To honor the legacy of Edith Renfrow Smith, the first Black woman to graduate from Grinnell College and a longstanding member of the Grinnell community, the Grinnell Area Arts Council (GAAC) has commissioned the installation of nine wheat paste murals around Grinnell. The project is funded by a grant from the Iowa Arts Council and is supported by Drake Community Library and Grinnell College.
The project consists of nine planned murals, though the number may increase. Pictures include Renfrow Smith as a child and as a new graduate of Grinnell College, both of which will be pasted on the side of the Community Arts building. A larger mural of Renfrow Smith and her sister will also grace the side of First Interstate bank.
“We’ll be putting up nine, officially. We may have a few more,” Isaac Campbell, the lead artist behind the project, said. “Projects like these breathe, so as we’re working, more people can see what we’re doing and get excited. We’ve got some backup ideas, just in case.”
Campbell studied video production at University of Northern Iowa before turning to physical art, specifically wheat pasting, in 2017. His process begins by compiling and editing photos, then printing, cutting and pasting the paper murals onto designated surfaces with the help of community members.
“Wheat pasting is a democratic form of art where you don’t have to be an artist to get involved,” Campbell said. “So we’ve been involving a lot of people.”
Working with GAAC Operations Director Monica St. Angelo and Monique McLay Shore, author of “No One Is Better Than You,” Campbell engaged with the community of Grinnell beyond the installation. Campbell taught classes at the Grinnell-Newburg High School on wheat pasting, and spoke about his work to Professor Mirzam Perez’s class SPN 320: Cultures of the Spanish-Speaking World.
The photos for the project were sourced from an archive of Poweshiek County history curated by Shore, a subset of which has been dedicated to documenting Renfrow’s early life in Grinnell.
The wheat paste murals feature photos from 1890 to 1950, during which time Renfrow’s family lived in Grinnell, and feature additional aspects of community history, including a photograph of the 1932 Grinnell-Newburg High School football team, which will be displayed on the side of the Brown’s Shoe Fit Co. The purpose of the murals is to honor the community’s rich history.
“I think the entire Renfrow revelation of the last few years has been really elevating in the memory of this community, that there has been a significant Black presence in Grinnell for over 100 years,” Shore said.
“So this is a really public way for people in Grinnell to see these photos of their history,” St. Angelo said. “They don’t need to go to a museum, they don’t have to go to the library or they don’t have to have digital access. They can just be walking down the street or driving or whatever, and maybe pause and take in a little bit of Grinnell history.”
Though the wheat paste murals are only temporary, lasting from six months to two years, the goal is to eventually inspire more permanent community art.
“At some point they’re going to come down, right, they’ll wash away,” Campbell said. “And I hope that what’s happened in a lot of places can happen here, which is it promotes the conversation about investing in more art.”
To learn more about the murals visit http://www.grinnellarts.org/connections-murals.
