Koestler Arts' The I and the We

The exhibition will showcase artwork by people across the UK’s criminal justice system which was entered into the 2021 Koestler Awards. The works on display span a variety of mediums across craft, fine art, music, animation and writing, illuminating the amazing perseverance many within the criminal justice system have maintained during the challenges imposed by the Covid-19 pandemic, and with limited equipment and space to create.

The unique and beautiful pieces include sculptures carved from prison-issue soap, a dinosaur constructed from scrap paper, a tram and boat painstakingly produced from matchsticks, a painted collage composed of grains of rice and a portrait painted with coffee.

The show will also include writing from the third volume of Koestler Voices, a poetry anthology published by Koestler Arts. The book showcases insightful poetry written by those in criminal justice settings during the difficult past two years we have just faced, and features a foreword by poet Jackie Kay.

Koestler Arts is a charitable organisation that aims to help prisoners, secure patients and detainees lead more positive lives by supporting them to participate and achieve in the arts. Their exhibitions increase public awareness and understanding of art by people in the criminal justice system, ultimately reframing the way we see prisoners, and allowing them a creative voice in a system that can often be silencing.

“In an environment which alternates between clinical brightness and a dreadful darkness, Koestler brings permission for colour, texture and light. Every prisoner should be given a brush and told to make a mark – perhaps then less would return” comments a previously exhibited artist.