In 2005 I started working with an outside art collective to create a teaching tool that would raise awareness about mass incarceration. We called it the Prison Poster Project. The visual was a cross section of a prison cell block, and we had different artists creating a piece in each cell that spoke to different issues of prison. This was, in some ways, my introduction to how art could play a role in fighting the carceral state.
Fast-forward about a decade. In 2017 I was four years into activism work with the advocacy nonprofit Let’s Get Free: The Women and Trans Prisoner Defense Committee, which I had cofounded with Avis Lee and Charmaine Pfender—two incarcerated organizers serving life-without-parole sentences—and Donna Hill, Char’s mother. An incarcerated artist friend of mine, Todd “Hyung-Rae” Tarselli, who’d gotten famous for his paintings on leaves and other found surfaces, reached out to me about doing an art show. (One of his paintings is in the header of this article, and another is below.) I thought it was the perfect opportunity to not just showcase his work, but to bring back all the fantastic, amazing art from the poster project that had been in my house just collecting dust.
We didn’t know what to expect when we organized the first Let’s Get Free art show—featuring TR’s leaves, the poster project pieces, and some art collected from and donated by friends. We were blown away by the response. It was so wildly successful in terms of creating energy: we got a bunch of new volunteers and made $5,000 to support Let’s Get Free’s activism. This ignited a tradition of doing these annual art shows. That’s how Creative Resistance, Let’s Get Free’s arts organizing committee, was born.
Our seventh art show, This Is Me, will open on November 1 at the Irma Freeman Center for Imagination in Pittsburgh. There will be numerous public events connected to it throughout November. Click here for more information about how to see the show and attend events. Let’s Get Free also has a growing Permanent Art Collection, which can be borrowed for display.
Below, readers can see some of the incredible work that has been featured in previous Creative Resistance shows. This Inquest feature continues with a conversation between two formerly incarcerated artists connected to Let’s Get Free, Duane “DJ” Montney and James “Yaya” Hough.
—etta cetera, cofounder of Creative Resistance and Let’s Get Free
All images courtesy of Let’s Get Free and Creative Resistance. To learn more about the collective, the images in this photo essay, and the broader collection, click here and here.
Header image: “Solitary” (2020), instant coffee in a paper bag, by Todd (Hyung-Rae) Tarselli.
