Message from Bruce Karstadt, ASI President & CEO

On a sunny August Saturday, I arrived at the Creative Activities Building of the Minnesota State Fair to enter my single loaf of Swedish rye bread for judging in the ethnic baking division. The line was rather long. Some people, like me, were entering only one baked item. Others were pulling little wagons filled with cookies, cakes, and pies. This was my second year in the competition and while I’ve yet to win a ribbon, I did get a rating (90 out of 100 points) that qualified my bread to be exhibited in the display case along with hundreds of other baked goods. It’s been quite an experience.

You may ask why I’m doing this, and for me, it’s quite simple. This is a way to honor my family’s traditions (not to mention that I really love rye bread). The dark bread flavored with molasses and anise that I bake is one that several generations in my family have prepared, especially at year-end during the Christmas season. Each of us, I suspect, has particular foods which are a part of our family history and cultural identity. For me, it’s that rye bread which is essential.

For 33 years now, I’ve been inspired by the joyous spirit of families and friends for whom a visit to ASI is an essential part of their holiday seasons. For some, the exhibitions in the Turnblad Mansion which reflect different Nordic and community holiday traditions are a priority. For others, it might be stocking up with an ample supply of holiday needs from our museum shop or our annual craft fair, Julmarknad. And there are many who savor the flavors and aromas of our annual lutfisk dinner or enjoy a reunion with family over a finely crafted mid-day meal at our FIKA Café. Many people will again be joining us for a seasonal baking or craft workshop to inspire their own home preparations for the holidays. We continue to honor a tradition of ASI’s Christmas season dating to the

1940s with a concert that celebrates the legacy of Sankta Lucia. And we look forward to hosting again a more recent tradition, a holiday open house when we especially welcome our neighbors and friends in the West Phillips Neighborhood to our campus.

Our aim is to provide a milieu and a set of experiences that will allow people to come to our campus with families and friends to sustain and give life to old traditions and to build new ones. In the familiar words of Thomas Merton, which I’m sure I’ve used before, “Tradition, which is always old, is at the same time ever new because it is always reviving – born again in each new generation, to be lived and applied in a new and particular way.”

All that we do is made possible only by your contributions, which support the work of our talented and creative staff in concert with our dedicated volunteers and Board leadership. My work over these years has been lightened considerably by the large and ever-widening community surrounding our treasured community asset, The American Swedish Institute.

Your generous and abiding support assures our ability to fulfill our mission “to be a gathering place for all people to explore diverse experiences of migration, identity, belonging, and the environment through arts and culture, informed by enduring links to Sweden.”

Thank you! Tack så hemskt mycket! Mahadsanid! Gracias! Wopila!

Bruce Karstadt, ASI President & CEO