Mary Erickson

Mary Erickson

Mary Erickson is a native of the Iron Range and has Finnish and Danish ancestry. Erickson first learned to weave as an art student at Bemidji State. She is now a full-time artist, participating in gallery shows around the area and teaches at the North House Folk School. Erickson had previously participated in a Minnesota State Arts Board apprenticeship program, where she learned to make Finnish himmeli from a local woman named Elna Hiettala.

Fieldwork conducted by Sallie Anna Pisera with support from the Minnesota State Arts Board.

Mary Erickson, left, with Elna Heitala in the latter’s apartment. Erickson was learning rye straw/himmeli and lastu/wood shaving Finnish season traditions from Heitala through the Minnesota State Arts Board’s Folk Arts Apprenticeship Program. Heitala’s sweatshirt concerns the pre-Lenten Finnish sliding festival, Laskiainen, held nearby in Palo, Minnesota. Photo by Phil Nusbaum in 2001. Source: https://digital.library.wisc.edu/1711.dl/BUEYXMW6QPJZN8B