Art Shhh-anty (silent) Auction

Art Shanty Projects is not great at being silent, but we’re gonna try with this Shhh-anty (Silent) Auction featuring the quirkiest items in town!

We have an array of shantastic goods and services! These arty-weirdo-wackadoo-inspiring-incredible-shantastic items have been generously donated by ASP artists, board members, superfans, sponsors and more.

Since 2004 Art Shanty Projects has created whimsical, weird and joyful winter art experiences for grown-ass adults and kids of all ages. Inspired by pop-up ice fishing villages, artists use the frozen lake as a public platform to create a temporary, interactive community. With few regulations and no building codes – and against intense and unpredictable winter weather conditions – artists have the freedom and challenge to create wild and wonderful work that can’t be experienced anywhere else. Together, with our visitors, we celebrate, champion, and embrace the extreme winter sport of art making. And, to answer everyone’s #1 question: Nope! We do not fish in our shanties. You’d need a license for that!

Art Shanty Projects is (usually, with conditions in our favor*) a four-weekend, winter art program attracting over 27,000 annual visitors of all ages to explore interactive public art in an extreme environment. More than 150 artists are given stipends to use the frozen lake as a public platform to create and present interactive art shanty installations and a rotating schedule of daily performances. Visitors can ride bicycles decorated like butterflies, peer through a huge kaleidoscope, write a love letter to a park, or climb inside a giant bird house.

Mission: Art Shanty Projects intentionally creates an impermanent art village on Minnesota lake ice amid changing climate and environment. With a spirit of embracing challenges through creativity, we support an ecosystem that inspires everyone to create and participate in art, thrive in winter, and build community.

*See our State of the Shantyverse for the impact of this past El Niño x Climate Change mashup winter: https://artshantyprojects.org/program-update-climate-chaos-causes-early-closing/