More than 500 feet of painted animals now line Mounds Boulevard on St. Paul’s East Side, in “The Procession of St. Paul.” The mural points toward Wakaŋ Tipi, a 27-acre site formerly known as the Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary, and brings the neighborhood’s present-day communities into a landscape with centuries of Dakota history.
Dakota artist Bobby Wilson made the mural with local artists and community members, working under the direction of Wakaŋ Tipi Awaŋyaŋkapi, the Dakota-led nonprofit that oversees Wakaŋ Tipi and Wic̣aḣapi, as MPR News reported. Wic̣aḣapi is a Dakota burial site on a bluff at Mounds Park overlooking Wakaŋ Tipi and the Mississippi River. The nonprofit began work on the mural four years before publication, with support from the city of St. Paul and funding from Public Art St. Paul and the Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, according to MPR.
Guiding Drivers Off the Interstate and Into Sacred Ground
Maggie Lorenz, Wakaŋ Tipi Awaŋyaŋkapi’s executive director, said the mural is intended to help people arriving from Interstate 94 recognize the cultural significance of the area. Lorenz, a Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa citizen and Dakota descendant, also described the sacred site as welcoming to people from different backgrounds, MPR News reported.
That sense of welcome extends to Wakaŋ Tipi itself, which Wakaŋ Tipi Awaŋyaŋkapi describes as a sacred cave site, with Dakota burial mounds running above it along the bluff at Wic̣aḣapi, according to the nonprofit's own account. The organization says Wic̣aḣapi holds deep significance not only to the Dakota but also to the Ho-Chunk and Ioway nations, as described on its website.
An Artist Returns to the Neighborhood That Raised Him
Wilson, a citizen of the Sisseton Wahpeton Dakota in North Dakota, grew up on St. Paul’s East Side and now lives in Arizona. He is also known for writing and producing the television series Reservation Dogs, Rutherford Falls and Echo. MPR reported that Wilson wanted the mural to reflect the neighborhood’s varied communities, including Hmong refugees, Black people and Somali people.
The mural uses animal characters to evoke different cultural connections, including an elephant, a bison and a beaver. Among the figures are a Hmong elephant working at SuperAmerica and a buffalo in a Metro Transit uniform. Wilson said he also wanted people from the neighborhood represented in roles that reflect everyday East Side life, MPR reported.
Walking the Same Path Toward the Burial Mounds
Wilson has described the procession as a series of generations moving across the same land toward his ancestral burial mounds at Mounds Park. That idea gives the animals and community figures a shared destination in the mural’s southward movement, according to MPR.
Efforts to reclaim and protect Wakaŋ Tipi began decades ago. According to the nonprofit, East Side and Lowertown community activists joined in 1997 to restore the site and formed what became Wakaŋ Tipi Awaŋyaŋkapi. The organization says it later led an eight-year effort that raised more than $10 million to reclaim the sacred site. Since 2018, it has worked with a project advisory team on a Cultural Landscape Study and Messaging Plan; an Immediate Acknowledgement Plan with videos, signage and pavilion messaging was implemented in 2021.
What the land record documents
The nonprofit’s account records a 2002 land purchase by Wakaŋ Tipi Awaŋyaŋkapi, the Trust for Public Land, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources and the National Park Service, followed by the conveyance of the land to the City of Saint Paul, according to Wakaŋ Tipi Awaŋyaŋkapi. This documents the land’s transfer into city ownership; the organization’s account also describes Wakaŋ Tipi as a sacred site.
The mural also builds on an earlier version of Wilson's concept. A vinyl rendering of “The Procession of St. Paul” was previously shown at the Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary as part of the Wakpa Triennial, according to MinnPost. At the time, Wakaŋ Tipi Awaŋyaŋkapi was proposing a permanent version of the artwork for a planned interpretive center at the sanctuary, the outlet reported.
That broader push for recognition has also reached City Hall. St. Paul entered an agreement with Wakaŋ Tipi Awaŋyaŋkapi in October 2024 to co-manage the sanctuary, and the city separately announced that the Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary and Indian Mounds Regional Park would be renamed, with the combined parks called Imniżaska, meaning white cliffs, and the individual sites named Waḳaƞ Ṭípi and Wicaḣapi, MPR News has reported.
