Muralist Ver Ikeseh is on campus Jan. 5-12 for the second of his two-part residency as Blake’s 2025-26 McGuire Visiting Artist. In October, Ikeseh led a team of Middle School students in creating a new mural in the division’s main corridor. On this visit, he is working with Upper School students on a completely different, but thematically tied, mural for the Carlson Commons. 

To prepare for Ikeseh’s visit, students who participated on the Middle and Upper School mural teams, led by art teachers Bill Colburn and Brooke Vertin, explored murals around the Twin Cities to see examples of public art and generate ideas for their own murals. These students were instrumental in the process, meeting with Ikeseh by Zoom this fall to provide valuable input that Ikeseh incorporated into his final designs. During his October visit, he sketched out the Middle School mural and invited all community members to help paint it. He is doing the same this week at the Upper School. 

The Blake community is invited to a Mural Reveal and Artist Talk at the Upper School (Minneapolis) on Monday, Jan. 12 from 5:30-6:30pm to view the finished mural and hear Ikeseh discuss public art and his creative process. 

An accomplished artist-scholar with extensive experience leading students in public art projects, Ikeseh, who is originally from Nigeria, is currently a Master of Fine Arts candidate at James Madison University in Virginia. The biennial McGuire program was established in 1993 by Dr. Bill and Nadine McGuire to fund residencies with visual artists who collaborate with PK-12 students and faculty, enriching Blake’s visual arts curriculum.