Art Offers Hope

Art Offers Hope

Mairangi Arts Centre has just opened InsideOut, a beautiful display of paintings, drawings, carvings, quilting and prints produced by prisoners through the ‘Art in Prisons Programme’. Artists from Auckland Prison and the Northern Region Corrections Facility and, for the first time, from Auckland Region Women’s Corrections Facility have artwork featured in the exhibition.

Now in its fourth year, the annual display is the result of a partnership between Mairangi Arts Centre and the Department of Corrections – recipients of Arts Access Aotearoa’s Big ‘A’ Community Partnership Award in 2011.

Exhibition curator Ellie Drummond is an art tutor at Auckland Prison and Auckland Region Women’s Corrections Facility. She says she has been overwhelmed by the level of participation and calibre of submissions. “The artwork is of a standard you would expect from high-end art facilities around the country. It’s artwork that will sit proudly in any house, garden, business or public facility.”

Artists work on planning and producing art for the show a year in advance.

Participation in art has been found to assist offenders in a number of ways including connecting with a sense of self worth, developing skills to work co-operatively with others and providing the impetus for a change in life direction. It provides an opportunity for prisoners and society as a whole to shift focus away from past negative patterns towards both future potential and the real hope offered by permanent, positive change.

Many InsideOut artworks have a Pacific or Maori theme while others are contemporary pieces without cultural reference. Gallery visitors will be extremely impressed by the level of skill shown by the artists. Exhibits are for sale at very reasonable prices and a donation from proceeds will be made to charity.
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