George Morrison grew up a member of the Grand Portage Band of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe in a rural fishing village on Lake Superior. The first highway opened from Duluth to the Canadian border at about the same time. As one of 12 children, life was a struggle, but George showed remarkable talent as an artist at an early age. George graduated from Grand Marais High School at the height of the depression. After high school, he went to the Minnesota School of Art, where he earned scholarships, including a Fulbright, which took him to New York City and Paris. His travels introduced him to some of the world's leading painters and sculptors. Their influence led him to become one of the country's leading Abstract Expressionists.
In the mid-1970s, the lure of Lake Superior pulled him back to his homeland, where he finished his career at Red Rock and died in 2000.
This spring, the United States Postal Service will release five of his most famous landscape paintings as a commemorative stamp.
In this episode of the Lake Superior Podcast, Walt and Frida speak with George's only son, Briand Mesaba Morrison, and Anna Deschampe. Anna is Chief of interpretation at Grand Portage National Monument, so along with Briand, they are the perfect pair to tell the story of the life and art of George Morrison.
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