Artists

Bruce Tapola

b. 1956 (Ohio); lives in St. Paul, MN

Bruce Tapola. Campers, 2025. Oil on canvas, in artist's frame. 16 x 20 in.

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Bruce Tapola. Campers, 2025. Oil on canvas, in artist's frame. 16 x 20 in.

Repurposing classic American tropes – cowboys, pin-up girls, religious tracts, Western vistas – Bruce Tapola’s paintings, drawings and sculptures extract humor, vulgarity and empathy from the country’s foundational hypocrisies. Simultaneously defiant, amusing and downtrodden, they embody the valiant folly of pushing back against the daily humiliations meted out by rigged social and political systems.

Bruce Tapola was born and raised in Ohio. He received his BFA from the University of Utah in Salt Lake City and his MFA from Montana State University in Bozeman, MT. He has exhibited nationally and internationally and has been the recipient of several awards including the McKnight Foundation Artist Fellowship. Tapola is an active member in several artist collaboratives including Paintallica, Free Art School and the Northern Forrest Brotherhood. He is the director and founding member of the Federation of Outlaw Creatives United (FOC-U). He currently teaches painting and drawing at St. Cloud State University and lives in St. Paul, MN.

Exhibitions

Kooks

Group Exhibition

Opening Reception

Kooks

7/10, 6:30–8:30PM