Juneteenth spurs reemergence of projections project in Iowa City

In the summertime, downtown Iowa City is rarely quiet. Community events and festivals bring in crowds to the Ped Mall nearly every weekend, and art projects burst forth at every turn. This year, even industrial fencing surrounding a busy reconstruction project on South Dubuque Street is adorned with colorful artwork.

From June 14 - 19, the Greatest Small City for the Arts has been alive celebrating Juneteenth with an assortment of free events . The multi-day celebration kicked off last Friday with a resource fair, a concert and a fashion show hosted by the Wright House of Fashion . It culminates on June 19, the official Juneteenth holiday.

Last Friday, visitors reclined in lawn chairs or crowded together on concrete planters as models strutted to music in the city’s Pedestrian Mall. Each was dressed as a historical Civil Rights leader or Black activist, embodying the mannerisms of Opal Lee, Malcolm X, Angela Davis and Bob Marley as historical speeches or interviews from each figure echoed in the background.

Not far away, many of those same powerful quotes were just becoming visible in the setting sun, projected high on the rooftops above Washington and Linn Street. The public art project, "Illuminating Excellence: A Civil Rights Exhibition," showcases 29 notable Black civil rights leaders and local Iowa City leaders in an educational display.

Wright House of Fashion founder Andre Wright designed each projection, asking community leaders like Dream City founder Frederick Newell and Johnson County Supervisor Royceann Porter to submit quotes that inspired them.

“My goal was to try to highlight some folks in the community that do social justice, but then also our business people and also just leaders in the community, so kind of a mixture of all three, and then coupling their images with specific quotes that they picked out,” Wright said.

The project marks the return of Iowa City’s public art projections , which cast works of art and literature onto area rooftops. Due to outdated software, the projections went into a two-year hiatus, but Iowa City Nighttime Mayor Joe Reilly says he hopes new updates and Wright’s project will bring new energy and spur proposals from other area artists.

“We want to find things that are kind of a reflection of us as an Iowa City community, so people here, visitors here — the things that make Iowa City, Iowa City,” Reilly said.

The project, which began in 2018, has featured several projections in the past, including a collaboration with artist b. Robert Moore , a partnership with Iowa City’s One Book Two Book festival, and a project that featured prose from residents of the International Writers Program.

But Reilly says this year, especially since the updated software allows for moving animations, like gifs, he hopes to project more visual art, like graphic design and photography.

“We’re trying to move beyond words,” he said. “Words will always still be important to us here in a [UNESCO] City of Literature, but we want to make it dynamic and engaging in the public's interests.”

Wright’s projections will be on display throughout the month of June.

“I think it's cool that they used this as an opportunity to kick [the project] off,” Wright said. “Hopefully it gets the proper eyes on it so more people can do the same type of thing with the projector project.”

Projections turn on at 7 p.m. each night, but aren’t completely visible until the sun goes down. They can be seen on the west wall of 129 E. Washington St. on the Jefferson Building, the north wall of 201 E. Washington St. on the Park at 201 Building and the north wall of 203 N. Linn St. near Willow & Stock.