Twin Cities Pride desires to use the visibility and platform we have as an LGBTQIA+ organization to elevate the work and voice of local LGBTQIA+ artists and amplify their exposure in the community. We seek a mutually beneficial partnership with Artists to represent their work and represent Twin Cities Pride to our community and youth showing what is possible when living as your true self and following the passion and artistic expression deep within all of us.
Twin Cities Pride is committed to celebrating and uplifting LGBTQIA+ voices and talents within our community. We are excited to continue to grow our year-long Artist Program designed to empower and showcase LGBTQIA+ artists. This program aims to provide a platform for artists to express themselves, connect with the Pride community, and contribute to the vibrant culture of our annual Pride festival.
Morgan LaCasse
Morgan LaCasse (known as morguedesign online) is a nonbinary artist and storyteller who has explored a wide range of creative illustration projects with gouache paint and digital illustration techniques. Their projects include a Super Mario World-inspired mural that spans all four walls of a game room, a “Peanuts on Parade” documentary that captured the history of the tribute to Charles Schulz and showcased more than 150 statues that are still on display, and a Pedro Pascal-themed art calendar, with twelve intricate paintings of his most well-known characters. Almost sixty calendars were printed, bound by hand, and distributed. Morgan’s work is inspired by the media they interact with, filtered through their lenses of choice, identity, and disability, to combine pop culture with their experiences to create something new and invigorating. As they have shared more of their artwork online, Morgan’s work has expanded to include videos of their art process, exploring how social media is changing the interaction between art and its audience. Where a painting, framed and hung on an otherwise blank wall, used to be the final presentation of artwork, the art process has taken its place.
Mikha "Mikhamik" Dominguez
Mikha Dominguez (aka Mikhamik) is a Queer non-binary Latinx Venezuelan visual artist, photographer, and sculptor based in Minneapolis since 2014. Born in Caracas, Mikha began their career in the Venezuelan national television industry as a Set Designer and Art Director. Mikha’s art has been showcased in significant exhibitions, including Twin Cities Pride in 2022 and 2023, and the 20th anniversary of Strut at the San Francisco AIDS Foundation in summer 2023. They were selected as one of 20 artists for the Art Shanty Projects in 2023 and 2024 and contributed to the PELI department at the Walker Art Center from 2022 to 2024. In spring 2024, Mikha’s work was featured at the MCAD Main Gallery for the MADE at MCAD show and in “Transmenniapolis,” an exhibition at the MCAD Library blending photography, collage, and installation. Additionally, their artwork appears in Volume 4 of Sensitive Content, a magazine that addresses taboo subjects and societal norms. Mikha is actively engaged with the community through Mikhamik House of Arts, a public access installation series on their home facade in South Minneapolis. Exhibitions include Latinidad CLUES 2024, “Latina and Latinx MN: Re/claiming Space in Times of Change” at St. Catherine University, and UNO-OLLAS ArteLatinX at the University of Omaha, Nebraska. They received the Juror Choice Award at Franconia Sculpture Park’s 5 MINUTE FILMS and exhibited in Deconstruction//Abstraction at Rumriver Gallery in Anoka, Minnesota. Currently a student at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design (MCAD), Mikha also teaches the “Work of Art” Workshop at Springboard for the Arts, equipping artists with essential business skills.
Maddie Stumbaugh
Having grown up in rural Minnesota, Maddie Stumbaugh (any pronouns) is an interdisciplinary artist, primarily working with acrylic on canvas, who currently lives and works in Minneapolis, Minnesota. At the core of Maddie’s art practice, their work centers queerness, vulnerability, and an interest in collectively held experiences. The majority of Maddie’s work aims to tell stories—many of which are influenced by their own deep-seated emotions, relationships, and lived experiences. They are interested in exploring how these shared encounters serve as invisible threads, connecting people across different pasts, presents, and futures; While Maddie makes work outlining a wide range of experiences, they place a lot of emphasis on telling stories featuring lesbians and other members within the greater LGBTQ+ community, as they wholeheartedly believe that queer representation in all forms media is incredibly important. There is an alternate, more provocative and transparent version of Maddie that walks through their body of work; Inviting viewers to come along on this walkthrough of their paintings, this version of Maddie explores a painted, dreamy, liminal space which creates room for conversations on gender, personal relationships, sexuality, religion, generational traumas, and overall, their take on what it means to be in this life. Maddie graduated from the University of Minnesota Twin Cities in the spring of 2021 with a Bachelor’s degree in Art, and they currently work full-time as a custom picture framer in addition to their full-time art practice. You can see Maddie’s work featured in a variety of queer zine publications or in various shows hosted by Twin Cities art organization, Otherworldly Arts Collective (OAC).
Dobbs DeCorsey
Dobbs DeCorsey (Miz Diagnosis) sparked his love of art at the ripe age of three. He
would spend his summers creating salt-dough sculptures with his mom and dancing around in costumes designed by his great grandmother, Velta. Dobbs’ first, and most beloved, medium was clay/sculpture. He would use stoneware, earthenware, polymer clay and porcelain to create figurines and functional pottery to express himself. This love of 3-d art lent itself to other mediums such as origami, watercolor, pastels, charcoal, acrylic, and collage. Dobbs also has an extensive background in musical theatre, cello performance, writing, makeup artistry, improv and stand-up comedy. Which has all prepared him for the world of drag and costume design/textile artistry. Dobbs, in the past, has explored themes of ability, mental wellness, queerness, togetherness, absurdity, community, existence, camp, movement, practicality and power. His art is deeply personal, but intentionally visible and loud. Dobbs holds a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Minnesota, and a PhD in Advance Body Movin’. Dobbs’ works and performances have been featured in The Gorman Rare Art Books and Media Collection, The Inez Greenberg Gallery, The Rarig X, First Ave, The Filmore, Fresh Eye Gallery, The Saloon, LUSH Lounge and Theater, The Gay 90s, Roxy’s Cabaret, Pieces, The Chateau Theatre, Playhouse Bar, One Eleven Bar, Barracuda, Platinum, LGBTQ Nation, V Magazine, The Star Tribune, MPR, The US Senate Floor, and his parents’ Christmas Card.
Kevin Zaid Martinez Garrido
Kevin Zaid Martinez, is a multidisciplinary, Minneapolis based painter, teacher, and public muralist. He primarily works with oil paint to document and paint portraits of community leaders and role models. Art has been a passage of healing for him as a survivor of abuse, discrimination, and cancer. He explores trauma theory and how one can turn grievances into “manifestations of warmth.” Zaid’s color palette is warm and fiery, pertaining to the idea of “home” He evokes a colorful and metaphorical fire that survivors obtain in a process of anger, solitude, and a passion for finding happiness in the smallest of objects. Zaid graduated from the Minneapolis College of Art and Design in 2021, with a BFA in Fine Arts, Graphic Design and Teaching. He is an aspiring educator and multilinguist working with students in Minneapolis Public Schools, via the Spanish immersion program. His experience working with people of different backgrounds and in special education allowed him to strive for accessibility. He currently focuses on working with community engagement and offering art classes to students in the MPLS schools district. You can find him creating murals along Northeast, and Central Minneapolis with the help of students or volunteers. He has exhibited at various locations such as the MSP St. Paul, International Airport, The Graves Foundation, Bloomington Center For Arts, and participates in seasonal art fairs.
