Connecting Art and Mental Wellness at SPREE: Shopping for Change
October 30, 2025
Natalja Yatsuka, a local artist who will be at this year's Women United SPREE: Shopping for Change, shares how art can inspire and help mental wellness.
For years, Saint Kate – The Arts Hotel has welcomed the annual Women United SPREE: Shopping for Change event, where inspiring women come together to promote local women-owned businesses, raise funds, and share in the spirit of the holiday season. Hosted by United Way’s Women United donor network, the event supports the United Way Key Initiative, Teen Mental Wellness: Empowering Minds. This year, in addition to the vibrant vendors, music, and food, guests will experience something truly special: a live painting by artist Natalja Yatsuka.
Natalja came to Milwaukee from Latvia over 20 years ago and started her career here as a hairdresser, putting her pursuit of art on hold. When she began offering makeovers for women undergoing cancer treatment, she saw firsthand how creativity, compassion, and self-expression could rebuild confidence and restore hope.
“Every woman has a story,” Natalja said. “I realized how deeply mental health affects us all. We carry so much, often in silence.”
Her love for empowering women expands into helping children who are navigating illnesses in hospitals. Her large, interactive chessboard art fuels children’s imaginations and creativity, both of which have the ability to support healthy mental development through hands-on and collaborative expression.
“When you play, you think, you strategize, you dream,” she explained. “It takes you out of your worries for a moment and into a space of healing. Every move on the board can be a move toward strength, recovery, and connection.”
Natalja knows that adolescent changes — physical, hormonal, and emotional — already challenge high school students. She also intends her art to help ease societal expectations, particularly for young women, by encouraging the next generation to practice critical thinking skills. She looks to donote her art to children's hospitals or similar facilities to support their mental health during an already stressful period in their life.
“One of the chessboards I made was with 66 kids and took nine months," Natalja said of a piece she is looking for a hospital to gift it to. "Art gives us the chance to lift each other up.”
That belief inspired Natalja to bring her art to this year’s SPREE event. When she learned that the event was seeking an artist and that the funds raised would support high school students in learning how to prioritize and advocate for their mental well-being, she was eager to be a part of it. It’s Natalja’s passions for art, empowering women, and supporting youth mental health that seamlessly blend into Women United’s driving force behind SPREE.
“Not only am I supporting a nonprofit with my art, I’m supporting children. And I hope guests at the event will see this message in my art, and will want to help kids through it, too.”
Art has the power to unite, and Natalja’s work highlights the beauty of perseverance and the strength of community. United is the Way we inspire young minds to do great things. Sometimes, it’s through one brushstroke or, in this case, one chess piece at a time.
Don’t miss your chance to meet Natalja during 2025's SPREE: Shopping for Change on November 14 and bid on her live art piece during the auction. Registration closes soon.
Top: Natalja Yatsuka with her art at Riga 1st Hospital, Latvia, 2020; Top/Mid Right: Natalja Yatsuka; Mid Left: piece that 66 children helped create; Bottom/Mid Right: Natalja with one piece that will be available at SPREE; Bottom Left: Speech-Language Hearing Clinic, Illinois, 2021; Bottom Right: Children and Youth Center of Riga Municipality, Latvia, 2023.
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