A mural created by students from the University of Northern Iowa’s Interactive Digital Studies program is set to return to downtown Waterloo this week.
Reinstallation of Diversity is Our Strength wraps up May 23 on the parking ramp near East Park Avenue and Mulberry Street. A ribbon-cutting event is scheduled for Friday evening, followed by the season’s first Friday Loo gathering.
The mural was originally installed in 2020, but removed only a few months later, after it was damaged by high winds and hail on the day much of eastern Iowa was hit by a derecho.
Cutouts of the image were applied to the wall using a method called "wheat pasting," which is a process where images are printed onto large rolls of paper and then "glued" onto walls using an adhesive made of flour, sugar and water.
"The rain and hail put tears into the wheat paste, and then the wind pulled at those tears and those pieces started peeling away," explained Jessica Rucker, executive director of Main Street Waterloo.
The mural depicts a collection of portraits representing leaders, educators and students in the Cedar Valley. It was partially inspired by a 2018 24/7 Wall Street report that listed Waterloo-Cedar Falls as "the worst U.S. metro area for Black Americans." It also drew from Nikole Hannah-Jones' 1619 Project, which explores the legacy of slavery in American history.
Rucker said it took five years to secure a wall, funding and the perfect timing to bring the mural back. The project is being led by wheat paste artist Isaac Campbell.
"Wheat pasting is a really special form of public art. I would even describe it as democratized art, because it invites participation from everyone," the artist said. "It's a great form of art that not only gets people involved in the artistic process, but also invites people and communities to be part of the message and use their bodies and their presence to say something. And so all of us here ... and whoever participates in this, are really using their presence to say that diversity is our strength."
Alongside the physical piece, UNI students developed a companion website that features extended profiles of the people depicted in the mural and the students who created it.
"This message is still important five years later," Campbell said. "I think that it's really exciting to know that so many people are so passionate about this message and this project. This wasn't just a one-off thing that we did five years ago. This is a living, breathing part of this community, and it's so exciting — it's a thrill, really — that we get to put this message out there again."
