Heather Friedli is best known for her contemporary impressionist oil paintings and snow sculptures, depicting her family heritage and the land in which she lives. Bold brush strokes and brilliant colors light up scenes of cloudscapes, water, and native flora. Many pieces are created in the context of her wilderness adventures; by directly creating large scale snow sculptures or bringing her paints outdoors to create work that shares with the viewer her experience of immersion in the landscape. Within these kinesthetic and contextual works, Heather explores the spiritual world through the lens of culture and lived experience of place. Heather’s work is creative, soulful, bold, and powerful.
Heather’s work is an effort to synthesize her love and experience in the natural world, and wilderness adventure travel. Those experiences, being out in the world seeing the beauty and power of nature are represented in large scale snow sculptures and oil paintings. She creates with a passion for the land, looking around and internalizing the rhythm, movement, beauty and colors- expressing them onto canvas. Working in a large scale is not only an expression of what she sees, but also becomes a physical dance with her art. The movement and rhythms in these works are her own unique dance with the land around her.
Heather is also an activist organizer, and communications strategist whose work lives at the intersection of political action and public art. Emerging with political art as a creative force during the George Floyd uprising, she has since become a key figure in Minnesota’s grassroots movement landscape.
Friedli recently served as Communications Director for Minnesota 50501, where she led messaging and media strategy for large-scale mobilizations. She has played a central role in organizing major actions including Hands Off and No Kings (I & II), helping to shape both their visual identity and public narrative.
Her artistic practice is rooted in collective resistance—most notably through the creation of large-scale political puppets, banners, large scale snow sculpture and participatory art installations that transform protest spaces into sites of shared power and expression. Known for her ability to bring people together through hands-on art-making and action-oriented organizing, Friedli’s work blurs the line between artist and activist.
Her work includes large-scale political puppets depicting figures such as Donald Trump and Elon Musk, as well as new works for No Kings 3, which includes a striking series of oversized handheld puppets that include Rebel Loons, a Whistle Brigade and Cell Phones Recording which say “Trust your eyes, not the lies,” culminating with her centerpiece large-scale puppet of Prince in his iconic Purple Rain outfit which reads “Prince Knew the Revolution would start Here!”
Friedli’s political public art also includes a monumental collaborative snow sculpture of Renee Good in a memorial installation honoring victims of ICE, culminating in a candlelight vigil and program in collaboration with former Minneapolis Poet Laureate Heid E. Erdrich. Heather was also the artist behind the large drop-down banners featured at No Kings 2 and recently at the Harriet Island Bandstand for No Kings 3. During Rage Against the Regime, Friedli expanded into performance, writing, directing, and acting in a satirical play in which Donald Trump is jailed by a cast of unexpected characters, blending political critique with absurdist theater.
An experienced public voice, she has appeared in live and recorded interviews, podcasts, and on-the-ground media coverage, as well as delivering speeches to mass audiences. At the core of her work is a singular mission: to speak truth to power and mobilize communities in defense of democracy.
Heather Friedli was born in Los Angeles, CA in 1982. She received a Bachelor of Fine Art from the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) in 2005. In 2010 Heather Thru-Hiked the Appalachian Trail which upon completion inspired her to continue her work as an artist concentrating on the natural world. She currently is enjoying life in Saint Paul with her husband Ben and sons Orion and Sirius.
heather@friedliarts.com
http://www.friedliarts.com
www.facebook.com/friedliarts
www.instagram.com/friedliarts/