Postville art exhibit illuminates life after the raids

If you take a walk through the CFL gallery in the next months, you won’t be greeted with Iowa landscapes or still life paintings. The new exhibition that was installed Oct. 25 features subject matter that is both timely and hits close to home: the people of the Postville raids.

Titled “Postville: Games, Apparitions and Mementos,” the exhibit features drawings and paintings by Craig Ede and feltwork by Lana Suomala. The artists worked separately, creating art that illuminated the hardships and often inhumane treatment of the immigrants that were living in Postville. Their work was brought together by Art Gallery Coordinator David Kamm.

“This show is interesting because it is so clearly directed towards life events,” Kamm said. “It’s using art as a vehicle to address other issues.”

Lana Suomala is a secondary Spanish teacher in Frazee, Minn. who became involved with people of Postville because of her brother-in-law, Campus Pastor David Vasquez. Drawn to the plight of these displaced people, Suomala titled her own work “Loteria,” after a game that involves chance and luck. In the hearings for immigrants, their fate was often left up to a kind of lottery regarding the level of punishment they would receive.

“My main hope with this project is to acknowledge those who have been through the process of immigration, raids, imprisonment and family separation as well as to inform the rest of us,” Suomala said. “It is important to see and understand the human stories of the individuals affected by the raid.”

Suomala created 36 handmade felt pieces to illustrate the kinds of struggles immigrants face. The pieces are divided into four categories: The Journey, Children of Poverty, The Raid and Connections. Each piece is carefully crafted to represent persistant problems with prostitution, hunger, illiteracy and drug trafficking.

Craig Ede is a Minnesota artist who has drawn portraits of numerous individuals who were present or directly affected by the raid. His work depicts the reality of the people who are still struggling with the aftermath.

“Part of the reason for these images was the urge to create a record of people affected by the Postville raid,” Ede said in his artist statement.

With the trial of former Agriprocessors owner Sholom Rubashkin starting in Sioux Falls, S. D., the exhibit is timely as it offers a unique story of the personal encounters of these two artists.