In the Belly of the Beast: Queer Art, and Joy, in Prison
A guest post by Ocean Capewell!
Hello, lovely people!
I’m currently taking some time off to travel and celebrate my wife’s birthday and her graduation from medical school (in case I haven’t mentioned it in the last ten minutes, I’m obsessed with her). Rather than just “go dark” for two weeks, I thought now would be a lovely time to celebrate and elevate some other perspectives on queer joy! Today’s guest post is brought to you by Ocean Capewell (they/them), author of the Substack Ocean Front!
Over to you, Ocean!
I volunteer at an organization called Let’s Get Free: The Women and Trans Prisoner Defense Committee. We do a lot, and one of my favorite things that we do is the yearly art show fundraiser. There is a gallery of art from people inside of prison and “artists in solidarity,” aka free people (some of whom are formerly incarcerated.) The gallery is here [Note: some of the artwork is sexually explicit] and there’s a lot of good art—not all done by queer people! I chose some art by queer people to highlight as a reminder of the resistance and joy that goes on behind the walls, despite everything. And also so you, dear reader, could hear their own words, and not just mine. The art and artists’ statements are sprinkled throughout my essay, so that the voices of those inside can be amplified.
My name is Ms. GeGe, and I am a transgender female . I am also the founder of an organization called the L.I.G.H.T Coalition, which is a sister organization of Hearts on a Wire in PA. We strive to educate ourselves and our members on topics like health and law and policy within the PA Department of Corrections so that we can use the tools that are available to us to fight for freedom and abolition of all prisons.
I got started painting in prison during some rough times. I realized that the only way to look beyond was to paint, to see the light through the dark. It was the beauty and brilliance that was sitting just outside. It takes the weight off my shoulders and gives me a sense of calmness. [... ]My art has changed over the years from a tiny abstract painting that I gave to my brother, to now when I’m painting murals for my prison. I just love to paint.
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I’ve spent the past 24 years, off and on, volunteering with people in prison. I got my start as a shy, punk 19-year-old. I really wanted to make a difference in peoples’ lives and do something to right the injustices of the world, but I froze up around people. When an acquaintance invited me to a packing session of Books Through Bars in Philadelphia one hot summer afternoon, I was hooked. The letters pouring in were witty, funny, heartbreaking, and fascinating. People requested books on everything from African history to handwriting analysis to engineering to Indigenous languages. I didn’t know how to talk, but I did know how to read (and write). Packing books and sending them to prisoners filled a need I didn’t know I had.
I kept doing it throughout my 20’s and 30’s. I moved to New York City, Pittsburgh and the Bay Area, and there was always a prison book project to join. My best friend Amanda, with whom I co-ran Book ‘Em (now known as the Pittsburgh Prison Book Project) once said, “Book ‘Em is my church,” because we packed every Sunday, because we’d felt something there that we were supposed to feel in church but never had. Communion, service, purpose, and joy.
“Many people look to the Bible to support their views. I agree with Rev. Bolz-Weber that the creation story in the Bible supports a non-binary view of gender identity. If that’s not good enough for you, the scientific evidence should convince you!”
I quit doing prison book projects for a while, but I can’t stay away for too long. In the past year, I’ve been opening the mail for Let’s Get Free: The Women and Trans Prisoner Defense Committee. LGF puts out a magazine called Daughters, which is mostly by prisoners, for prisoners, and which generates a lot of mail. I read every letter and respond to the ones that need a response and put the submissions to the magazine in the appropriate pile. The letters are still witty, funny, heartbreaking and fascinating. In my 40s, after fifteen years as a social worker, in a world where I consume information endlessly, there isn’t much that surprises me. But these letters consistently do.
Justice looks like many things:
The freedom to talk back ,
The ability to find your voice,
To ask hard questions,
To take a stand for what you know is right…..
Our voice is our greatest power,
to not be silenced……
For justice is a song
We should all sing
From the streets of Harlem
To the dirt roads of Appalachia….
Like a forest of strength
Our numbers are many, the colors of a rainbow
Blending into one voice,
The fruit of humanity ripened,
No longer willing to accept the status quo….
For justice belongs to everyone
And justice isn’t justice
Until it’s true justice for all…
After the election, answering the mail was one of the things that kept me hopeful, kept me going. One thing that struck me, over and over again, was how even people in the most hopeless-sounding situations pursued joy. Stubbornly, almost reflexively. Over and over I heard about finding joy in meditation, reflection, art, reading, reconciliation, restoration. Life in prison is incredibly hard, especially for queer and trans people. People have very little access to things that we as free people take for granted: the ability to decide when to go to bed; choosing what food you want to eat; accessing medical care. The outdoors, animals, the rain, the snow. Friendships and relationships are broken up at the whim of an administrator; the most important person to you can be taken away, all lines of communications cut.
“The piece is intended to depict how the many pieces of my life, some small, some broken, have come together to form myself as I want to be. The rainbow colors represent my LGBTQIA+ community, where I draw my strength from and where I find my chosen family. The stained glass look of the portrait represents my faith and the light it brings me, as a Jew and as a trans man. The piece is painted with acrylic paints and includes pieces of gold foil from the kosher-for-Passover chocolates that we can order for the Passover from commissary specially for the holiday.”
And yet, every week, we hear from people organizing for better conditions, for dignity. We hear from people who have been fighting for ten years, twenty years, fifty years, who have never given up even though their situation is, by most definitions, hopeless.
Someone wrote a letter, saying, “The guards try to keep me from my boyfriend, but we always find a way back to each other.” Someone else wrote a letter, saying that she was a trans woman who had found the love of her life—another trans woman—inside and they had just gotten married. “We are the first trans couple to marry in this institution, to my knowledge,” she wrote, her handwriting in careful script with hearts dotting the lowercase i's. “I am too excited to hold this joy inside. I wanted to tell my brothers and sisters in the Daughters community, who helped me to love myself. I hope that this submission will help others hope. Love is found in strange places! Yes, I met my wife at [name of prison], she was a PV [parole violator].”
I read the letter aloud to Etta and we were both so moved. Then we went back to work.
Thanks so much for this amazing post, Ocean! Everyone should go and check out their wonderful work at Ocean Front!
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Thank you for sharing! This was lovely to read and the art was very impactful.
loved this!