In the Twin Cities art scene this weekend, artists turn to the body, the gallery and the page to tell stories of survival and belonging. At Red Eye Theater, five performers present unfinished works that move through Black lineage, queer visibility, disability and the cyclical nature of time. At All My Relations Arts, 15 Indigenous artists turn ancestral stories into contemporary art. And in Burnsville, more than 30 local Somali writers and publishers gather for an afternoon of storytelling, music and dance.

Black queer artist time travels through grief

In Red Eye Theater’s “New Works 4 Weeks Festival,” five artists share their “Works-in-Progress,” inviting audiences into the raw, evolving process of performance-making. Among the experimental performances this year is Twin Cities-based artist and movement therapist Bri Blakey’s “remembering future mornings — again and again.”

Blakey’s work blends dance, poetry and Black quilting traditions to explore grief — both personal and political.

“How do you get up every day and begin again?” she said. “I keep coming back to this idea that what we’re experiencing now has happened before.”

For Blakey, history isn’t linear but cyclical — a pattern she finds “informative and activating.”

Over the course of several months, the five “Works-in-Progress” artists — Blakey, Snem DeSellier, D. Hunter, Jess Kiel-Wornson and Taylor West — met regularly to share works in development and offer feedback — a process Blakey described as “fruitful” community-building.

Blakey sees the festival as a space that invites both artists and audiences to arrive as they are. In a culture that often values urgency and resolution, her work encourages audiences to pause, reflect and sit with what remains unfinished.

“Being Black and queer has called on me to think creatively about how to move forward and how to live life even when it grates up against people,” she said. “These aren’t things I’m intentionally looking into, but they’re part of my own fabric.”

Indigenous artists explore origins of the world

All My Relations Arts and the Native American Community Development Institute present “Creation.Story,” a traveling exhibit rooted in the oral traditions of the Očhéthi Šakówiŋ — the Lakota, Dakota and Nakota people. The exhibit brings to life traditional stories about the origins of time and the formation of the world.

Co-curated by Lakota artist Keith BraveHeart and David Meyer of the Akta Lakota Museum and Cultural Center, “Creation.Story” features the work of 15 contemporary Indigenous artists honoring ancestral knowledge and spiritual connections. Highlights include Marlena Myles’ depiction of Haŋwí, the Dakota Spirit of the Moon and James Star Comes Out’sbuffalo sculpture made from buffalo hair, bells, beads and feathers, paired with a muslin-draped figure evoking the Lakota sun spirit, Wí.