For the 3rd year running, Let’s Get Free teams up with Boom Concepts for a prison justice art fundraiser and series of events.
Artists were asked to create work around the ideas of home and relationships to create a show that encapsulates the feeling of home: What does home look like? Feel like? A space? A state of mind?
The call was to create things that literally glowed. People were encouraged to create work with ships and pun off concepts like relationSHIP, friendSHIP, leaderSHIP, etc.
Glow Home is an homage to friends old and new recently released from prison and a prayer that our loved ones still behind bars will be home soon. There will be an altar where you can leave something for a loved one who you wish to come home.
Over 60 artists from both sides of the prison walls have submitted provocative pieces utilizing ceramics, photography, textiles, beadwork, silk screen, collage, stained glass, digital drawing, water colors etc. There are close to 100 pieces of art up for auction benefiting the work of this local prison advocacy group. The opening and auction will take place on October 4th from 6 – 10pm with the auction closing at 9pm. The show will stay up through October 26th.
Click on photos below a for a quick preview slide show.
Click here for more information on Glow Home
Overview of October Events
Gallery Hours for Glow Home October 4th – 26th
Gallery Hours are every Thursday thru Saturday 1- 7pm and Sundays 1-4pm
Gallery Hours are suspended during events. Check Boom’s Calendar
Liberate our Imaginations: A Vital Step Towards a World Without Prisons
October 12th – 12 – 3pm – Saturday
A 3 hour participatory workshop With Kempis Ghani Songster & etta cetera
Back by popular demand, Ghani Songster returns from Philly to lead an interactive space in effort to free ourselves from the mental chains that inhibit our progress. Ghani believes that our salvation hinges on our ability to liberate our imagination. etta says, “It’s gonna be like going to the gym for your mind.” How do we stay connected to the bigger movement of abolition?
Listen to Ghani shares 5 Lessons of the Geese from last years workshop.
The event is free but please rsvp letsgetfreepa@gmail.com
Snacks will be provided
Blountly Speaking:
Lifting Up Women in Prison
Words and Songs by Naomi Blount, (Pending Travel Permission but we are speaking it into existence!) Followed by a Panel Discussion: Impact of DA’s Office on Incarcerated Women with Lisa Middleman and local community leaders.
October 19th – 12pm – 3pm Saturday @ Boom Concepts – 5139 Penn Ave
Free Lunch served at 1 pm
Naomi Blount, 69, is the second Pennsylvania woman to receive commutation in nearly three decades after serving 35 years of a life sentence. Released this past July, Naomi will share reflections of her experiences from prison to the commutation process as well as lift up the women she left behind. Community leaders and Lisa Middleman, candidate for District Attorney, will then convene for a panel to speak on the impact that the DA’s office has on people impacted by the criminal injustice system. The event will conclude with a musical performance by Naomi.
The event is free but please rsvp letsgetfreepa@gmail.com
October Monthly Sustainer Drive
Collective Donations towards Collective Liberation!
Sign Up to be a sustaining donor during the month of October to help us reach our goal of 50 new monthly sustainers! You will receive a special Thank You Gift of your choosing including limited edition artwork or a bouncing baby house plant (Pittsburgh only:)
Monthly sustainers are a critical part of community organizing and help us gather unrestricted funds. This money is used for: direct assistance to people in prison and returning citizens (hard to write a grant for that) stamps, printing newsletters and commutation kits, speaker stypens as well as transportation costs to visit prisons, the state capitol and faraway meetings and conferences.
Our goal is to sign up:
20 Sustainers @ $5 a month
15 Sustainers @ $10 a month
10 Sustainers @ $15 a month
5 Sustainers @ $20 a month
5 Sustainers @ $25 a month
If achieved would raise collectively $575 a Month. Simply click the donate button and check the “recurring donation box”
Come to Harrisburg with the Coalition to Abolish Death by Incarceration
Coalition to Abolish Death by Incarceration(CABDI)
Day of Action to End DBI & Heal Communities
October 23rd – 7am – 7pm Wednesday in Harrisburg
Sign up for Vans from Pittsburgh by filling out this form