That project is to support women in transitional housing, women that have experienced homelessness, mental illness, substance abuse disorder, and so on. The nonprofit collaborated with Emma Norton to hire artists to do portrait paintings for these women in transitional housing.”

Sam St. John

There are ten artists featured on the Twins website from all over the state of MN and all of their chairs are very interesting to see. Check those out at www.mlb.com/twins/fans/city-connect/ripple-effect.

St. John has a few shows coming up, the first being at Fresh Eye Gallery on June 28 at 4238 Nicollet Avenue in Minneapolis. You can learn more about Sam at www.samstjohnart.com

The Minnesota Twins City Connect uniforms have certainly invoked a lot of different emotions since their recent reveal. Regardless of how you feel about the uniforms, one thing you can feel good about is the associated event put on by Nike and the Twins, ‘The Ripple Effect’ event where they hired local artists to paint Minnesota Shaped Adirondack chairs. The theme of the chair painting was to include the City Connect uniforms. Hastings’ artist, Sam St. John was one of 10 artists to be chosen for this project.
“They were looking for local artists to live paint these Minnesota shaped chairs. What they're doing is using the proceeds from auctioning off these chairs for nonprofits that support youth programs, preserving the land and getting people out into nature. The reason they did this project is they wanted to celebrate the release of the new Twins City Connect uniforms,” explained St. John.
St. John was selected and soon she had a sneak peek of the new Twins uniforms well before the rest of the state. The uniforms were the color palette for the painting of the chairs, so she had to see them for inspiration and planning. Before she went to do the live painting, she even did some research on how fans thought of the uniforms along with the various aspects of the uniforms and what they represent.
There are ten artists featured on the Twins website from all over the state of MN and all of their chairs are very interesting to see. Check those out at www.mlb.com/twins/fans/city-connect/ripple-effect. Sam’s chair features the horizon on a lake as the main part of the chair, but she also brought a part of Hastings with her. The Vermillion Falls makes an appearance on the front leg of the chair.
“The water in Hastings has just been a huge part of my life. I was super excited to do this nature project because I think one of the best parts of Hastings is all that access to nature, the trails and the water and what a great way that Hastings incorporated the community into nature,” she said.
The two chairs that St. John painted are copies of each other which allows one chair to travel the state while the other chair is sold at auction to benefit non-profits committed to our state’s youth and our land.
St. John is also involved in another program benefitting a non-profit, the Emma Norton Project.
“That project is to support women in transitional housing, women that have experienced homelessness, mental illness, substance abuse disorder, and so on. The nonprofit collaborated with Emma Norton to hire artists to do portrait paintings for these women in transitional housing,” St. John explained.
The idea is that these women can take this art with them and make any place feel like home until they reach that final destination of permanent housing, showing that art can make a difference in the community.
St. John has a few shows coming up, the first being at Fresh Eye Gallery on June 28 at 4238 Nicollet Avenue in Minneapolis. You can learn more about Sam at www.samstjohnart.com