The reality of living 25 years in a 6-foot by 9-foot cell was the inspiration behind the title, Not Enough Space, a free art exhibit featuring the artwork of two Puerto Rican political prisoners. The event opens tomorrow on the first floor of the University main library and will be up through the end of May.

An opening reception, also free and open to the public, will be held tomorrow from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. at the University YMCA, 1001 S. Wright St.

Not Enough Space commemorates the 25th anniversary of the imprisonment of Oscar L¢pez Rivera, 62, and Carlos Alberto Torres, 52. L¢pez Rivera is serving his 70-year term in a Terre Haute, Ind. penitentiary while Torres is serving his 78-year term in a correctional institution in Oxford, Wis., according to an April 21 University press release.

L¢pez Rivera and Torres were convicted of seditious conspiracy for their involvement with Armed Forces for National Liberation – a group that sought Puerto Rican independence – but never of injuring or killing anyone. Both prisoners support the movement of Puerto Rican independence and the U.S. government considers this a threat, said Jorge Felix, the curator of the exhibit.

Felix said L¢pez Rivera and Torres were incarcerated for “no crime other than speaking out,” and are imprisoned alongside murders and rapists, whose prison sentences are shorter than theirs.

Both men use their artwork to combat prison life and as a resistance to the inhuman and often brutal conditions they face, according to the Boricua Human Rights Web site.

“They painted because they were trying to recover their humanity in an environment that tried to destroy their humanity,” said Alejandro Molina, a member of the National Boricua Human Rights Network Coordinating Committee in Chicago. “Specifically to combat the grayness prison imposes on you.”

The National Boricua Human Rights Network (NBRHN) is the national organizer of the exhibit, which premiered in Chicago at the beginning of April and will tour throughout the United States and to several countries, including Mexico and Venezuela. Molina helped organize the art exhibit and coordinated with the University Community Informatics Initiative (CII) to bring it to Champaign. The CII “serves as a hub for research, learning, and action activities, some longstanding and others newly begun,” according to their Web site.

The objective of the art exhibit was “to revive the issue of the Puerto Rican political prisoners in an educational way,” Molina said.

Molina also said he believed it was very important the exhibit be on display on a college campus, where it will be available to thousands of students. Molina said the issue of Puerto Rico as a United States colony does not have to be a debate, but a discussion in which young people have a voice.

“The best thing that could happen is they have questions,” Molina said. “The worst thing that could happen is there is no effect.”

Franklin Carrero-Martinez, a graduate student and founder of Sociedad de Estudiantes Puertorriquenos (Society of Puerto Rican Students), will be giving welcoming remarks at tomorrow’s opening. Martinez said it’s great having the exhibit at the University because it increases the awareness of Puerto Ricans in the United States. He also said he hopes it raises the question of why the United States has political prisoners.

“I hope that having people see this will raise awareness on these issues that we have to face,” Carrero-Martinez said.

Carrero-Martinez said he saw some of the artwork on the NBRHN Web site and noticed one painting in particular. “The Real Pitirre,” a painting by L¢pez Rivera, shows a group of Puerto Ricans, some holding flags or playing bongos on the upper half of the canvas, while below is a dark image. Carrero-Martinez said he interpreted the dark image as a court judge tangled in spider-webs. He explained that a pitirre was a small Puerto Rican bird, with the ability to chase away the larger Puerto Rican hawk.

“The symbol for the U.S. is a great eagle but the little bird can chase it away,” Carrero-Martinez said. “That’s the way I see it and that’s why it made an impression on me.”

Ann Bishop, University professor in library and information science and co-founder of the CII, was on the local organizing committee for the exhibit. Her role was to collaborate with the Chicago community that created the exhibit and determine how to bring the exhibit to Champaign. She said she is interested to see the reactions of the campus and the community to the exhibit.

“I think people will come away from the exhibit as with pure aesthetic delight in the exhibit,” Bishop said.

In addition to the exhibit is life size replica of a prison cell.

“That was very shocking to me,” Bishop said. “To actually see, to get a very visceral sense of what ‘not enough space’ really means.”