Teejop is a special place.

Hoocąkra have always loved and cared for the Four Lakes area. 

And it has sustained Wąąkšikra since time immemorial.

There are stories and relationships––past and present––everywhere here. 

Oftentimes hidden in plain sight.

The Teejop Community Art Project encourages you to visit some of these places.

Try to approach them in a new way.

Practice sensitivity to land.

Listen.

Feel.

Appreciate the public art shared by the Indigenous artists.

Reflect on the themes and discuss them with your friends, family, and neighbors.

Maybe even create your own art.

The Teejop Community Art Project is an opportunity to learn about Hoocąkra.

But it’s also an invitation to consider our shared responsibilities to this beautiful place: Teejop.

How do we all become good ancestors here?

The Teejop Community Art Project journey began over 10 years ago.

Following a First Nations Cultural Landscape Tour on the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus in June 2016, the Madison Community Foundation wondered if something similar could be done for the entire city. 

After conversations among Teejop-area Ho-Chunk community members, the answer was yes.

What followed was years of discussion, reflection, and consideration of what to share and how to do it mindfully. 

Together, the Teejop Community Art Project committee developed guiding values/learning themes, visited and selected locations throughout Madison, and created intentions––what we hope to contribute to the community. Our goals are to:

  • Allow contemporary Native perspectives and experiences to be encountered and heard

  • Provide representations of the established Ho-Chunk presence in the region

  • Encourage listening to the land and being sensitive to land as a living being

  • Provide awareness regarding changes in the physical landscape and lakeshores

  • Grow and explore personal connections and feelings towards the land and region

  • Create new perspectives for seeing and relating to the land

  • Engage neighborhoods with history of place and continued significance

  • Foster personal connections for a responsibility to the land and community

  • Encourage ongoing reflection that becomes a natural part of our community’s identity

The best way to meaningfully share eventually became clear: public art.

In 2025, the Madison Arts Commission released a call for artists to explore the past––and present––relationship of Hoocąk people to the Four Lakes region. The amazing artists selected will share their work with you beginning August 1, 2026. 

We hope you visit the places, appreciate the art, reflect on the values, and maybe begin to see Teejop in a new way. 

Pinagigi! Thank you!

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

So many people have helped with this project along the way. 

Thanks to all of the Teejop Community History Project Committee members over the years:

Janice Rice

Tara Tindall

Kyla Beard

Josie Lee

Missy Tracy

Chloris Lowe

Omar Poler

Adrienne Thunder

Kendra Greendeer

Chris Jendrisak

Truman Lowe

Karen Martin

Steve Kantrowitz

Nicole Yazzie

Deb Whitehorse

Finn Ryan

Art & Sons

Thank you for guidance on how to do this well:

Bill Quackenbush

Cecil Garvin

This wouldn't have started or been completed without:

Aaron Bird Bear

Tom Linfield

Karin Wolf

Support and funding provided by:

Madison Community Foundation

American Family Insurance

Madison Arts Commission

UW-Madison School of Education and the Office of the Provost

CONTACT US