As a Korean adoptee raised in North Dakota, Jennifer Weir tells people she grew up with no reference for her own Asian-ness. Her journey of self-discovery led her to an unexpected place — the traditionally male-dominated art of Japanese taiko drumming, a full-body performance experience that Weir uses to connect with a community of mostly female performers through her St. Paul-based nonprofit, TaikoArts Midwest.

The 2016 Knight Arts Challenge winners included TaikoArts Midwest, who received $30,000 to expand the impact and accessibility of taiko, the ensemble drumming rooted in Japanese traditions, with a monthly series of free pop-up concerts throughout St. Paul. (Photo courtesy of Knight Arts Foundation: Rich Ryan)

Tired of not getting her studio lease renewed every few years “because we are so loud,” Weir has big plans to take TaikoArts up a notch, so to speak, with new programming and its own dedicated performance center in St. Paul’s North End.

She’s fundraising $2 million, most of it to renovate and soundproof a vacant warehouse at 449 Front Ave., east of Dale Street, with the hope that legislation carried by state Sen. Sandy Pappas, DFL-St. Paul, will provide another $2 million through a cash appropriation.

Nonprofits seek funding from Legislature

It’s no small ask in the waning days of the legislative session, especially at a time when a number of St. Paul-based arts and cultural institutions are seeking both private philanthropic donations and public dollars to open new public-facing centers in the capital city.

They’re looking to state bonding dollars, the state Legacy Act and more to plant a permanent flag of sorts in St. Paul, but even Pappas herself has cautioned that this will be a difficult year to find state dollars for nonprofit efforts, given difficult budget forecasts a year from now.

“Everyone (at the state) is saying ‘There’s no cash for nonprofits this year,” Weir acknowledged.

Weir, who is featured in the 90-minute documentary “Finding Her Beat” on Amazon, is nonetheless hopeful that lawmakers will smile on her proposal, which she said would bring some badly-needed vitality and community outreach to a high-minority neighborhood lacking in arts organizations, fostering the sense of community she sometimes found lacking as a child.

“We have just slightly under a year left in our current lease (on Fairview Avenue), and the rumblings are they want to redevelop into more of a commercial space, instead of nonprofits,” Weir said. “One of the biggest taiko groups in the country has moved more than 20 times. You never really anchor into a neighborhood. It’s really hard to find space for taiko.”

Other arts groups

Among other St. Paul-based arts centers in various stages of planning:

• The Playwrights’ Center: This storied workshop and performance space for up and coming playwrights broke ground last fall on a new 19,000-square-foot center at 710 Raymond Ave. in St. Paul, an adaptive reuse of a 1913 building that will span double the organization’s existing footprint in Minneapolis. The center, which works with 25 to 30 “core writers” at a time and many others through classes, fellowships and residencies, was founded in 1971 and workshops around 70 new plays annually. A $19 million fundraising campaign launched last year and a new producing artistic director joined in January. The new center could open to thespians and their fans within the 2024-25 season.

A rendering of the Playwrights’ Center’s new home in St. Paul’s Creative Enterprise Zone sits on an easel inside the building on Feb. 13, 2023. (Jared Kaufman / Pioneer Press)

• Minnesota Latino Museum: State Rep. Maria Isa, state Rep. Samakab Hussein, Pappas and others are promoting the concept of a museum dedicated to the state’s Latin experience, which would be the first in Minnesota and the Upper Midwest. Organizers have scoped out a site on Water Street, by Harriet Island Regional Park and the Mississippi River, that would draw on the immigrant experience of the West Side. St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter, the St. Paul Port Authority and others have written letters of support to state lawmakers. “We have a request with the state for $10 million,” said lead organizer Aaron Johnson-Ortiz, executive director of (Neo)Muralismos de México. “We’re very happy to be seeing all these community arts organizations doing great work, and we’re excited for our museum, as well.”

• Hmong Cultural Center Museum: The museum, which opened near Western and University avenues in 2021, now spans 2,000 square feet following the recent addition of exhibit space. The new space showcases photos from the mid-to-late 1960s donated by the family of a former comptroller in the USAID office in Vientiane, Laos, and houses a newly-expanded gift shop and cultural artifact exhibit. The addition was made possible by a two-year direct appropriation of about $288,000 from the state’s Legacy Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, which also funded new track lighting throughout the museum.

Hmong Cultural Center program director Mark Pfeifer and executive director Txongpao Lee pose for a photo next to a display of story cloths and flower cloths at the museum on University and Western Avenues in St. Paul on Tuesday, Dec. 28, 2021. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)

• Wakan Tipi Center: Wakan Tipi Awanyankapi — the organization formerly known as the Lower Phalen Creek Project — plans a $13.5 million nature and cultural center near downtown Kellogg Boulevard, Fourth Street and Commercial Street, at a site located within the Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary, a 27-acre nature reserve. The goal is to showcase the Daḳota history, language and values in a building that will feature an exhibit hall, classrooms, ceremony space, community gathering area, teaching kitchen and teaching gardens. Construction was put out to bid around January, and the 7,500-square-foot center is expected to open in late 2025. The capital campaign launched in 2018 with $3 million in state funds.

• Victoria Theater Arts Center: Organizers behind the future community-driven arts center and performance space at University Avenue and Avon Street say they expect to reopen in August what had once been a silent theater, Prohibition-era speakeasy, cabaret and then retail storefront. A $6.8 million project began in May of last year and was halfway done by December.. The Victoria Theater Arts Center will lead an Earth Day clean-up from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m. Monday in the parking lot of the Model Cities building, as well as a youth-led music and arts festival, “Speak Out And Lead (SOAL),” from 12 p.m. to 5 p.m. on May 19. The latter is in collaboration with Springboard for the Arts.

Organizers of the Victoria Theater project celebrate the purchase of the building, which sits near the Victoria Station light rail stop on University Avenue. centered cafe, arts and performance space. (Courtesy of the Victoria Theater Arts Center)

TaikoArts Midwest: Weir said she has raised about $500,000 toward her $4 million goal, which would allow her to convert the empty warehouse at 449 Front Ave. into a soundproofed drumming center. Plans include a multipurpose event space for community activities, and the nonprofit’s strategic plan calls for targeted outreach to homeless youth, youth of color and the gay/lesbian/transgender community. TaikoArts Midwest, which was founded in 2016 and currently leases space at the Fairview Business Center, will host a Mother’s Day concert on May 12 at the downtown St. Paul Ordway Center for the Performing Arts. The show will feature renowned drummers from Japan, Canada and Minnesota featured in the documentary “Finding Her Beat.”

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