Started with a Borrowed Studio and an Open Door
Lantern Arts Collective was founded in 2016 by Thea Kowalski and Marcus Bellerose, two Edmonton artists who had grown frustrated watching the arts scene become more credentialed, more expensive, and less accessible to the communities they cared about.
Thea is a printmaker from the North End who got free studio access early in her career. Marcus is a muralist and community organizer who spent years in Edmonton's Indigenous community sector. They started with a simple idea: borrow a space, leave the door open, and see who shows up.
Their first Open Studio ran out of a borrowed church basement on 118 Avenue in February 2016. Fourteen people came the first week. Within three months, they had outgrown the space. By 2018, with support from the Edmonton Arts Council and a growing network of community donors, Lantern Arts moved into its permanent home on 109 Avenue in McCauley, a 3,500 sq ft studio that has stayed open every day since.
Today, Lantern Arts serves 800+ participants a year and has commissioned 45 murals across Edmonton. Thea and Marcus remain active as artistic advisors and occasional facilitators, though day-to-day leadership has grown into a full team of staff, contractors, elders, and community volunteers.
