(woman) Welcome to... a patchwork of stories about the arts, culture, and history in our region.

Hi, I'm Barb Gravel.

And I'm Matt Olien.

On this edition of Prairie Mosaic, we'll learn about Minnesota lake culture, watch a master woodcarver, and listen to a group of musicians who know how to play an Irish jig.

For more than 40 years John Olesen has been creating beautiful glassware.

From his studio near Clitherall, Minnesota, he creates everything from wall sculptures to bowls, vases, wine and martini glasses.

His passion for glassblowing can be seen in his one-of-a-kind designs.

My interest in glassblowing is unique to glass in the fact that it can go from these vivid, bright opaque colors to beautiful jewel toned transparent colors.

The fact that it's transparent, you can add great depth to the work things that you can't do necessarily in some other art forms.

So it just has that breadth of expression that you can utilize, and it's fairly immediate.

So anything like a wine glass that I make today is available tomorrow.

My name is John Olesen, I am an artist focusing in glass.

We are at White Pine Studios, we're in south-central Otter Tail County.

White Pine studio has been here since 2002.

My work consists of 2 different aspects of glass art where I mainly focus on wholesale work-- selling to galleries, and that consists of vases, bowls, and a lot of stemware, a lot of wine glasses, martini glasses, other high-end drinkware.

That's kind of the bread and butter of what I do, and I also work in commission work where I'll do specialty pieces for walls and people's homes and some public art.

So all glassblowing starts with a blowpipe.

The blowpipe needs to be preheated.

If it's not hot enough the glass won't stick to it properly, it'll pop and crack.

The glass is coming out of here at 2100 degrees give or take 50 degrees.

Not to gather glass.

I got started by going to college, Anoka Ramsey, and when I found they had glassblowing, it was like I would like to try that, that looks like fun, that's something I could get into.

Anoka Ramsey was a 2-year college.

So I wanted to go back to school to work on an art degree.

So I started attending the University of Minnesota to work on an art degree, moved up here in 2002 to build White Pine Studio, This process is called marvering.

I believe, I've been told that marver is Italian for marble, and in the olden days it was a piece of marble rather than a piece of steel.

This is little bits of color called frit.

This flower bowl is going to be red and blue and pink.

I've been blowing glass for over 40 years and learning in the early years the craft of glassblowing, learning how to make the object in the shape that I need to make or wanted to make, then going back to school later on I learned more of the art side of things-- the ability to throw some ideas against the wall and see what sticks, making the same thing over and over again, trying to make it a little bit different but within constraints of a wine glass or a martini glass or a bowl-- after making lots of those pieces then going back and assessing what parts of it worked and what parts didn't.

Those are my inputs into that, that is my interpretation of it and then my deciding what I want to include and how I want to mash those things up into a final product.

So this is the start of the layering process of color for this bowl.

Most of the color is going to be focused on the bottom middle of the bowl.

So we'll add color, then we'll get more glass and add more color, more designed to it then start inflating those gathers of glass to create a bubble.

We'll add vines to the outside of it, and those will be added to the bit of glass that'll get trailed onto there-- that organic natural sort of design to it.

I think for beginners the biggest challenge for glassblowing is the fact that it always needs to be moving.

The punty is always turning, there isn't an opportunity to really stop and look at what you're doing.

The glass, you can't stop it, if it gets too cold it'll break, if it's so hot it'll fall off center, it gets off center that's a problem for the whole piece.

After 3/4 of the piece is done, then we'll punty it, the piece, which is applying solid rods with a bit of glass on it to the bottom of the piece, breaking it off with a blowpipe, then we'll start working on the top and opening it up and doing that finish part.

So that's where we'll see those first bits of color we put in there, although when we're doing it they're going to look all the same color, they're all going to be orange or black.

We won't see the true colors until it cools down the next day.

The reasons I make what I make, I like the pieces that people are going to use.

I like the stemware and barware type things because I envision people using it and enjoying it.

Minnesota is known as the land of 10,000 lakes.

and from a from the state's earliest years, lake life has been a significant part of its culture.

The Legacy of the Lakes Museum and Gardens in Alexandria, Minnesota hopes to preserve this history for future generations.

(woman) We're not just boats.

The entire museum's dedicated to lake life and lake culture and the history of boating as an industry.

We have so much to offer that even if boats aren't your thing, you'll still love this museum.

[guitar, bass, & drums play rock] The Legacy of the Lakes Museum started when when a group of individuals who either summered at the lake or were lake residents or lived in Alexandria got together in the mid 1990s, and they wanted to preserve wood boat craftsmanship.

They thought it was something that deserved to be recognized and preserved.

We officially incorporated in 1999 as the Minnesota Lakes Maritime Society, and we were able to open up the museum itself here in 2006.

Our mission of Legacy of the Lakes Museum is officially to celebrate lake life and lake culture and preserve that for future generations.

In 2016 we switched our name from the Minnesota lakes Maritime Museum to Legacy of the Lakes Museum to more broadly encompass things beyond wood boats.

We still have our very large wooden boat collection, but we also do things like art displays, photography, swimsuit history, resort history, fishing gallery, it's not just boats; it's so much more.

We reopen mid May, we're open through October 31st every year.

The reason behind that is that these wood boats, they have to go into special storage so they don't dry out.

We want to preserve them as long as possible, so in the winter months it's a little more difficult, so we shut down the museum.

Our main collection, of course, is our over 100 watercraft, everything from a 1970s version of a jet ski to an 1894 launch to a 1950s wood classic runabout.

We just try to focus on how do we interpret these boats with different stories.

We have lots of unique and rare watercraft in here.

Several of them are one-of-a-kind.

One of our very unique boats here is one of only two that remain as built.

It's a naptha launch from 1895 called Frieda.

Naptha is like a low-grade gasoline kind of like lighter fluid.

It works like a steam engine, so instead of boiling water, you boil the naptha which at the time was actually safer than boiling water.

But it didn't last very long.

During the world wars they were stripped of all the copper fittings for the war efforts.

So to have one that has its original engine with all its fittings is a very unique and rare thing.

The Falls Flyer is made by Larson boatworks, and Larson is one of those brands that is synonymous with Minnesota and has a lot of recognition The Falls Flyers came about in the 1930s, they were heavily inspired by Charles Lindberg's JN-4 Jenny biplane.

Charles Lindberg was also from Little Falls, same as Paul Larson, and they were classmates and friends.

So he made the Falls Flyers in kind of a tribute in honor of his friend.

We can also see things like the history of Alexandria Boat Works.

It's one of the very first boat works ever in the state.

It was around for over 100 years.

There's little boat works all over Minnesota.

Why?

It's because lakes are very prevalent in Minnesota and boats were essential to commerce and recreation lakes.

We tell the story of local resorts and why people have come to Minnesota for years because of the lakes.

Waterskiing was invented in Minnesota on Lake Pepin which, of course, also borders Wisconsin but because the inventor Ralph Samuelson lived in Minnesota, we get the credit.

He had this idea that if you were able to ski on snow, you should be able to ski on water.

So he took a pair of snow skis and was pulled behind a powered boat and was able to stand up, and that is where waterskiing was developed.

And it really rapidly develop after that Alexandria is one of those communities where we have a very vibrant permanent residency all year 'round.

We do also have people who return to the lakes every summer and have been doing that since as early as the 1880s.

If you could afford to, you would want to come out to the lake and just take in the cool breezes.

Fishing was a really large thing.

There were train companies that would specifically sponsor tickets and excursions to bring people with them to different resorts.

So you get this lake culture of going to the lake.

It does make Minnesota special.

And the ways we enjoy the lakes now are not that different than how we enjoyed them 100 years ago.

We are so incredibly supported by many different communities, not just our local community here in Alexandria but also the wood boat community.

People love coming in here.

Even if you're not into boating you can still appreciate these boats as art forms because it is the craftsmanship that went into making these boats and they work at every detail that went into these boats.

We get visitors from far and wide because they have seen us advertised or stories have been written about us in different boating magazines.

We do a classic boat show every year in July, and so we have lots of involvement from the wood boat community.

That and the community here in Alexandria have come out to see all the wood boats.

It's important to preserve the history of lake life and lake culture because it's very ingrained to who we are as Minnesotans and Minnesota culture and Minnesota history.

People have been coming to lakes in Minnesota for generations, We are the land of 10,000 Lakes.

What makes it special is our lake life and lake culture, so it's just the story that we want to tell and make sure people are aware of.

Joe Wavra of Red Lake Falls, Minnesota is a master woodcarver who uses various chainsaws to craft amazing designs like bears, cartoon characters, and eagles.

It all started as a hobby years ago, but today, his business, Klondike Carvings, is both his livelihood and his passion.

[acoustic guitar finger-picking in bright rhythm] [buzzing of a chain saw] (Joe) It's a hard job, but I enjoy it.

Every morning I'm thankful I get to come out and make some more sawdust!

♪ I'm Joe Wavra from Red Lake Falls, and my little business here is called Klondike Carvings.

I've been carving with a chainsaw for about 20 years now.

Part time to start, but now it's just full time, it's all I do.

Keeps me out of trouble and busy.

My wife and I built a log house down between the two rivers in Red Lake Falls where the Clearwater and Red Lake River meet.

We built a log house, then she wanted some decor for it, and she was going to buy this and that, she had plans.

I told her well, let me try to make that for you.

She said I couldn't do it, so that challenged me to start.

It just kept going, started selling a few of them and the more I did, the more I did!

And the more that sold, we just kept workin' it up, and then I was busy workin' full time and building a house and carving some, then after I got my house finished, then I started carving a lot more.

Like every day, I was carving weekends.

And word of mouth, most of it.

People would come and say, oh, can you make me this?

I was like, I don't know, but I can try!

[laughs] That's kind of how it started.

It was a lot of wonder, you know, can you do it?

Will anybody come?

Will I make this work or not?

You never know until you try, but you've got to roll the dice.

You got to try it.

If I would,'t have tried it, I would've not been happy.

I get most of my wood up north of Bemidji, some loggers I know up there.

I've been buying from them for about 20 years now.

I'm looking for white pine or red pine normally.

I like the white better personally, but they both carve really nice.

My style is more like folk art, I guess.

That's what I'd call it.

I'm not trying to make a realistic looking bear, I make a caricature bear.

I do a lot of cartoon characters too.

I've done Goofy, Popeye, Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck-- lots of those kind of old classic cartoon characters.

Yeah, there's always bears.

You can never make enough bears.

They're just kind of like meat and potatoes part of the deal.

I've made I don't know how many.

They were never my favorite thing to make.

It's what it is, people want 'em, so you just keep punchin' 'em out.

I do a lot of like, bears in logs and laying down and different styles.

Like on a bear there's about 9 cuts, and I can pretty much have one blocked out, and then the rest is details, different saws-- I got, I don't know how many chainsaws, 14, 15 different ones that are set up different for whatever I am doing.

Then I'll do the detail part.

Then you have tools you have to build yourself like eye tools, and there's some weird stuff you wind up learnin' how to make from other carvers I like my flying eagles, probably are one of my favorite things to make.

Anything you're trying to get like flying with the wings spread out, it's a lot harder than a perched eagle.

They're nice when they're done; they're really pretty.

I do a flag holding eagle that's really popular.

It's a soaring eagle that holds a flagpole.

We have a really nice trail system, so I've got a bunch of benches that I've done for the city.

So people that are around walking, hiking, biking trails can take a break, sit on a bench.

So I got quite a few of those.

There's a lot of people in town that have supported me very well.

There's sculpture everywhere in town, there's a lot.

My favorite way to work is when I don't have to think about it anymore.

I just start the saw, and my hands know what to do.

It's almost like autopilot where I'm not thinking about what I have to do; I can just do it.

That's I think when I do my best stuff.

My body knows what to do.

That's why I like chainsaws-- it's fast-- I call it speed art.

It doesn't take me forever because I don't have a lot of patience.

I do hand carve like some of my human faces and stuff with chisels, but more in the winter when I have more time.

When it's 40 below I don't want to be outside working anyway, So I'll take the hammer and chisel and knock some stuff out that way.

And I enjoy that too, but I do like to saw because you can go move a lot of wood faster; things get done.

[buzzing of the saw] I just want to thank the people for supporting me.

It's been hard, it's a lot of work, and it's risky.

I mean, I don't know if anything will sell ever, but I've got faith in myself and what I can do.

I wake up every morning, and I'm happy.

I'm like, oh yeah I get to go do what I want to do today Poitin is a group of talented and vibrant musicians exploring the correlation between Irish and Red River Métis traditional music, accompanied by classic Irish instrumentation.

[fiddle intro; playing in bright rhythm] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [instruments only; no vocals] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ (Bonnie) Whoo-hoo!

Whup, whup, whup, whup!

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [instruments only; no vocals, fiddler plays lead] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ Whup, whoo!

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [instruments only; no vocals, fiddler plays lead] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [instruments only; no vocals, fiddler plays lead] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [fiddle intro; playing in fast folk dance rhythm] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [instruments only; no vocals, fiddler plays the lead] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [instruments only; no vocals, fiddler plays lead] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [instruments only; no vocals, fiddler plays lead] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ If you know of an artist, topic, or organization in our region that you think might make for an interesting segment, please contact us at... (Barb) You can watch this and other episodes of "Prairie Mosaic" on Prairie Public's YouTube channel, and please, follow Prairie Public on social media as well.

I'm Barb Gravel.

And I'm Matt Olien Thank you for joining us for another edition of "Prairie Mosaic."

[guitar, bass, and drums play in bright country rhythm] (Barb) "Prairie Mosaic" is funded by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage fund with money from the vote of the people of Minnesota on November 4th, 2008, the North Dakota Council on the Arts and by the members of Prairie Public.