Swimming In The Desert: Prison and the Transportive Power of Art

Event Details

Join Founder/Director of the Justice Arts Coalition (JAC), Wendy Jason, and artist Carole Alden to explore the transportive, transformative role that the arts can play in the lives of people in prison. View works by incarcerated artists, and provide your feedback, reflections, and encouragement to the artists through letters and your own artwork. You will have the opportunity to choose a piece by an incarcerated artist that speaks to you, write a letter to the artist, and make a piece of your own, inspired by their work, to share with them. JAC will collect your digital images of these letters and creative works, and print them to mail to the artists on your behalf. It means so much to the incarcerated artists in JAC’s network to know that folks on the outside are seeing, appreciating, and being impacted by their artwork. The responses they receive from you will bring hope and validation, help them to feel less alone, and inspire them to keep creating.

Materials Needed:

• Have pen and paper on hand for letter-writing (handwritten is preferred, rather than typed), as well as any supplies you’d like to use in creating a piece of artwork. Normally, the materials one can use to compose letters and artwork to send into prisons are very limited because of mailroom policies, but because JAC will be sending prints of your digital images, you can use whatever supplies you would like!

Red Dirt is a warehouse studio and incubator for a small group of independently practicing artists and creative professionals, from fresh out of school to nationally known.  They share resources, offer critical feedback and push each other toward greater professionalism in work. It’s a space for projects, ideas and community exchange.