Cultural Connection: Contemporary Rosemaling with Tara Austin (Webinar)

Explore rosemaling as a contemporary art form inspired by the natural world. In this webinar, Tara will share ten original botanical designs based on plants of the boreal ecosystem—including Trout Lily, Rowan Berry, Lady’s Slipper, Blue Flag Iris, Wild Rose, Coral Root, Arrowhead, Pipsissewa, Marsh Marigold, and Maple Leaf—and demonstrate how traditional rosemaling brushstrokes can be reimagined to capture their unique forms and character. Tara will also briefly explore the connection between rosemaling, contemporary botanical art, and the history of plant classification through Carl Linnaeus and his apprentice Anders Dahl, whose name lives on in the dahlia. In 2014, Tara took her first rosemaling class at North House Folk School in Grand Marais, Minnesota. Since then she completed a yearlong Rosemaling Apprenticeship with Vesterheim Gold Medalist Andrea Herkert, focusing on Telemark and Gudbrandsdal styles. She received her MFA in painting from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2017 and now works as a practicing artist and instructor, teaching rosemaling throughout the Upper Midwest. In 2020, she received a Scandinavian Folk Arts and Cultural Traditions Grant from the American Scandinavian Foundation. Tara is the Folk Artist in Residence in spring 2026 at the Center for the Study of Upper Midwestern Cultures at University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her work is inspired by the boreal ecosystem of the Upper Midwest and draws from botanical and natural beauty. Originating in Norway, rosemaling has developed and changed over time and space, and Austin’s work—inspired by Norwegian and Norwegian American rosemaling styles, Swedish folk painting, scenic painting and faux finishing, and reverse painting on glass—has been exhibited in galleries throughout the region. She loves plants, painting, and her home on the North Shore of Lake Superior.