Babylon provided home to underground art and politics

When the Babylon burned down Friday, January 17, it was a loss to both the arts and political communities of Minneapolis. I was a part of the small group of people who started the Babylon in July of 2001. Initially, we intended to open a coffee shop and gallery that would feature local emerging artists. Because of city regulations and financial restraints, we were unable to realize the coffee-shop side of things, but went forward with the gallery.

Babylon came to be a political art space because of the events of September 11, 2001. In the flag-waving, xenophobic days following September 11, a small group of artists came together who felt isolated by the U.S. government’s war drive, and the Many Voices Community Forum, a group of visual artists, poets, performers and filmmakers, was formed. We felt it was our responsibility to provide a counter balance to the ostentatious pro-U.S. propaganda put forward by the U.S. government. A visual art show entitled “The Art of Resistance” and a night of performance was organized by this group. More importantly, artists of many different walks of life came together in a time of extreme isolation and presented a creative form of resistance to the path the powers that be were presenting.

With this show, the role of the Babylon as a political art space became more clearly defined. Our mission is the convergence of art and social activism, and the people that have been involved in the Babylon hold a deep conviction that art can and should be used as a means of creating social change. Further, we believe that artists as the creators of images and messages have a special role and responsibility in this image and sound bite driven society.

In the past two years the Babylon has been defined by the incredibly creative and motivated people who have been part of this unique experiment. We were proud to be the hosts of the first Hmong/Laotian joint art show in the history of the United States. The Babylon has hosted countless benefits, where poets and other artists put their talents to work to raise funds for organizations like the Women’s Prison Book Project.

One of the most unique and important projects Babylon supported was the Art Across Borders exhibit. While in the Middle East, Art Across Borders volunteers delivered hundreds of pounds of art supplies donated by local artists, met and worked with artists and gallery owners, and collected art work for an exhibit that premiered at the Babylon in February of 2003 and is currently touring the country. While the exhibit is on tour and was not damaged in the fire, a large amount of information, photographs and documentation related to the exhibit was lost in the fire. The Art Across Borders exhibit is an example of one of the most unique ways the Babylon served the community—presenting Middle Eastern art and culture in a time when the government has been trying to associate all things Arab or Muslim with terrorism.

The Babylon has also served as a political organizing center. In the lead up to the latest war in Iraq, a loose group organizing creative resistance to the war drive held their coalition meetings at Babylon, as did the coalition that organized a response to the Minneapolis police slaying of Somali immigrant Abu-Kassim Jelaini.

It is exactly this mix of activism and creation that we are continually striving towards. Our last art show, “America; Land of Rape and Genocide,’ fully realized this goal. Local artist and activist Chris Stark used her show to explore connections between genocide and slavery, and the abuse of Native American and African American women in prostitution. The evening before the fire at Babylon, a group of women who are survivors of prostitution, as well as activists who are involved in helping women leave prostitution, came together to discuss the formation of a new coalition of women of color to continue work around this issue.

One of the most tragic aspects of the timing of this fire is that Babylon had entered into a partnership with the La-Tia Latino artists collective in the beginning of January. The collective had planned on sharing the space with the Babylon collective, bringing new energy, and a full schedule of events to be carried out in the space.

On top of the loss of the space is the loss of irreplaceable artwork by Babylon artists. Almost all of La-Tia leader Patricia Mendoza’s collection was burned, as well as her studio space and all the materials she was using to work on current projects.

The loss of this amount of work for an artist is devastating; it can be like losing a part of your history. “These paintings are my school. I wanted to study from these paintings ... my art is a part of me, “ explained Iraqi artist Haider Al-Amery who lost the past six years of his work in the fire.

I watched the Babylon burn for more than 5 hours. It was a surreal feeling, and sometimes I think I still haven’t really realized the extent of the loss we have experienced as artists and creators of culture, and as a community as a whole. In response to this crisis, we have decided to move forward. We are planning on re-opening the Babylon, in partnership with the La-Tia collective in May of 2004. To make that possible, we need to raise $75,000. This will enable us to go into a new space with a much firmer financial footing, and put cultural and educational events at the forefront of what we do.

We hope that through this revisioning process we will become more deeply rooted in our community. We will be holding public meetings where community members can express what they hope to see happen at the new Babylon and become a part of this process. All details about upcoming fundraisers and meetings will be posted on our website at www.thebabylon.org. The first such meeting will be a public ceremony of remembrance outside of the Babylon sometime during the week of February first, the original ceremony scheduled for Thu., Jan. 29, was postponed due to extreme cold. We encourage people to bring items to place on a community altar, and there will be time given for anyone who is interested in reading a poem or saying some words about what the Babylon has meant for them. For more information, please feel free to e-mail me at megbabylon@hotmail.com.