120 languages ... 1 home: The first art exhibit created for the Minneapolis skyway system highlights the experiences of Minnesota's new immigrants and inspired a charter school to initiate a similar project.

Nov 11, 2008 (Star Tribune - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- LINLE | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating -- As she stood in the Minneapolis skyway Monday and looked up at a 13-by-10 foot photo framed on a transparent window, Somali immigrant Maymun Mohamed, 17, recalled feeling less different.

Her class of about 20 students from Lincoln International High School, a 140-student charter school in downtown Minneapolis, toured an art exhibit that uses 23 family photos and stories from immigrants to celebrate the diversity of the Twin Cities and to explore their thoughts about home.

"I feel like we're part of Minnesota," said Mohamed, a high school junior who came to Minnesota from Somalia with her parents and five siblings more than three years ago. "We're not the only ones who had problems that led them to seek refuge here."

The exhibit, called "Speaking of Home," prompted teachers at Lincoln High to arrange a tour Monday with the exhibit's artist, Nancy Ann Coyne, and to issue a similar writing assignment to their students who hail from countries as diverse as Ecuador, Somalia and Mexico.

"What I tried to do with this was take real stories and place them where people are shopping, catching the bus ... otherwise they'd only read this in a book or magazine," Coyne said.

The New York native has lived in the Twin Cities for almost a decade, and her latest project is the first public art exhibit created for the Minneapolis skyway system. Coyne's pictures will remain in the skyway between 7th and 8th Streets over Nicollet Mall through Saturday.

For many of the Lincoln students the pictures and stories are a reminder that the Twin Cities area is home to thousands of immigrants who speak 120 languages and moved here for reasons similar to their own, teacher Kelly Schwartzbauer said.

Schwartzbauer, an English as a Second Language instructor, said she hopes the exhibit prompts her students to open up about their own lives and what it is like to adjust to life in Minnesota.

"This was just a perfect fit," she said. "They were interested in how all of these people moved to Minnesota just like they did."

Most of her students have lived in Minnesota anywhere from a few weeks to two or three years, she said. A few of the teenagers had never been to the IDS Center or other portions of the skyways.

As their tour ended, Mohamed said the photo and story about a mother from India who often wears traditional clothing and is known around the metro area as a skilled Henna artist was inspiring.

She said the woman's story is a example of many immigrants' ability to adapt to life in Minnesota without forgetting who they are.

"She's keeping her culture alive," she said. "She's saying 'be proud of who you are.'"

Patrice Relerford --612-673-4395

IF YOU GO

"Speaking of Home" is located in the skyway between 7th and 8th Streets in downtown Minneapolis and will be on display through Saturday. It's presented by the Family Housing Fund, Forecast Public Art and the Institute for Advanced Study at the University of Minnesota. For more information about the project visit www.speakingofhome.org.

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