To Hear, To Belong to a Place: The Concept of Gullat

Banner image: INGRAIN no6, 18"x48" pencil, colored pencil, rubio stain, thread on wood, by Tia Keobounpheng. Photo credit: Pat Barry.

 

I came across the work of artist Tia Keobounpheng for the first time in 2023 on the occasion of the Minnesota Artists Exhibition Program at Mia. Each one of the colorful Nordic-inspired geometric pieces in the exhibit were irresistible, but I knew little back then of their true meaning, of the excruciating self-examination Keobounpheng had hidden in each of the threads. 

Keobounpheng’s relationship to selfhood, history, and the natural world is complex. Her work is not simply a form of cultural storytelling on her Finnish and Sámi heritage: It is a highly personal confrontation of core wounds channeled through labor-intensive, intricate, manual stitches. While the work is trying to reconcile with an absent narrative in her lineage, it is also a beautiful universal example of personal transformation, of the value of learning, unlearning, of digging deeper into selfhood and the meaning behind the natural order of Earth.  

Much of Keobounpheng’s work is embedded in Sámi, which are Indigenous people of Northern Europe, concepts. One of them is "muitit," a North Sámi word that means "to remember." With an embodied approach, Keobounpheng sets out to re-imagine the legacy of her ancestors, turning the work into a way of awakening wisdom. Her two ongoing series, Threads and Who Do You Think You Are—which exhibited at the Armory Show last year—are filled with complex symbolism about identity, family heritage, and humanity.

For her upcoming exhibition at the Weinstein Hammons Gallery, Keobounpheng has centered the work on the concept of “gullat," a word defined by the Sámi as “to hear, to belong to a place.” According to the gallery summary of the exhibition, it “considers listening as an act of belonging and a reciprocal relationship with the land that exists beyond ownership, stressing the interconnectedness between community." With Gullat, Keobounpheng will be presenting her new series, INGRAIN, advancing (and surprising us) with an evolved use of geometry.

INGRAIN no3, 2026, 24"x18" pencil, colored pencil, rubio stain, thread on wood. by Tia Keobounpheng. Photo credit: Pat Barry.

 

INGRAIN is inspired by VUOIŊŊALAŠVUOHTA: An Essay on the Sámi People’s Spiritual Connection to Land, by Sámi literary scholar Harald Gaski, who explores the spiritual relationship of the Sámi people and their natural environment, their reciprocal connection and a collective ability to hear the beating heart inside the Earth. Keobounpheng also participated in a panel with Gaski at the Scandinavia House in New York City in May of 2025. 

Gaski taught Keobounpheng the concepts of Gullat—“to hear”—and Guldalit—“to listen and act accordingly"—which she immediately understood to describe her artistic practice. 

For Keobounpheng, “this ability to hear and to belong to a place is generative, creating rings of connection to community, environment, land, and all that shapes them. As my home, Minneapolis, faces alarming threats to peace, justice, and democracy, our collective ability to hear and belong is increasingly urgent and self-evident. These works serve as my own reminder to place an ear to the earth, to hear its pain, and to listen for the hope for a future we so desperately need.”

INGRAIN no3 (back). Photo credit: Pat Barry.

In INGRAIN no6 Keobounpheng traces the wood grain while stitching, producing a form of geoglyph on the Baltic birch. The wooden panel is rubio stained, marked by pencil and colored pencil, and finally threaded. The result is a color gradient landscape filled with smooth transitions, a captivating overlap of lines and shapes, sinuous and angular. Some works nod to the adaptability of the reindeer eyeball to the extremes of Arctic light extremes, a unique evolutionary adaptation of this species of deer, while others are symbolic of Sámi drums.

Fiber as abstract art is a centuries-spanning, cross-cultural modality. The geometry in Keobounpheng’s work heavily recalls modern abstraction and design, in particular the textiles of German-Jewish designer Anni Albers (1899-1994), through her grid-based approach and unique focus on color and rhythm. The tactility of Keobounpheng’s work even recalls the intricate constructions in Quipu (khipu), the ancient Andean knotting system for keeping records.

But the total effect of the stitched colored circles, curves, and radiating lines in Keobounpheng's pieces is novel, showing a surplus of creativity and innovation that produces a great deal of wonder. ◼︎ 

Gullat, new work by Tia Keobounpheng, opens Thursday, March 26 with a reception attended by the artist from 6 to 8 pm at the Weinstein Hammons Gallery in Minneapolis. See more of Keobounpheng's art.