Join professor of literature at the Sámi University in Norway, Harald Gaski, and American visual artist of Sámi descent, Tia Keobounpheng, for a conversation about Sámi values, views, and understandings through the lens of “Gullat, guldalit”—to hear, to listen and to act accordingly—in literary and visual art. This program is presented in coordination with Nordic Echoes: Tradition in Contemporary Art, the first major traveling exhibition of contemporary Nordic folk arts and cultural traditions from the Upper Midwest.
ABOUT THE PANELISTS
Harald Gaski is a Professor in Sámi Literature at Sámi allaskuvla / Sámi University in Norway. He now lives in his original home community Deatnu (Tana) in North Norway, after more than 40 years in the city of Tromsø and the university there. Gaski is the author and editor of several books on Sámi literature and culture. He has translated Sámi literature into Norwegian and English. Particularly well-known are his interpretations of works by Nils-Aslak Valkeapää, who was awarded the 1991 Nordic Council Literature Prize. Gaski’s research specializes on Sámi aesthetics, worldview and values, and the transition from oral to written culture. Gaski has been instrumental in establishing Sami literature as an academic field and has been awarded for his research and writing, most recently with an honorary doctorate at Umeå university in 2024. Gaski’s anthology of Sámi literature, Myths, Tales and Poetry from Four Centuries of Sámi Literature, was published in 2020.
Tia Keobounpheng (b. 1977 Virginia, MN) is an interdisciplinary artist of Finnish and Sámi descent based in Minneapolis, MN. Her abstract geometric paintings—tapestries of threads over drawings on wood—break apart traditional craft methods as a means of speaking to inherited generational patterns. Tia has received numerous grants from the MN State Arts Board, the McKnight Foundation through the Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, and the American Scandinavian Foundation. She has exhibited regionally and nationally, including solo exhibition Revealing Threads at the Minneapolis Institute of Art/Mia (2023), Common Threads at Apple Park in Cupertino, CA (2024), Nordic Echoes at Scandinavia House in Manhattan, NY (2025), and Chicago EXPO 2025 with Weinstein Hammons Gallery. Her work is part of the collections of Mia, The Minnesota Museum of American Art, the North Dakota Museum of Art, and the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, MN.