SPECIAL EDITION: EA Fall Lineup
Events include The Only Door, Return to Sender, NYC Marathon, Urban Arts Festival and more...
Given the number of exciting events that Empowerment Avenue is hosting or participating in this fall, we figured we’d send out a bonus issue! Check out what’s coming up and please say hi if you attend.
THIS WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 27TH: Prison Journalism and Censorship
4-6pm ET on zoom, RSVP via Eventbrite
Prison Journalism and Censorship is a conversation between Empowerment Avenue incarcerated writers/organizers Christopher Blackwell, Kwaneta Harris, Sara Kielly, and Emily Nonko. Formerly incarcerated abolitionist Jessica Phoenix Sylvia moderates this virtual event.
This conversation focuses on the challenges incarcerated journalists face while communicating information through highly monitored structures that conspire to suppress information to and from the inside of prisons. Participants will discuss why prison journalism matters and why prison officials seek to censor and silence them.
ALSO THIS WEDNESDAY THE 27TH: Museum of African Diaspora (MoAD)’s Launch of The Only Door I Can Open: Women Exposing Prison through Art and Poetry
Digital exhibition through March 3rd, 2024.
The Only Door I Can Open is an exhibition of visual art and poetry curated from within the Central California Women’s Facility at Chowchilla by Tomiekia Johnson and Chantell-Jeannette Black. EA created this in partnership with Flyaway Productions and (MoAD). MoAD’s digital exhibition will launch this Wednesday and run until March 3rd, 2024.
WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 4TH: MoAD Panel Discussion of The Only Door
6:30pm PT in person at MoAD and digital live stream. Register here.
This conversation celebrates the launch of the digital exhibition The Only Door I Can Open: Women Exposing Prison through Art and Poetry on MoAD's website. It explores the challenges faced by women at the Central California Women's Facility in Chowchilla where both the co-curators and all of the artists for this exhibition reside, while uplifting the empowerment that telling their own stories can bring. Ultimately, the partnership between MoAD, Empowerment Avenue and Flyaway Productions seeks to bring light to the conditions of incarcerated women, to humanize and connect them with those on the outside, and to insist on radical prison systems change that especially impact BIPOC women.
Joining in conversation are Robin Levi, co-editor of Inside This Place, Not of It: Narratives From Women's Prisons; Rahsaan Thomas, formerly incarcerated at San Quentin, the founder and executive director of Empowerment Avenue and a producer on the award-winning podcast Ear Hustle; Rachel Nelson, director and chief curator of the Institute of the Arts and Sciences at University of California, Santa Cruz and co-director of Visualizing Abolition, an arts-based public scholarship initiative on prisons, art, and the movement for abolition; and Laura Elaine Ellis, a dancer and dance educator who has been an essential part of Flyaway Production's Decarceration Trilogy.
OCTOBER 6TH-15TH: The Only Door in-person exhibition
Select dates at Space 124 at Project Artaud in San Francisco, buy tickets here.
See in person the visual art and poetry, curated from within the Central California Women’s Facility at Chowchilla by Tomiekia Johnson and Chantell-Jeannette Black. The work will accompany a dance performance by Flyaway Productions called If I Give You My Sorrows which explores women’s complex relationships to their beds.
NOW THROUGH OCTOBER 28TH: Return to Sender: Prison as Censorship
EFA Project Space in NYC, select dates now through October 28th. Details here.
We are honored to be collaborators on Return to Sender, an exhibition curated by Mariame Kaba that maintains that the prison itself is censorship, which is multifaceted and complex. Therefore, the only way to end prison censorship is to end prisons. This is a call for prison industrial complex (PIC) abolition.
EA directors Emily and Christine will both attend Return to Sender’s Closing Reception Saturday on October 28th, 4-6pm ET. Do not miss this incredible exhibit — if you can’t make it in person, here’s the virtual catalogue.
NOVEMBER 6TH: EA founder Rahsaan Thomas runs the NYC Marathon
All day, with support locations around NYC to be announced.
Following his hit performance on a documentary chronicling the marathon run inside San Quentin State Prison, Rahsaan will take on the NYC Marathon on Sunday, November 6th! Empowerment Avenue’s team will be celebrating in the streets and would love to see you there. We are also launching an Empowerment Avenue fundraiser to coincide with the event — please keep an eye out for details.
NOVEMBER 11TH: The Bayview Urban Arts Festival
2:00pm to 6:00pm PT, Bayview Opera House in San Francisco. Details here.
California Lawyers of the Arts presents the Urban Arts Festival! Nine artists, including four Empowerment Avenue artists, and an external collaborator will create thought-provoking art installations addressing the injustices of prison labor for minimal wages. Their mission is to raise awareness about involuntary servitude and promote civic engagement through voter registration.
Join us for an afternoon of creativity, inspiration, and social impact at the historic Bayview Opera House! This event features music, guest speakers, vendors, food, spoken word, and live performances.