On Tuesday, June 20, 2023, the Lake Region Arts Council (LRAC) Board awarded the $5,000 annual LRAC Fellowship to Lake Region area poet, Athena Kildegaard. Miranda Lape, the LRAC Grants Manager, sat down with Kildegaard to get to know the Fellow for the year.
Miranda Lape (ML): Tell me a bit about yourself.
Athena Kildegaard (AK): I’m sitting right now on the screened-in porch on the house we recently built, on a property that used to be a dairy farm. It’s a 32 acre property, and one of the first things we did out here was contact the Fish and Wildlife Service, and they came out and looked at places on the property that were wetlands, or near to wetlands, and they were able to restore one. It’s like living on a wildlife preserve. We are here on a flyway, the wetlands birds flyway, and the birdlife increased. This is one of the great pleasures of my life, surrounded by interesting stuff that is happening all the time. I grew up in St. Peter, and I would get home from school, and get on my bicycle, and go to the river. I would sit by the river and recover from the school day, write some poetry, and enjoy what was going on around me. That’s a good way to describe me. I aim to be the kind of person who pays attention.
ML: What was the “thing that started it all” when it came to your artistic journey?
AK: I was really lucky to grow up in a household with two parents who were avid readers. They read to us, it was just a part of the daily routine, being read to. Because my dad taught in the English department at Gustavus, we had a lot of writers come through our home. I was surrounded by words and the pleasures of words, and that’s how I started. My mom was a singer, she taught me a lot about song, about opera, about music. One of the things that attracts me to poetry is the musical qualities of poetry.
ML: In addition to writing books of poetry, you have also written lyrics for songs. Does your approach to lyrics differ from your approach to poems for your books?
AK: Kind of! The very most recent piece that I wrote the lyrics for was a commission for a choir at the University of Minnesota Morris. The theme was earth, wind, fire, water. Starting with a theme is not how I normally approach poetry, and I wanted it to be fresh and new, which was setting myself a challenge with the lyrics. I often write out of challenges like that, approaching a new form. So yes, and no! Working within constraints, I find that really challenging and interesting.
ML: I’ve noticed that your work tends to reflect what is happening in the “interesting stuff” in the world around you, as you said. How does this chapter of your life reflect in your current work?
AK: It’s interesting because there are certain themes that I find myself writing about again and again. Right now I’m trying to get a book published with surreal poetry that I started writing during the 2016 campaign. Writing surreal poems was a way to kind of make sense of that time. A lot of the poetry that I’m writing right now has a lot to do with physical change in the body and in the world. We’re facing this down. You open the news and it’s stories of physical change in the world around us. Floods, fires, mudslides, extreme heat: we can no longer ignore the effects of climate change.
ML: As our 2023 Fellow (selected from a highly competitive pool of 7 applicants), how are you feeling?
AK: I’m totally honored and thrilled! To be selected for this fellowship is a real tip of the hat in honor of the work I’ve done, and I’m so grateful for that. It will allow me to get away for an extended residency, and it’s really exciting that this fellowship will allow me to do that. There’s a kind of excitement in thinking about it. The podcast idea I’ve been thinking about for a number of years. People love to hear poetry, and they’re excited to hear it read aloud. I don’t know the first thing about starting a podcast but I’m going to learn!
ML: What would you tell someone else thinking about applying for an LRAC grant?
AK: First of all, you have to know what you want. Second, you have to be able to describe it in a way that anyone reading your grant would know what you want and why you want it. I think a lot of people writing grants are shy about asking for help. But that’s my third piece of advice – talk to Miranda!
ML: Beyond the Fellowship, what do you hope the future has in store for your art?
AK: One thing I really hope for is more collaborations with composers. It has just been so amazing.
Kildegaard will be recognized as the incoming LRAC Fellow at the LRAC annual meeting, taking place Monday, July 31, 2023 at Theatre L’Homme Dieu in Alexandria, Minnesota. Our 2022 Fellow, Chris Walla, will also be recognized for what he has accomplished during his Fellowship year.
Those who wish to attend the meeting may register on the LRAC website at LRAC4.org.
