“Watching and being part of a group of individuals, and to have a voice, and hopefully an impact on upcoming doctors is a privilege I will never forget” - A testimonial from House Call, a collaboration between the medical center and incarcerated women at ORW From our most recent Radio OPAC with Sheila Okere, a medical student at OSU who started a local chapter of Physicians for Human Rights and the House Call program. |
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Driving Lessons workshops - a recap |
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What does success look like to you? What do you want to be celebrating at the end of 2021? What does it look like for you to take responsibility for your career, and what skills/knowledge/relationships/network/experience do you need to become the person you want to become? These were just a few of the questions that a dozen artists reflected on together during Driving Lessons, a 2-day workshop on February 6 and 7. The group had some amazing opportunities to share and reflect what they were learning about their own work and the story they need to tell about it, how to communicate about what drives them, and how to bring the public along on their artistic journey with them. We built this partnership with Wave Pool, an artist-run organization in Cincinnati that helps artists thrive, to help as many justice-involved artists get access to great professional development tools as possible. We are sending recordings and worksheets into prisons to support the ongoing education of incarcerated artists, and can make them available to other people who are justice-involved. If you or someone you know could benefit from these tools, just reach out and we can get them to you. And - we're planning for more workshop cohorts in the future. If you want to attend, or want to get involved in planning, let us know. Many thanks to Ohio Arts Council, Greater Columbus Arts Council, and Art for Justice Fund for helping to make these workshops possible. And thanks to Anissa Lewis, Maria Seda-Reeder, and Cal Cullen for amazing teaching and facilitation. |
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Radio OPAC in February and beyond |
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In our next episode of Radio OPAC, we'll be in conversation with Eric Gardenhire, Charlsie Banks, and Pam Braddy - three long-time staff members with the Recreations Departments of Grafton, Dayton, and Pickaway Correctional - who have worked to support artists who are doing time and who make a strong argument for the excellence of the work and the importance of bringing them in to a broader conversation across the prison walls about the role of the arts in promoting communication and healing. In this episode, you'll get a rare look in to a space that supports many incarcerated artists with tools, materials, and skills to develop their artwork. We launched this weekly conversation series at the beginning of the pandemic to be a weekly dose of art and humanity, and have produced over 35 episodes on Facebook Live. These conversations have featured teaching artists, academics, returned artists, and DRC staff members all working in different ways at the intersection of the You can view all archived Radio OPAC streams here. In March 2021, we will shift to a new format for a new season. Look for a monthly themed conversation between artists working in all kinds of different ways! Themes will include:
- Art in Public Spaces
- The Power of Singing Together
- Healing through the Arts
- Music and Change
- Art and Resilience
- Art and Time
- Movement
and more. |
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Singing in Prisons: A Conversation with Catherine Roma and Michael Powell Wednesday, February 17 at 8pm EST Facebook Live From Choral Commons, a media platform that provides a space for singing communities to realize the liberatory potential of the ensemble as a site of radical imagining: "The Choral Commons begins our spring #gather series on incarceration by welcoming Dr Catherine Roma, professor emerita of Wilmington College, and one of the foremost figures in prison choral music. Her work in Ohio has attracted admiration and attention nationwide. To this gathering, she has invited Michael Powell, an artist with whom she worked in the Marion Correctional Facility’s KUJI Men’s Chorus. An accomplished percussionist, Michael, recently released, starred in the production of The Hamilton Project while incarcerated.This session will undoubtedly shed light on the perennial question of how to begin and build a prison choral program. Perhaps, more importantly, it will present the transcendent and compassionate power of choral music in inhumane settings." |
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In the News: Writers in Residence Project and "How Mommy Found Her Way Back Home" Writers in Residence Project At the beginning of February, News 5 Cleveland published an article on Writers in Residence, a program that use creative writing to end recidivism in incarcerated youth. They run workshops in nine of Ohio's juvenile detention centers. Thank you to Taneisha Cordell for covering this story. "How Mommy Found Her Way Back Home" Recently, longtime facilitators at Ohio Reformatory for Women- Annette Dominguez and Candace Paulucci- and illustrated by a woman who learned she could draw in prison- Sheila Luther- released a book for children whose mothers are serving time in prison. The book can be found at the website for SEED N hope. From Annette Dominguez, one of the co-authors of the book: “The overarching theme is that there is this population of children out there with a missing mother, and we need to see them and then we need to serve them. We need to give them an opportunity to have their voices heard and then respond to what their particular needs are.” Holly Zachariah's writeup in the Dispatch can be here. |
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A Look Outside Ohio 1. Denver University Prison Arts Initiative Back in January DU Prison Arts Initiative published "Sojourn: The Search," an arts journal that they distributed to artists and staff at 22 CDOC facilities. A free PDF version of "Sojourn" can be found here or you can purchase a copy here. 2. Poetry Foundation Project Poetry Foundation's February 2021 issue is titled 'The Practice of Freedom' and features the work of poets, artists, and writers who are directly impacted by the criminal legal system. 3. MoMA PS1 conversations connected to Marking Time exhibitions MoMA PS1 continues their lunchtime conversation series with Mary Enoch Elizabeth Baxter and her fellow artists from Marking Time: Art in the Age of Mass Incarceration. The archived recordings can be viewed here. Coming up, they have planned talks through April 1st with the next one being February 18th from 12-1 PM. |
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