Gloria Pfeifer of Starbuck (from left), Deb Holmes of Lowry and Rose Meade of Glenwood, Minn., pause to catch up before entering the old one-room Farwell schoolhouse, now an art gallery, in June.
Farwell, Minn. has a population of about 50. It doesn’t have traffic lights or a gas station. But as of this summer, four buildings — most of its remaining downtown — are now open as renovated art and community spaces.
Art workshops, concerts, gallery shows and pop-up art sales, all by local artists, are scheduled every Saturday through September in the new venues, bringing new energy to the community southwest of Alexandria.
“Maybe it’s true, if you build it, they will come,” said Gloria Pfeifer, who organized the artist line-up and has been heavily involved in the renovation of all four buildings.
Pfeifer, of Starbuck, Minn., is quick to point to the many volunteers who have been involved in the project over the past five years.
The newly renovated corner garage in Farwell, Minn., seen here in June, is now open as a venue for art classes, casual concerts and pop-up art sales by local artists.
It began with one building: Farwell Norwegian Lutheran Church, built in 1907. Pfeifer said that when work began, the building was beyond repair.
“Part of the roof was coming down, the tower — it was a mess. So everything had to be redone,” she recalled.
For over 20 years, the church had been empty, except for the bats that had taken up residence in the outhouse. Slowly but surely, the old church was rebuilt and restored. Pfeifer repeated the original stenciling around the ceiling. And at Christmas 2017, when the newly renovated space hosted its first open house, hundreds of people came to see it.
“Everything grew out of that project,” said Ted Irgens, a Minneapolis attorney who bought the failed building and hired Pfeifer to paint.
Artist Gloria Pfeifer recreated the original stenciling along the walls of Farwell Norwegian Lutheran Church, which is now used for concerts and events.
Irgens’ great-grandparents were founding members of the Farwell Church, and he grew up in nearby Alexandria, hearing family stories. Irgens said community outpourings had a reunion vibe and that proved they had something special.
Next came the one-room schoolhouse from 1886. Instead of tearing it down, the city gave it to Irgens, who had it moved to downtown Farwell next to the post office. With Pfeifer at the artistic helm, the building opened as an art gallery in 2018. These were big projects.
“There were definitely times when [it felt like] ‘OK, what are we doing?'” Irgens said. “But the two buildings kind of made sense. They add it all together.”
Then the old corner garage became vacant. Then the creamery. Renovations and repainting continued through the pandemic, and all four buildings are now open, attracting locals and sailors alike to see the changes in this quiet town.
On a Saturday afternoon earlier this summer, Kori Williams of Alexandria found an informal concert in the renovated corner garage. Its large roller doors were open to let in the breeze, and a dozen people had spread out at the tables for a stamping class.
The former garage office now houses a weekly pop-up art sale. Today’s featured artist, Vianne Olson of Farwell, said she sold a few lefse earrings and lutefisk lip balms, but the day was mostly social, as expected.
Visitors crossed the quiet street between the garage corner activities and the watercolor show in the schoolhouse gallery. People called on others they knew and shared memories of the old spaces restored to new life.
Paul Anderson, 88, grew up on a farm near Farwell and remembers the daunting task of coming into town as a child, when Farwell was a stop on the railroad with two grocery stores, a bank and a feed store. He remembers getting milk from the creamery with his parents.
The newly renovated Creamery will soon be serving refreshments in Farwell, Minn., as seen in June. Plastic ripples on the wall, waiting for new patio doors.
The refinished creamery has dark wood floors, cow paintings on the wall and a polished counter that drew “oohs” of appreciation from visitors. Pfeifer has worked hard to preserve the original design and feel of the buildings, and she said hearing people’s stories has been one of the joys of this yearlong project.
“Something wonderful has happened here,” said Deb Holmes, who drove in from Lowry, about three miles down Highway 55. She has volunteered as a gardener, planting the flowers that run between the buildings.
“This is life in rural America,” Holmes said. “We’re all going to sink or swim together. I mean, we’ve got to work together; we’ve got to support each other in our little communities, because otherwise — Farwell would be long gone. And I think everybody had written off Farwell , until this started, and now the possibilities are endless.”
There’s no place in town to buy food right now, and the art crowds on a regular Saturday aren’t big enough to entice a food truck. Shipping delays have slowed the finishing touches on the creamery, but eventually it will have a commercial kitchen to make and sell refreshments. In the meantime, Pfeifer has brought various snacks and water and put them out for people to grab.
Pfeifer said she knows it’s a commitment for an artist to put on a show in a new, small venue. She was amazed that every single artist she has invited to perform or show works has said yes. She said she thinks the small size could be appealing to some new artists, and believed that “maybe big is overrated.”
“Maybe here, being so rural, there’s a need,” she said.
As for next steps, the Irgens said they are in the process of creating a nonprofit organization, the Farwell Community Arts Association, to keep doing what they are doing now: building community through the arts.
