation.
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A majority of the 24 artists represented are based in Minnesota, including Sonja Peterson, Amber M. Jensen, Talon Cavender-Wilson, Pieper Bloomquist and Lucy and Gene Tokheim of Tokheim Stoneware.
Yerkovich traveled through the Upper Midwest, visiting artists in their communities in Duluth, Grand Marais, Montevideo and Rochester.
“I realized that a lot of the artists really work on their own, either in their own communities or families, and that they weren't very well known even within the region,” Yerkovich says.
“I began to think, wouldn't it be a great idea to have an exhibition that would bring more visibility to some of the work that the artists are doing, and have it travel through the states that we support in the Upper Midwest.”
While many objects made using traditional methods are on view, Yerkovich says she also wanted to show how Midwest artists are updating these traditions or making them their own.
“The key to sustaining the traditions is to interest more people in them,” Yerkovich says.
“We found that one of the keys to that is to show that the traditions aren't static, but in fact are changing, and that artists who are skilled in the crafts that are represented very often innovate within the tradition.”
One of those artists is Tia Keobounpheng of Minneapolis, who recently had another show in New York at the Armory. Keobounpheng draws on her family's weaving and sewing practices to create geometric tapestries.
She created a new piece just for “Nordic Echoes,” an abstracted family portrait of her four siblings and parents, which she calls “Who do you think you are, no. 11.”
“The piece really speaks to the way that there is, in families, an energy that is unique,” Keobounpheng says. “Especially growing up in a large family, there's a certain level of individuality that needs to be kind of surrendered in order to operate and be a functioning part of this family unit.”
South Dakota Art Museum will host an opening reception for “Nordic Echoes” Oct. 24 and the exhibition will close Jan. 3, 2026.
It will then open at the American Swedish Institute in Feb. 2026, followed by the Vesterheim Norwegian-American Museum in Decorah, Iowa, before heading in 2027 to the Plains Art Museum in Fargo.
For a closer look inside “Nordic Echoes” — and to hear directly from the artists — watch this video produced by Pioneer PBS: “Continuing the Folk Arts | Nordic Echoes: Tradition in Contemporary Art.”
