MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — Works of art created by current and former inmates are on display at the the Alabama Department of Archives and History in Montgomery.
The exhibit titled “Changing the Course: Art by the Currently & Formerly Incarcerated” opened this week and will be on display until April 15.
Participants in Auburn University’s Alabama Prison Arts + Education Project and programs at Ingram State Technical College, Julia Tutwiler Prison for Women, Draper Correctional Center, and several Alabama Bureau of Pardons and Paroles Day Reporting Centers created the artworks, according to the Alabama Department of Corrections.
A reception and educational event about the programs will take place at 5 p.m. on March 15 at the Department of Archives.
Admission to both the exhibition and educational event is free.
“Therapy programs, including art-based instruction, have proven to not only reduce recidivism, but also to improve the lives of those suffering with mental illness,” Cam Ward, the director of the Bureau of Parsons and Paroles, said in a statement about the exhibit.
Steve Murray, director of the Dept. of Archives and History, talked about the exhibit on APT’s Capitol Journal.
“It’s a display of everything from paintings to sculpture and three dimensional work by incarcerated Alabamians who are participating in an arts program that help them to think creatively and to focus their energy in a positive and creative way.
Murray’s interview begins at 23:30.