The Wake

There are certain places that young women are advised not to travel alone to at night. Whether well-earned or not, Northeast Minneapolis holds a reputation as the “bad part of town”. For a neighborhood that boasts the highest concentration of children in the Twin Cities, it looks in poor shape, full of traffic, liquor stores, and fast food restaurants. In little steps at a time – one group is trying to change perspectives of Northeast from the inside out. Juxtaposition Arts’ initiative, aptly titled “Remix: Creating Places for People on West Broadway,” is responsible for the mysterious bursts of life and creativity that have been appearing around the neighborhood: murals on Emerson and Broadway Avenue, a sculpture park on the corner of 2nd Street and West Broadway, banners on area light posts. Juxtaposition arts is a non-profit organization that gives kids from Northeast Minneapolis and surrounding areas quality training in the arts. As executive director Deanna Cumming puts it, “repositions youth themselves and youth culture and expression as a foundation and focus for the near-north community.” The Remix initiative, in collaboration with the UMN’s Landscape Architecture and Design Institute, focuses especially on art in public spaces with a goal of “community improvement, beatification, and engagement.”

Students contributing to the Remix project take classes as a part of the “Street Life” curriculum. Their sanctuary is Juxtaposition Arts’ studio on the corner of Emerson and West Broadway. The first level of the studio is full of treasures. Custom designed Nike shoes are proudly displayed on the windowsill; endearing self-portraits are prominently exhibited on the walls. Spray paint, toothbrushes, and other various tools are strewn on tables and easels, and a large sheet of paper is hung for an evidently brainstorming purpose. In addition to notes and reminders such as “eye-popping,” and “paint brushes, rollers,” the brainstorming paper offers practical suggestions such as “talk to each other,” and “groove your body.” The brainstorming paper displays thought provoking conversation such as this one between a red and blue marker; Red: “Safety from the government…HA!” Blue: “I thought the government worked for us?” Rocks, plants, and Christmas lights strewn about the studio pull the space together.

The second level of Juxtaposition Arts is a tastefully cluttered attic-type space containing desks and bookshelves and windows. Posters and pictures cover the walls, among them a picture of the devil’s body with President Bush’s face posted over the head.

One of the desks on the second floor belongs to DeAnna Cummings, who spearheaded Juxtaposition Arts in 1995 with Payton Russel and her husband, Roger Cummings. With boots and dangly earrings, Deanna is dressed as though she just stepped out of catalog. Her words are intelligent and polished – she gives off the air of both an artist and a communications professional.

DeAnna is passionate about instilling pride in the people of Northeast Minneapolis. “[Our goal is to] shine a positive light on the many assets in the community, to bring about change with young people in the forefront,” she explains. DeAnna describes the history of Juxtaposition Arts classified into three periods; the first period being focused primarily on giving individual kids opportunities in the arts, the second focused on reaching out to the greater community, establishing Juxtaposition’s place in Minnesota’s artistic community by collaborating with the Walker and with Intermedia Arts. “Now we are trying to strike a balance between the two,” explains DeAnna, who wants to maintain a presence in the larger community while keeping up with Juxtaposition Arts’ original mission to give youth in the community “skills and tools…to make the best lives for themselves.”

In addition to uplifting the neighborhood, DeAnna hopes to positively impact individual students like Herbert Johnson. Johnson is one of the several hundred students at Juxtaposition Arts. When moving from place to place, to, say, get a different paintbrush, Johnson dances instead of walking, his lanky arms bending like rubber. He is quietly working on a t-shirt in commemoration of Tupac. “He is kind of like my favorite rapper,” Johnson explains politely. He says he has wanted to be an architect since he was a little kid when he would “get a box and make a building out of it.”

Bending over Johnson’s shoulder is instructor and project coordinator Satoko Muratake. Muratake explains that this year’s Streetlife students outdoor project is a collection of banners on the theme of the history of shoes. “[We teach students to] observe their environment and articulate the ways in which their surrounding can be improved,” Muratake explains, “Students realize that they can make change around them with simple things, like a chime on a door.”

The people at Juxtaposition arts are a community of believers. First a chime on a door, and later an entire neighborhood rejuvenated; they believe that a little goodwill can go a long way. They believe that art can heal a community and give young people the gift of dreams, and they invite you to believe with them.