Empowerment Avenue Takes On NYC
A gallery show, Brooklyn Museum event, Rahsaan visit, and 11 new stories!
Corey Devon Arthur on the phone, speaking to a packed house, for his opening reception She Told Me Save the Flower.
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Empowerment Avenue was founded inside San Quentin and much of our work is based around the Bay Area of California. But to the delight of our Brooklyn-based Writing for Liberation director, we had a ton happening in NYC this month.
Throughout March we hosted Corey Devon Arthur’s show, She Told Me Save The Flower at My Gallery NYC, which chronicled his feminist journey inside prison. The opening reception was powerful, with poetry performances, a short video and a call-in from Corey in which he spoke to a packed house. We’re interested in continuing to share the message of Save The Flower, which includes traveling the exhibit and creating other creative and educational projects. Our goal is to educate and bring awareness to the power of healing through feminism, especially in the carceral state. If you're interested in plugging in with this project and Corey, please email empowermentave@gmail.com.
Next up: Rahsaan “New York” Thomas made it to New York! It was two amazing weeks of connecting with partners, family, and a presentation at Columbia University’s Beyond the Bars conference of Adamu Chan’s film What These Walls Won’t Hold. Bay Area folks — keep reading for info on an SF screening by Adamu.
Finally, we hosted a poetry reading at the Brooklyn Museum for its First Saturday event, featuring two currently-incarcerated poets, April Harris and Meech Buckley, and formerly-incarcerated poet and rapper Lucinda Karma. It was an honor to share the work of these poets at such an incredible event.
On top of all this New York magic, stories kept publishing and we were honored by our friends at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. Keep reading and thanks for your support!
Our Latest Work
Congrats to EA writer Dan R. Grote, who just published his powerful poetry book "We Are All Doing Time," with Iniquity Press/Vendetta Books. You can buy the book on Amazon!
This year, Felix Sitthivong will be a regular contributor to International Examiner, the PNW’s only nonprofit AANHPI community media source. Don't miss his latest contribution about the threats to cultural organizing groups inside Washington State prisons. “While all of these groups and their various chapters at their respective correctional facilities around the state have their own independent legacies, one thing is for certain — they have been united by the love for their people, a radical love for themselves, and a hope for something better,” he writes.
The latest from EA writer Jonathan Kirkpatrick, who is a member of Christopher Blackwell’s mentorship program, is about how harm reduction work brought him and his brother together after 28 years in prison. Read about it at Truthout. “My work has allowed me to reach beyond these walls in a way I’d never known to be possible,” he wrote on Twitter. “In a moment of synchronicity, on the same day this article was published in Truthout, my brother and I met in person for the first time in nearly three decades.”
More on harm reduction: Jonathan Kirkpatrick for Filter Magazine wrote about harm reduction for the syringes made in prison.
For Prism, EA volunteer Khawla Nakua and EA writer Tony Cobb co-wrote apiece about how older people in Florida prisons have been consistently stuck with poor access to necessary medical care. “A prison that looks like a nursing home is a public safety failure,” says one of their sources.
From the outside now that he is free, EA co-founder Rahsaan Thomas published a story for The Press Democrat about a Santa Rosa council member’s longtime role in San Quentin’s basketball program. “Coming into a correctional facility for over a decade has confirmed the value of the human beings here,” Mark Stapp told Rahsaan.
Study & Struggle’s latest book review is up! Juan Moreno Haines had a chance to review the wonderful new biography of Shirley Chisholm by Anastasia Curwood. "The recently elected women in the United States House of Representatives, called ‘The Squad,’ are beneficiaries of Shirley Chisholm, the first Black woman elected to the House,” Juan writes.
Juan Moreno Haines also has an essay up in Knee Deep Times about experiencing the climate crisis from inside San Quentin State Prison.
For The Appeal, EA writer Ryan Moser wrote about how Florida’s dire prison staff shortage hurts people inside. Despite the Department of Corrections’ $2.9 billion budget, persistent staffing shortages are creating a major crisis.
Another story for The Appeal: Christopher Blackwell and Chelsea Moore examined new legislation that would reconsider the extreme sentences of youth in Washington state. Currently, adult prison sentences are automatically enhanced based on prior youth adjudications.
Double-whammy good news: Prism just launched its Right to Write Project to feature and pay incarcerated writers, and the program launched with a story co-reported by EA writer Steve Brooks and EA volunteer Olivia Heffernan. Their piece is about how incarcerated students can now teach at the first accredited prison college in the U.S.
Inside/Outside Insights
WOW! We are thrilled to be included in YBCA’s #YBCA100 this year. The list recognizes innovators and boundary-breakers building a better tomorrow, and we feel incredibly honored to be in such great company. Check out the full list here.
AWKWORD interviewed Christopher Blackwell about life behind bars, prison journalism, and more. “We need to think about why people ended up here,” he says. What were their environments?" Listen to the full interview here.
Christopher Blackwell also spoke in front of the Washington State Attorney General's Task Force on Jail Standards. “Sometimes it's important to take a moment and let it sink in that the AG's office took the time to arrange for an incarcerated person to Zoom in from prison,” he wrote on Twitter. “No small feat.”
Kudos to EA fam Adamu Chan and Gary Harrell, who are now Right of Return fellows. We can't wait to see the incredible artistic work they achieve with this support.
We had a great time at Beyond the Bars: Seeding Justice this weekend at Columbia University, where Adamu Chan, Lonnie Morris, and Rahsaan Thomas presented on Adamu Chan's film "What These Walls Won't Hold." You can read a KQED profile on Adamu and his film here.
Bay Area folks, don’t miss Adamu screening his film at the San Francisco Film Festival on April 15th! Details here.
EA writer Kwaneta shared her thoughts and experiences for a TIME article about how prisons use menstruation as a form of punishment. “If you’re one of the heavy bleeders, women who have fibroids or are premenopausal, the state will not provide you any extra items,” she told TIME. “You must purchase them. We aren’t paid to work in Texas. And nothing is free in prison.”
HUGE CONGRATS to Ryan Moser who was featured on NPR talking about the journalism that takes place inside prison. We are super proud of him!
Bonus Content
For those who couldn’t make it to Corey Devon Arthur’s Save The Flower exhibit, you can check out photos on our social media:
And here’s Ryan Moser reading his PEN America winning essay, The Reinvention of Lenny Primo, at Books and Books in Miami: