Celebrating the St. Croix Valley
UW-River Falls partners with community to produce Millennium Mural
By Jolene Bracy

The St. Croix Valley's cultural and environmental diversity and contemporary life at the turn of the millennium are being celebrated through a new wall mural at UW-River Falls. Artists of various ages, cultures and lifestyles united to create the mural, "Find Your Dream," at the UW-River Falls Chalmer Davee Library. The 18 muralists included UW-River Falls faculty, academic staff and undergraduate students, along with middle school students, local artists and residents.

"We wanted a broad focus, a representation of a living time capsule," says UW-River Falls Collection Development Librarian Curtis LeMay, one of the mural artists.

The Millennium Mural, 7.5 feet by 18 feet, invites viewers to consider the importance of the environment and dreams, says Chalmer Davee Library Director Christina Baum.

In "Find Your Dream," the center of the circle includes images signifying the 12 months of the new millennium. The circle of life symbols are arranged in a clock style, starting with a dream catcher, and continuing with a robin, the humanities, a white-tailed deer, trillium, monarch butterflies, mourning doves, a Peregrine falcon, a gardener, a cow, wood violets and honey bees. Flora and fauna indigenous to the St. Croix Valley and Wisconsin are hidden in the border.

The generosity and creativity of the participants made it possible to form a single image from 18 people, says Lynn Jermal, UW-River Falls associate professor of art and mural artist.

"I was inspired by everyone's enthusiasm and energy," Jermal says.

Rebecca Pollak, a seventh grader at Ellsworth Middle School, says the project was fun because she could work on the art every day.

"I liked it because it didn't feel like the adults were making all the decisions. We all worked together," she says.

An 18-member muralist team created "Find Your Dream," depicting the environment and culture of the St. Croix Valley at the turn of the millennium. Participants included (from left) UW-River Falls undergraduate Sara Allen, Ellsworth Middle School student Rebecca Pollak, UW-River Falls Tutoring Coordinator Rose Rude, UW-River Falls undergraduate Johnson Vang and Chalmer Davee Collection Development Librarian Curtis LeMay.

Involving the larger St. Croix Valley in the Millennium Mural follows in the footsteps of a similar project: a wall-sized mural of the Kinnickinnic River, produced collaboratively in 1998 as part of the City of River Falls' 150th anniversary. The river mural, on the side of the Hallmark Store in downtown River Falls, involved artists from UW-River Falls, the City of River Falls Sesquicentennial Committee and the community.

The River Falls Art Education program, St. Croix Valley Artists, UW-River Falls Teen University and Chalmer Davee Library sponsored the Millennium Mural project. The artwork was funded by a grant from the Wisconsin Humanities Council, the Otto Bremer Foundation and matching contributions from UW-River Falls.

The mural was unveiled at a community celebration Sept. 25 in the Chalmer Davee Library Breezeway. Grant participants and the River Falls Latino Student Organization sponsored the event. A presentation about the mural project was followed by a slide show titled, "How American Mural Movements Grew Consciously Out of the Mexican Mural Movement," by WPA/Depression Mural Scholar UW-Stout Professor Sue Beckham.

In addition to Jermal, LeMay and Pollack, project participants included UW-River Falls academic staff member Rose Rude; UW-River Falls students Sara Allen, Jodi Kruse, Jaime Livermore and Johnson Vang; Hudson Middle School student Adam Selon; River Falls Middle School students Clint Robins, Colin Trechter and Jeff Trechter; and St. Croix Valley residents Joe Frost, Harold Henson, Ben Knutson, Tiffany Meyer, Kim Orth and Cree Orth.