People to Watch 2023: Caleb 'The Negro Artist' Rainey proves spoken word has a place in Iowa City, and in young writers

Editor's Note: This is the first profile in the Press-Citizen's 10 People to Watch for 2023. Find them all at press-citizen.com.

The Iowa City spoken word scene is in bloom, largely thanks to years of tending to by Caleb “The Negro Artist” Rainey.

The 28-year-old author, spoken word artist, teacher and producer is likely already a familiar name to community members.

It was a busy year for Rainey. He performed at Lit Walk part of Mission Creek Festival, at Iowa City Poetry Alfresco, co-produced the Mic Check Poetry Fest and contributed to an art installation involving Iowa City parking spaces.

That’s on top of his work with IC Speaks, which educates and supports local youth in their writing with a mission to sustain a thriving, spoken-word poetry community.

The world of writing opened itself up to Rainey while he was in elementary school. He thought he was going to be a novelist.

At 16, his trajectory changed when he and a female classmate in Columbia, Missouri were watching a documentary about spoken word.

She thought it was cool.

Rainey seized the opportunity to impress her and told her he could do that.

So he did.

Then he performed it in front of a crowd at school.

“One of the coolest things about it was when I was on that stage, everyone else was listening. And that was very, very, very powerful to me, especially in a life and school system and whatnot that I felt not listened to,” Rainey said.

“A moment where I could feel it, like it was palpable, right? The listening, the focus, the attention, that wasn't just me being goofy or whatever. I had written something that mattered to me, and someone was paying attention to it.”

He recognized the power in this art form. Now, he’s busy creating spaces so that others, including local youth, can find their voice in poetry.

The pillars of Rainey's successful teaching: Honesty, attention and genuine care

When Rainey arrived at the University of Iowa, he wasn’t thinking about doing spoken word poetry professionally.

But he did imagine there would be a plethora of places where he could perform.

There were none, Rainey said, just like there was never quite a space in his high school poetry club for the different type of poetry he was immersed in.

Instead, he found himself driving 30 minutes to Cedar Rapids to participate in open mic events led by Akwi Nji, founder of The Hook in Cedar Rapids. Nji later invited Rainey to extend these open mic events to the Iowa City area and taught him how to produce events.

That became some of the groundwork for the poetry performance scene in Iowa City today, making space for the people who did want to explore this art form further.

Rainey’s trajectory changed once more after he was approached by Lisa Roberts, founder of Iowa City Poetry. At the time, she was with the Iowa Youth Writing Project.

She asked if he’d ever considered teaching high school students.

He told her no.

Writing was something Rainey wanted to claim for himself.

Despite his belief he’d never teach, Rainey soon found himself working with students. He realized he had the opportunity to teach spoken word and poetry in a way that empowers other young writers to be who they want to be. He could make a space where students can feel more like themselves.

“I learned in my journey through therapy is that I am obsessed with being the person that I needed when I was younger,” he said. “So when I didn't have a poetry space or a space to feel heard or feel like my experiences weren't valued or validated, then I want to create a space where kids can come in and feel that way, where young people can feel that way.”

Rainey's thoughtful, intentional attitude towards teaching created such a space.

He asks for honesty from his students, and gives it right back.

It’s an example of a much larger belief. Rainey doesn’t ask his students anything he won’t do.

When they’re writing, he writes. When they’re sharing something, he’ll share.

Rainey provides plenty of work by poets so that all his students can see themselves in the art form. He will give them multiple prompts so that students can approach their writing from various perspectives and understand that there is no right way to it.

He offers students his full attention, making young writers feel “truly seen and heard,” Roberts said in an email to the Press-Citizen.

“Caleb also has the rare ability to hear the poem inside the poem, the poem beneath the poem, that’s struggling to be born. This talent makes him an invaluable part of each young poet’s growth and development as a creative thinker and truth seeker,” she said.

But Rainey is more concerned with the process of each student’s evolution than the final product of their poems, she said.

“But this is the magic trick he performs again and again: by caring deeply about each student’s emotional journey, he frees and uplifts them to write really great poems,” Roberts said.

‘There is truly no wrong way to do it’: Pursuing spoken word poetry and authenticity

In a UNESCO City of Literature, in the home of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, spoken word can get lost here, Roberts said.

Rainey’s work, including IC Speaks, organizing Iowa City’s first youth slam team to enter state competitions and co-producing events like the Mic Check Poetry Fest, has changed that.

“Spoken word is such a democratic art form, one that welcomes and celebrates poets of all ages and identities and backgrounds to speak their truths,” Roberts said. “Because of Caleb’s work, more people in our city now have poetry as a tool for constructive self-expression. More people also have an expanded capacity for empathy gained from listening to spoken word poets and poems.”

“That’s quite a gift that he’s given to us all.”

In 2023, IC Speaks will work to expand into local junior highs.

For Rainey, he hopes to share more of his work across America.

It’s quite a transformation from the child who learned not to take up too much space. From the child who learned to act, to speak — and sometimes, not to — in the honors and AP classes he and just a few other Black students were in. Their decisions, decisions not always authentic reflections of themselves, were born out of survival.

These experiences coincided with Rainey’s other exploration.

What it meant to be an artist, and what it meant to be Black.

Then he came across “The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain” by Langston Hughes.

“Oh, he tells us that it's okay to be Black and beautiful,” he said. “And that there's no way people don't know you're Black… when I'm starting to take the stage I'm choosing to speak and I'm now wielding the power and the knowledge that I know you're going to see me as Black. I know I'm Black. Now that you know, I'm not ashamed of that. Where do we go next?”

"The Negro Artist" in Rainey's name sparks conversations about language and about people's relationship with race. And because it's part of Rainey's name, it is cleverly unavoidable and requires honesty from everyone who encounters it.

Just like the honesty Rainey asks from his students. Or, spoken word, an art form that he said demands honesty.

“There is truly no wrong way to do it and that freedom allows so many other people to step into art when they would often be scared to,” he said.

Paris Barraza covers entertainment, lifestyle and arts at the Iowa City Press-Citizen. Reach her at PBarraza@press-citizen.com or (319) 519-9731. Follow her on Twitter @ParisBarraza.

This article originally appeared on Iowa City Press-Citizen: Caleb Rainey's impactful hand in Iowa City spoken word scene