FAU Exhibition Aims to Critique and Deconstruct Institutional Racism and Prison Industrial Complex

by FAU College of Arts and Letters | Friday, Jan 20, 2017

The University Galleries in the Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters at Florida Atlantic University will present "Sharon Daniel: Secret Injustices 2007-2016," accompanied by related faculty works in the Schmidt Center Gallery Public Space, from Friday, Feb. 3 through Saturday, April 1, in the Schmidt Center Gallery, 777 Glades Road, Boca Raton campus. An opening reception for the exhibition, which is free and open to the public; will take place on Thursday, Feb. 2 at 6:30 p.m.

The exhibition features the work of Daniel, who creates interactive and multimedia installation projects that document the secret injustices of the criminal justice system and the prison industrial complex. Developed in collaboration with Wendy Hinshaw, associate professor in FAU's Department of English, along with a multidisciplinary group of College of Arts and Letters faculty, the exhibition further focuses on exploring the use of new digital technologies for the presentation of research and scholarship.

Daniel creates digital media art that engages the public in a critical dialogue about crime and punishment and challenges the assumption that imprisonment provides a solution to social problems. This exhibition will present four works:

  • "Public Secrets" provides an interactive interface to an audio archive of hundreds of statements made by incarcerated women.
  • "Blood Sugar"examines the social and political construction of poverty and addiction in American society through the eyes of those who live it through an interactive interface to an audio archive of conversations with 20 current and former injection drug users recorded at the HIV Education and Prevention Program of Alameda County and in California state prisons.
  • "Inside the Distance" documents victim and offender mediation practices in Belgium showing how mediation poses a potential cultural alternative to dominant modes, methods and theories of justice and punishment. This work, which includes interviews with mediators, criminologists, victims and offenders conducted in Leuven and Brussels, focuses on the subject positions of victim, offender and mediator.
  • "Undoing Time" isa series of multimedia installations and online archives, co-authored with incarcerated men and women. In "Undoing Time," flags, targets and uniforms made for state institutions by prisoners in California's prison factories are 'inscribed' (embroidered, printed, laser-cut) with the testimony of incarcerated men and women. The products thus transformed materialize a gesture of resistance to the injustices of the criminal legal system and mass incarceration.

The Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters also will present a performance by Daniel Beaty, acclaimed actor, writer, singer and composer, on Thursday, Feb. 2 at 8 p.m., in the University Theatre adjacent to the Schmidt Center Gallery. Beaty's performance is part of a larger series of public programs associated with themes in Daniel's exhibition and the concurrent exhibition in FAU's Ritter Art Gallery, "Community Justice: The Black Panther Party and Other Civil Rights Movements."

These programs will be headlined by Angela Davis, an American political activist, academic scholar and author, who is giving a public lecture on Thursday, Feb. 23 at 7 p.m. in the University Theatre. Tickets for the Davis lecture can be purchased at www.fauevents.com. For more information about upcoming Social Justice Events and public programing, visit www.fau.edu/artsandletters/social-justice-events.php

The University Galleries are open Tuesday through Friday, 1 to 4 p.m., and Saturday from 1 to 5 p.m. Visitors must obtain a $2 parking pass or use the limited metered-parking before visiting the gallery. More extensive parking directions are available online at www.fau.edu/galleries. The University Galleries operate an active Museum Education Program that is approved as a Field Experience Provider by the School District of Palm Beach County. Class and other group tours can be arranged during and outside of open hours by appointment.

 For more information, call 561-297-2661 or visit www.fau.edu/galleries.



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