TOfte Lake Center Electronic Press Kit

Our Story

It all begins with an idea. Maybe you want to launch a business. Maybe you want to turn a hobby into something more. Or maybe you have a creative project to share with the world. Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.

Fast Facts

Located in Ely, MN
16 week residency season
Residencies for individual artists & arts organizations
Subsidized residencies for BIPOC artists, parent artists, and BIPOC arts educators
Programming for all career stages and artistic disciplines
Approximately 100 artists in residence every season
60% of artists in residence from Minnesota

In the words of our artists

“It was close to the best personal experience I’ve ever had, and very likely the best art experience.”
- Madison Moore, Writer

“Grateful beyond measure for this preciously restful stretch of time - so luxurious to have time to move through some depths and heights, sink into bliss, come out, go back in, weave through it all…”
- Sarina Partridge, Musician, Composer & Songleader

“As an artist still figuring so many things out about my practice, the residency gave me a confidence boost in my abilities as an artist and a glimpse at a different way of living as an artist.”
– Vincent DeZutti, Visual Artist

Our Story

Tofte Lake Center was established in 2008 by Liz Engelman. Nestled on a pristine lake near the Boundary Waters of Minnesota, TLC is often lovingly referred to as Norm's Fish Camp in honor of the resort’s previous owner, Norm Saari, who built and operated a fishing resort on Tofte Lake for over four decades.

Liz founded TLC to create an artistic home for artists of all career stages and disciplines from the belief that supporting individual creative potential and self-expression has a direct and essential impact on the world at large. TLC offers space to slow down, reflect, connect, and respond, all while being surrounded by a nurturing natural environment and a creative community of fellow artists.

Since 2017, TLC has advanced efforts to provide access to residencies to underserved populations who, due to perceptual and existing access barriers, rarely benefit from the opportunities a creative retreat like Tofte Lake Center offers. This has resulted in dedicated residency programs for BIPOC artists, BIPOC arts educators, and parent artists from Minnesota.

While TLC has evolved throughout the years, the core of the place and the program has remained true to Liz’s original vision: to support artists as they deepen their creative potential and center their art in an inspirational and healing natural environment.

Our Purpose

Tofte Lake Center supports artists in taking time and making space to discover, uncover, or rediscover their creative passions and vision, foster joy, be inspired by beauty, live creatively, be in nature, and encourage artistic expression and community.

Our mission is to support artists by providing a nurturing experience rooted in nature where artists of all disciplines and backgrounds feel safe to take a break from the "work" of art to play, feel inspired, and be rejuvenated. We envision an interconnected world in harmony with nature, where artists are supported and celebrated and where taking a break is recognized as integral to the creative process.

TLC provides the time and place to find that ocean in the grain of sand, to let the call of the loons be a call to the creative impulse. It is no accident that writers have traditionally retreated to cabins by the sea to write their masterpieces; there’s a reason the water beckons them.

What you’ll find at TLC is that all the elements of nature exert an influence on us and our work, if only we let them: the sun, the water, the clarity of the light and heat, the calming of the cool clear lake, the turbulent energy of a summer storm…the work begins.

Words from Our Founder & Executive Director, Liz Engelman

Stories. From a very early age, stories fed me, and the theater seat was my high chair from which I ate. It is thus no surprise that the theater became my profession, and storytelling my native language. My career in theater began as a dramaturg, working with playwrights to develop their own stories for the stage and their communities, which led to my working in non-profit theatres across the country. Having served on the boards of non-profit service organizations such as Literary Managers and Dramaturgs of the Americas (LMDA), the National New Play Network (NNPN), and the National Theatre Conference (NTC), I continue to witness profound proof of the value that stories play in our lives - and how much it matters who gets to tell them. I’ve also learned the importance of leadership in our field, in connecting the work of the arts and the artists who create the work to the society and culture in which we live.

Founding Tofte Lake Center allowed me to become the protagonist in my own story, and to live out a long-held dream of creating a place where time, attention, and support are given to the process of creative discovery that later leads to impactful results. I’ve never felt as fulfilled as I do now when I experience TLC alive with the energy that accompanies the thrill of the work, knowing how grateful those present are for this place, this space, and this opportunity.

“Our artistic homes are right there in our own back yards. They’re in our own soil, in our souls. Sometimes we have to go somewhere outside of ourselves to realize this. We have to have the dream, take the journey, and then wake to discover it’s right in there inside.
”

— TLC Founder Liz Engelman