Audio Spreading politics across the walls. (story audio) Photos Mike Alewitz "Workers unite!" Harriet Tubman View full slideshow (5 images) Resources Kiehle Gallery Your Voice Join the conversation with other MPR listeners in the News Forum.

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Spreading politics across the walls.
by Annie Baxter, Minnesota Public Radio
October 1, 2004

Mike Alewitz stands in front of his mural of Malcolm X. He's painted political murals all around the world. Now his work is being shown at the Kiehle Gallery at St. Cloud State University. (MPR photo/Annie Baxter)

The work of artist Mike Alewitz is currently on display in an unusual place: an art gallery. His wall sized murals are intended for more public, and often more dangerous, spaces. He's painted murals on buildings along the Israeli Palestinian border and on the bombed streets of Baghdad. And here in Minnesota, one of his murals provided a backdrop to the Hormel strike in 1986. A show of Alewitz's work at St. Cloud State's Kiehle gallery gives an overview of the career of one of the country's most prolific political muralists.

St. Cloud, Minn. — The white walls of the Kiehle gallery stand mute. But the voices of revolution rumble across the pictures hung upon them.

	"Workers unite!"

Working people of all countries, unite!

Proletarios de todos los paises, unios!

If there is no struggle, there is no progress!

These phrases, read aloud by visitors, are etched into Mike Alewitz's murals. They dance alongside images of striking workers and revolutionary figures like Malcolm X and Karl Marx.

Many of the works on display here are reproductions of murals that no longer exist. Some murals-- like the one he painted with striking Hormel workers in the 80'-- have been torn down. Alewitz says that mural was deemed too politically incendiary. And at least one mural here never went up.

"This piece you're looking at was meant to be on the side of a building in Baltimore," he says. "It was censored, and I never got to paint it."

	Harriet Tubman

Alewitz points to studies he did for the mural. It shows Harriet Tubman, leader of the Underground Railroad. Like most of his mural figures, she's cartoonishly rendered in sharp outlines and bright colors. But she's clearly a figure of power: she clutches a burning tree in one hand, and a rifle in the other. Alewitz says the mural didn't get painted because people objected to the idea of an armed Harriet Tubman.

"We live in a country that is surrounded by images of people with weapons, but one black woman with a rifle, one black woman, and it scares the authorities in an unbelievable way."

Alewitz has dedicated most of his life to challenging the establishment. He's a gadfly. And he looks the part. He's short and muscular, dressed all in black. His stubbled chin and pierced ear lend him a tough look, but that's softened by his smiling eyes.

	Mural in Palestinian area

Alewitz became politically engaged during the student uprising at Kent State University in 1970. He was a political organizer. From there, he got involved in unions. And he turned to art for practical reasons: to make posters for his cause. Eventually he earned two degrees in fine arts. And now he teaches art Central Connecticut State University.

But he stridently rejects any formal aesthetic.

"You can make things that are formally powerful and beautiful," he says. "But all the great art of the world, has to relate to its time, and what's going on in history and what people are thinking and doing."

But not all of Alewitz's pictures are easily accessible unless you really know your labor history. He peoples them with obscure labor activists from the 30's and 40's. And other figures might be unrecognizable because they're from foreign lands... Alewitz has travelled to places like Nicaragua, Chernobyl, and Israel to create murals in collaboration with workers and political activists.

	Hanging the show

He's well aware that some of his murals require some thought, and maybe even study.

"A lot of the imagery in my murals, the symbolism, it has an educational aspect to it," he says. "You can't really understand the work unless you investigate what those symbols mean, and in the process you learn something about the history of this country, the history of the world."

But not all visitors to the Kiehle gallery will need to crack the history book to figure out all the messages here. Murals dealing with Iraq make a fairly straightforward point.

In an era when people are being accused of political inconsistency, Mike Alewitz's viewpoints remain very clear.

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