Let’s Visit Bigfork: Edge Center Gallery

“I don’t know that he gained his income from painting. I think he was just kind of recently recognized as having value in his paintings. I’m sure he logged and did everything else like everybody up here. You find a way to make a living. [You] scratch it out.” – Gail Blackmer on local artist and canoe builder Bill Hafeman Bigfork, MN is a remote, naturally beautiful community in northern Minnesota. With the Bigfork River running right through this small town that is surrounded by lakes, the remote area is a natural vacation destination for people looking to spend time at their family cabin, camp in a state park, fish, kayak, and truly get away from stresses of modern life. In a surprise twist, this little community is also a prime location to take in some high caliber art and theater. Bigfork, with a population of less than 500, also boasts a state of the art medical facility equipped with modern options for people in all stages of advancing age and medical diagnoses. The tiny town of Bigfork has a big heart. With its deep, logging history at the soul of the community, both winter and summer recreation seem to breathe a new life into the area today. It’s a place where locals are proud and long term and visitors tend to return. In this particular segment, Gail Blackmer gives Katie Carter a guided tour of the art gallery inside the Edge Center for the Arts describing the long term influence of local artists like Bill Hafeman who built birchbark canoes according to the native way and passed those skills down thru his family who now keep the birchbark canoes in production.