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Minnesota
decoys on display
Nestled between the writings of
Charles Dickens, Plato and William Shakespeare in the Winona State University
Library are the works of Oscar Anderson, Alfred Moes and Leon Theisen,
three of the carvers whose decoys are featured in a new exhibit of decoys
and duck calls by Minnesota makers. There are 33 decoys and two calls,
all made between 1917 and 1960, on loan from the Minnesota Decoy Foundation,
a non-profit group founded in 1991 to encourage the preservation of
decoys by Minnesota carvers.
Erv Bublitz, a professor at WSU, came up with the idea of bringing the
decoys to campus to share this historic folk art with the community.
Winona is located on the Mississippi River, surrounded with sloughs
and backwaters. Decoys were tools for duck hunting here, making it an
ideal selection for a public display.
To secure the current display, Bublitz worked with Andy Anderson of
the Minnesota Decoy Foundation and the Minnesota Decoy Collectors Association
who was eager to share the resources and artifacts of his organization’s
collection.
“The Minnesota Decoy Foundation has worked tirelessly to preserve these
decoys before they are lost into private collections, never to be seen
by the general public again,” says Anderson. “We are always looking
for venues to display these artifacts. When the opportunity to work
with Winona State presented itself, we knew that hundreds of students,
educators and community members…would experience the history of decoy
carving.”
Anderson also spoke at a reception there in February to a large crowd
from the local community about decoys and decoy collecting. Although
this exhibit only runs through the end of February, the university hopes
to build a permanent collection of decoys and hunting related items
that will remain on display.
The Minnesota Decoy Foundation actively seeks donations and contributions
and can be contacted at (651) 464-8861. If you would like to donate
a decoy or waterfowl sculpture to the Winona State University collection,
contact Erv Bublitz at (800) 342-5978 or (507) 457-5425.
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