Group leads discussion on ‘Blackness and Belonging’ in Iowa City

IOWA CITY — Around 15 members of the Iowa City community gathered Thursday night for an open discussion about the culture of public art and how it serves the Black community.

The event, “Blackness and Belonging,” was led by Public Space One’s Oracles of Iowa City team members and supported by the Iowa Arts Council and the National Endowment for the Humanities: Exploring the Human Endeavor.

The community conversations are being held after the Oracles of Iowa City artists completed a series of murals on the south side of the Old Capitol parking ramp, talking about community participation.

Oracles of Iowa City is a mural project conceived by the Center for Afrofuturist Studies at Public Space One and funded by University of Iowa Office of the Vice President of Research and the City of Iowa City. The mural project was in partnership with Antoine Williams and Donté K. Hayes, two Black artists who wanted to conceptualize a visual call out about Black people’s experiences living in Iowa City.

Uche Anomnachi, a fellow of the Public Space One Center for African Studies, led Thursday’s discussion and wanted to focus on making connections and engagements with the Black community about how people feel about the future of public art.

Loyce Arthur, a University of Iowa associate professor and member of the Iowa City Public Art Advisory Committee, said the committee decided to have a mural in downtown Iowa City because of the public art that was coming out of the George Floyd murder and protests around the country.

Arthur worked with Public Space One before the mural and thought they would be a “perfect partner” because of their activist program.

After the opening ceremony and kickoff event in last September, Anomnachi said the Oracles of Iowa City team started the conversations for community feedback and for people to feel like they’re part of the process.

The previous conversation, Anomnachi said, was about discussing community feedback about the impact of the murals and how they would’ve utilized the space.

“Our last conversation posed the question to attendees, what would you have done with the space? — to see if people were satisfied with the way that these murals use downtown and the dimensions of the parking ramp,“ Anomnachi said. ”We gave people cards that have similar dimensions and ask them to show us in a brief workshop … and discussed how we use space.”

Arthur hopes that these conversations help extend the Oracles of Iowa City’s mission and includes a variety of members in the community.

“One of the things that we wanted to do as a team was make sure that we follow up so that the mural is not enough just to keep things functioning," Arthur said. ”And so whatever we can do to keep these conversations going, and finding ways to include different people, what they're saying about things is also what's going on this series of talks.”