By Brianne Sanchez for Arts Midwest.
Broadcast version by Mark Moran for Iowa News Service reporting for the Arts Midwest-Public News Service Collaboration

At the close of his whirlwind 2024, Caleb “The Negro Artist” Rainey paused to reflect. The Iowa City-based poet likened a year filled with career-validating recognition to ‘someone turning a spotlight on’ to illuminate his creative and community work. 

“It’s like that moment in a play where everyone else freezes, and you get to step forward,” Rainey says. No single project catapulted his career. “A whole lot of people hit the lights at the same time for me. You prepare for something for so long, and then when it happens, it’s exciting and overwhelming.”

Over the past 12 months, many of Rainey’s wildest dreams have come true. He shared the stage with his hero, headliner Rudy Francisco, at the Mic Check Poetry Fest. (Grant funding from Arts Midwest helped support that event, which Rainey co-produces.) He launched ‘Looking Back at Black Iowans,’ a pioneering workshop series that engaged hundreds of high school students by bridging poetry and the state’s diverse cultural heritage. He created a new format for open-mic programming and expanded emerging artist mentorship. A documentary film about Rainey’s ascent as a spoken word poet and teacher premiered at Iowa’s Pearson Lakes Art Center and in Los Angeles. 

In November, Rainey received an Iowa Author Award for poetry from the Des Moines Public Library Foundation.

“I’m always telling young people, if you have a poem that you’re ready with, then that opportunity will show up,” says Rainey, who facilitates IC Speaks workshops in Iowa City high schools. “Always stay ready so you don’t have to get ready.”

That attitude led to performance opportunities at events like the Okoboji Writers’ and Songwriters’ Retreat, which amplified his exposure and expanded his network. His infectious enthusiasm also caught the attention of collaborator Lisa Roberts, nonprofit founder of Iowa City Poetry. She witnessed Rainey remain undaunted by early-career rejections.

“I’ve learned a lot from [Caleb’s] ideas that, if you don’t see what you need, then make it happen,” Roberts says. “Don’t fret too long about not being invited into the club. Make your own club. That’s what he’s done. Then, he’s invited everyone else in.” 

Committing to His Creative Practice 

Now, Rainey is asking himself what comes after attaining so many of his dreams. He recognizes he still has so much to learn as a poet, performer, and youth facilitator. 

At the beginning of 2024, Rainey chose to focus on the word ‘discipline’ and explore how he could be more attentive to his creative practice. 2025 will be about staying “centered.”

Conducting his monthly ‘poetry potluck’ prompt on Instagram with fellow Iowa poet Kelsey Bigelow is one way Rainey ensures he remains consistently engaged with his craft and in touch with a community that inspires him. On the first Monday of every month, followers submit words he incorporates into a completed poem that he shares the first Friday.

“The biggest thing that I had to learn when it came to the discipline of my writing process is to be dedicated to answering the phone when inspiration calls,” Rainey says. 


Brianne Sanchez wrote this story for Arts Midwest.


get more stories like this via email

Supporters of the arts are gathering Wednesday in Sacramento for Arts Advocacy Day in order to lobby lawmakers on a range of issues.

Educators are drawing attention to problems with the implementation of Proposition 28, which was supposed to help schools hire more art teachers.

Abe Flores, deputy director of policy and programs for the nonprofit Create CA, said some districts are doing something of a "bait and switch."

"Some schools are using the new Prop 28 funding to replace their existing investments in arts education," Flores pointed out. "Their students are not seeing a net increase in their arts teachers or arts programming."

The Los Angeles Unified School District is currently being sued over the issue by local parents and by the author of Proposition 28. Create CA also wants the state to designate the visual and performing arts as a qualified shortage area, so people studying to become an arts education teachers have access to more financial aid. They'd like to see lawmakers pass Assembly Bill 1128, which supports grants for student teachers.

Julie Baker, CEO of the advocacy group California for the Arts, said they will be asking lawmakers to restore funding to a number of different programs which have been zeroed out in the past few years.

"California is number one in the United States for arts jobs," Baker noted. "But we're actually 35th in the United States in per capita funding to our state arts agency, which is the California Arts Council."

California for the Arts is also promoting a bill to make it easier for cities to hire muralists by removing a requirement they be licensed painting contractors.

By Frankie (Amy) Felegy for Arts Midwest.
Broadcast version by Mark Moran for Iowa News Service reporting for the Arts Midwest-Public News Service Collaboration

Chuy Renteria started dancing-specifically breaking-at the age of 14. A magazine editor and writer these days, Renteria still uses breaking to express his identity-and defiance, rebellion, and frustration with the other dancers.

"We're in conversation. We're having the equivalent of a heated argument on the dance floor," he says. The improvisational street dance is rooted in African American and Latino culture. It originated in New York City in 1980s, alongside a growing hip-hop scene.

Renteria dances to engage with the labels pasted onto him, both accurate and biased.

"When people see me walking down the street, they can't help but think A, B, C, right? So when I go to sleep and I wake up, I can't take that away," he says.

'This is Me'

Renteria grew up in West Liberty, Iowa, in the 80s and 90s-a time and place that has shaped who he is and where his art leads him.

The city is less than two square miles in size; inside is a historically majority Hispanic population.

"Growing up in West Liberty, I felt too Mexican for the white people and too white for the Mexican people. And that was always this constant [existence] between those spaces," Renteria says.

As young as nine years old, the first-generation Mexican-American remembers racial slurs being flung at him. People would say they hated him.

"And when I found dance, it transcended all of that," he says. "It's like, this is me."

Finding Meaning

Renteria shares: "Just by nature of my own identity, in the context of the social constructs around us, me existing becomes this political conversation point to folks."

But that politicization isn't as direct a translation in dance as, say, artforms that use words or visuals. The dialogue is more subtle.

"Dance and movement, and that sort of expression, is just as valid, and it's just as politically cognizant of the world. It just does it in this kind of abstraction. It doesn't have to be hitting you over the head," he says.

Renteria's 2021 memoir We Heard It When We Were Young, along with his more recent blog posts in Of Spanglish and Maximalism, grapple with his past, the now, and beyond.

What is identity? How does intergenerational trauma and racism impact who we are? The list goes on: "Did I have a good childhood? Am I a good person because-or in spite of-my upbringing? ... Is my town a good town? The town that I grew up in, the town as of now, is it a good place?" Renteria asks.

"I'm really interested in the questions that I don't know the answer to."


Frankie (Amy) Felegy wrote this story for Arts Midwest.


get more stories like this via email

By Anya Slepyan for The Daily Yonder.
Broadcast version by Mike Moen for Minnesota News Connection for the Public News Service/Daily Yonder Collaboration

As the 2024 election approached, news channels and commentators once again revived a familiar narrative: the urban-rural divide. 

But Laura Zabel, executive director of Minnesota-based arts non-profit Springboard for the Arts, was more interested in urban-rural solidarity. 

“Going into an election year, we knew that there was going to be a lot of narrative that focused on ways we might be different, or ways that people assume we’re different,” Zabel said. “And we wanted to do something to not only counter that narrative, but to help people build real relationships and real solidarity across urban and rural places.” 

Stoking resentment between urban and rural communities serves to divide largely working-class constituencies that could gain more political power if they work together, Zabel said. Emphasizing what these communities have in common, across different geographies and demographics, can help counter that divide. But it’s not easy to overcome a narrative that is so deeply ingrained that many Americans take it for granted.

So Springboard for the Arts launched a new initiative, consisting of over 35 artists working on projects across Minnesota, Michigan, Kentucky, and Colorado that connect urban and rural communities. The installations include phone booths that connect communities in rural Northfield, Minnesota and Minneapolis, a culinary project that celebrates the fusion of a chef’s Southeast Asian roots and rural midwestern upbringing, and a Kentucky poetry slam honoring the renowned theorist and professor bell hooks.

The results, Zabel said, demonstrate “all of the different ways that we’re connected, and all of the different creative ways that we might reach out to one another and build that kind of understanding.” 

Using art projects to foster connection and understanding is effective, according to Zabel, because they leave room for nuance and complexity that is often flattened by media narratives. Creative projects can also help people approach new ideas with a more open mind, she said. 

“Art has a tremendous ability to build shared experience in ways that takes people outside of their comfort zone, or makes people more open to thinking of things in a different way,” Zabel said.

A project installed in two Minnesota elementary schools demonstrates the principles behind the projects. Artist David Hamlow worked with 2nd and 3rd graders in rural St. James and urban Minneapolis to design wall sculptures made of recycled materials. Each student was also given a yearbook photo of a participating student from the other school, and asked to incorporate that picture into the sculpture. The resulting walls of faces serve a purpose similar to pen pals, according to Zabel.

The youth-focused project also hopes to reach urban and rural children before they’ve internalized the harmful stereotypes these communities can apply to one another. 

Project installations by the initial class of 35 artists are ongoing, but Zabel hopes to expand the initiative further in coming years.

“I think that if we are able to build greater understanding and connection, and help people see a more complete picture of what it looks like to live in different contexts, we end up finding out that there is a lot of shared interest and shared hope for our future and our children,” Zabel said.


Anya Slepyan wrote this article for The Daily Yonder.


get more stories like this via email