Beyond Survival, Immigrant and Refugee Stories

We are on track to have all the pieces of work for the exhibit in October-November with portraits, family trees, business profiles and videos. We have already done many interviews of the narratives shared through our radio show. The murals are in the process of being created and soon to be painted at an organic farm. More murals will be created inside a store in late fall. The maps created with Carleton college classes are ready and being shared with the community and the maps drawn by community members will be part of the exhibit. ; All the goals were achieved and even surpassed the desired outcomes. This was possible because of a major development for the nonprofit. During the work on this grant our organization, working on economic stability for our immigrant community, we had the opportunity to have the Mercado Local in a rented building. This was only possible because of a local entrepreneur and philanthropist, Jennifer Sawyer, was able to invest in paying the rent for a year with the help of a group of other women donors. Having the opportunity to have a rented space that has two sections, the Mercado Local store in the front of the building and a large meeting room in the back of the building allowed for all the exhibits and work of the grant to have a permanent home. This allowed for even more more members of the community at large experience all the work in four different exhibits. Let me clarify that none of the work on the building was done with the funds of the grant but rather with other funds. The grant was used for the exhibits.

Since the opening of the exhibit countless community members have visited the exhibits. An official opening was done on March 16, 2024 and we plan to do more events to invite more members of the community into the art space and art and narrative exhibits.

Here are the different areas:
Exhibit 1: A FAMILY FOREST: Families created a family tree that reflects their transnational families. Excerpts from the interviews at the radio show El S'per Barrio Latino, KYMN, The One, are located by the family trees. Many families gifted us with their trees at Mercado Art Space as a loan. Trees made by: Leticia, Adriana, Rosy, Ang'lica, Bel'n, Rocky, Nohemy, Mercedes, Mar'a, Mar, X'chilt, Leslie, Ver'nica, Kika, Lucy, Rebeca, Monte, Ruby, Alberta, Donovan, Paola.

Exhibit 2: MOSAIC MURAL. Instead of painting one of the walls we created a mosaic mural with art from artists and art lovers ranging from very young children, as young as 6, all the way to adults. The themes were Northfield, the river, our Hispanic culture, and heritage with art from 20 artists: Jade, Nohemy, Leticia, Leslie, Marco Andr's, Rosal'a and her kids, Luca and Aaliyah , Adriana, Natalia, Xotchil, Oliver, Mercedes, Mariana, Mar, Kika, Monte, Fatima, Isaac.

Exhibit 3: MURAL BEACH AND DESERT. We now can say that we have a beach and desert in Northfield! Artists Leslie M'ndez, Mar Valdecantos and Monte Montero with help from Isaac Mijares and Juana Mijares created a fictional beach based on Playa Santa in Puerto Rico and Playa Dominicus in Bayahibe, Dominican Republic, and a desert sunset with a snake, cactuses and a cow skull. Over the murals there is a snake from the logo of the Mercado Local, representing the Aztec feathered snake god, Quetzalcoatl.

Exhibit 4: ARTISTS WALL A collection of art by several artists showcases the wealth of talent. Gabi Estrada depicts two women in her family limpiando frijolesin a universal image of women cleaning the beans before cooking. Heriberto Rosas followed the demise of the Archer House from the empty streets in 2020 to vines growing in the abandoned building. Andrew Mazariegos creates a collage of his world and how memories inform the present. Jessenia Prado approaches her culture from a fresh and fun perspective and Conchas, the pastry, becomes origami. Leslie Mendez downtown pop corn cart in Bridge Square depicts the center of town from where memories are created. Rocky Casillas Aztec Deity Feathered Serpent Quetzalcoatl art gives Mercado Local its colorful logo. Marlena Myles, Dakota artist's map, showcases the Northfield area with words in Dakota language, in a collaboration with Dawi.

Exhibit 5: MAPS. Is your home close to a park? This was one of the questions we asked when exploring the imbalances and segregation in Northfield. The North side areas around highway 3 continue to be neglected and house many low-income community members. They don't have a large park as many other neighborhoods. Rice County Neighbors United/Vecinxs Unidxs worked with the Carleton Digital Humanities class with Professor Austin Mason in the spring of 2023 and students Jason Min, Graham Gordon and Taylor Kang created maps to explore the segregation and imbalances in Northfield. One of the maps was about the parks. Others were about Viking Terrace, the large manufactured home park, and affordable housing.