Art by Brita Sailer and Tiffany Besonen is on display at The Gallery @ The Armory through September.
A reception took place on Saturday, August 10th.
Sailer describes her art exhibition as “a combination of retrospective and introduction of new works in a variety of watercolor, pastel and acrylic paintings, drawings and mixed media with landscape, garden, farm and horse motifs.”
Shannon Geisen/Enterprise
“I actually started out as a potter,” she said. “I was always drawing as a kid, so I went to Moorhead State and studied art there. … I kind of paint my life. Your art teacher tells you, ‘Paint what you know.'”
She served as State Representative for District 2B from 2005 to 2010, Executive Director of the Recycling Association of Minnesota, and CEO of Sailer Environmental.
Besonen, an art teacher at Menahga School, said she loves to “play and experiment.”
She creates both two- and three-dimensional mixed media works.
“I’m returning to the nest I lived in when my babies were little, which is now empty. But who am I now if I’m not a mother every day,” she said.
Besonen added pastels, colored pencils and gouache to a still from her short film “RISING.”
Shannon Geisen/Enterprise
On her “Wall of Artifacts,” she reuses shredded tire treads, copper wire, rusted metal and other objects that fall into her path. “I enjoy combining new and old and seeing what happens,” she says.
Incantation bowls from a previous exhibition also attract the attention of visitors.
Besonen thanked the Five Wings Art Council for awarding her first scholarship 25 years ago.
“That really encouraged me,” she said. “I was newly married, teaching, and very busy, but I knew I had to make art. I also thank all the art councils for providing access to art in rural Minnesota, which is something I feel very strongly about.”
Call 218-237-3722 for gallery hours. The exhibition will also be part of Art Leap 2024, September 28-29.
