Future IDs at Alcatraz is a yearlong project, exhibition, and series of monthly public programs on view in the New Industries Building on Alcatraz Island until October 2019. The installation features ID-inspired artworks created by and with individuals who have conviction histories as they conceive and develop a vision for a future self. In stark contrast to prison-issued IDs, these artworks represent individual stories of transformation.

Artist Gregory Sale leads a team of collaborators that translates criminal justice reform efforts into a visual language to shift thinking about rehabilitation, reentry, and reintegration. Dr. Luis Garcia, Kirn Kim, Sabrina Reid, Jessica Tully, Gregory Sale and many others have designed the project and exhibition space to function as a platform for engagement through performances, workshops, and civic dialog experiments that are co-curated with community partners. 

Presented in partnership with the Art in the Parks program of the National Park Service, Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy, and Headlands Center for the Arts, Future IDs at Alcatraz engages Alcatraz's layered history as an iconic federal prison, birthplace of the Native American Red Power Movement, national park,and international Site of Conscience. Attracting 1.7 million annual visitors, Alcatraz is uniquely positioned to initiate a broad dialogue about destigmatizing those with conviction histories. 

The projet invites reflection on the criminal justice system and second chances in the United States. Today, this country has 5% of the world's population and 25% of the world's incarcerated people. More than 95% will eventually be released. Of those incarcerated, people living below the poverty line and people of color are disproportionately represented. Though none of the Future IDs participants were incarcerated on Alcatraz, individuals returning to society – both then and now – face an almost insurmountable stigma of having a history of incarceration, which contributing to the consistently high rates of recidivism.

Adding a deeper dimension to the exhibition, on the 3rd Saturday of each month, Future IDs at Alcatraz is accompanied by participatory programs, co-designed with local organizations, including Actors' Gang Prison Project, Project Rebound, William James Association, Young Women's Freedom Center, Success Center, and many others. Since the beginning of 2019, these community partners and others have been co-producing events and activities in the exhibition space that serve their constituencies. In doing so, they have expanded the resonance of the project. Seeing and learning from this amalgamation of public programs, each a different communal expression, has helped evolve the project. 

Throughout the yearlong project, the Future IDs team will co-host public programs, continue to offer artmaking workshops, accept new contributions of ID-inspired artworks, and evolve the installation to amplify the voices and visions of individuals returning to everyday life after incarceration.

© All Rights Reserved by Sherrill Roland

Harlem: In Situ Exhibition

​​Harlem is as much a place as a myth. Throughout the 20th century, this northern Manhattan neighborhood has been written into history as many things; however, in this context, Harlem is ultimately and unceasingly, a black creative mecca, a place whose rich social and cultural fabric has been woven out of the abundance of people of African descent worldwide who have come together in its streets, salons, parks, restaurants, and clubs, influencing generations of artists, musicians, and writers. Harlem: In Situ explores the depth and complexity of this renowned neighborhood, highlighting the work of some of the most important visual artists working from the late 1920s through today. Initially inspired by the Addison’s trove of Harlem street-photography, which includes significant bodies of work such as Harlem Document (1935) by Aaron Siskind, Harlem Heroes (1930–1960) by Carl van Vechten, Harlem, USA (1975–1979) by Dawoud Bey (a three-time Elson Artist-in-Residence at Phillips Academy), 1920s–1950s (Harlem) by Lucien Aigner, and The Sweet Flypaper of Life (1984) by Roy DeCarava, this show also includes prints from the collection by Romare Bearden, Elizabeth Catlett, James Lesesne Wells, and Vincent D. Smith, as well as several key works by nearly a dozen artists, working across time and media, including Charles Als​ton, Jordan Casteel, Aaron Douglas, Miatta Kawinzi, Alice Neel, Lorraine O’Grady, and Kehinde Wiley, that will come to the Addison as loans from sister institutions. These artists and their works investigate the legacy and trajectory of Harlem, which encompasses mass migration, opulence, cultural renaissance, depression, demise, empowerment, pride, and gentrification.

© All Rights Reserved by Sherrill Roland

The Maria & Alberto de la Cruz Art Gallery and the Prisons and Justice Initiative at Georgetown University are pleased to present Sherrill Roland’s interactive performance art event, The Jumpsuit Project, on April 10 and 11.

Roland spent nearly one year in a D.C. prison for a crime he did not commit before being exonerated of all charges in 2015. He returned to art school and developed The Jumpsuit Project in response to his experience. He is currently completing a Post-MFA Fellowship as part of the Documentary Diversity Project at Duke University's Center for Documentary Studies.

During his performances, which will be captured by a Duke documentary filmmaking team, Roland interacts with the public in an orange jumpsuit, encouraging viewers to address their own prejudices towards those who have been incarcerated. The Jumpsuit Project and Georgetown College’s de la Cruz Art Gallery aim to provide a safe space for the public to question, process, and challenge the crisis of mass incarceration.

The two-day event will begin on Wednesday, April 10 at 10:30 a.m. in the de la Cruz Art Gallery. Until 3:30 that afternoon, Roland will occupy a space the size of his D.C. prison cell inside the Gallery while wearing an orange jumpsuit. Roland invites the public to listen and converse with him as he shares personal stories to heighten awareness and challenge assumptions about incarcerated people.

The following morning, Roland will introduce a new element of the performance created for this occasion: The Jumpsuit Walk. Roland will walk six miles in his orange jumpsuit from DC’s Central Detention Facility, where he was incarcerated, to the de la Cruz Art Gallery on Georgetown University’s campus. Roland invites the public to join him for the middle leg of the walk, which will take place along the south side of the National Mall between the U.S. Capitol reflecting pool and the Lincoln Memorial, from approximately 9 to 10 a.m.

At 6 p.m. Thursday, Roland will perform The Jumpsuit Project in the de la Cruz Gallery. Immediately following his performance, Roland will have a public dialogue with Dr. Marc Morjé Howard, Professor of Government and Law at Georgetown University and the founding Director of the Prisons and Justice Initiative (PJI).

“We are incredibly proud to be collaborating with Sherrill Roland — a talented young artist who possesses the ability to create much needed change — on the first DC iteration of The Jumpsuit Project,” said Al Miner, Founding Director/Chief Curator of Georgetown University Art Galleries. “Sherrill’s performance is the perfect fit for our new Galleries program, which highlights the link between contemporary art and social justice through engaging exhibitions and public programs.”

Photo Credit: Christian Carter- Ross

© All Rights Reserved by Sherrill Roland

O.G. tells the story Louis (Jeffrey Wright) who is in the final weeks of his 24-year sentence and was filmed in Pendleton prison with many men incarcerated there cast in acting roles. The film explores the experience of a man who has been incarcerated for nearly a quarter century, coping with the impact of his actions and the challenges of reentering society. The film premiered at the 2018 Tribeca Film Festival, where Wright won the award for Best Actor in a U.S. Narrative Feature Film. 

The O.G. pop-up experience in New York City will be a first of its kind, full art exhibition including work from exclusively formerly incarcerated artists and feature programming by notable artists and advocates. The experience will spark conversation and provoke change in how we think about incarceration and examine the deep impact on those both in and outside of the penal system with art being critical to distilling such a complex issue.


Photo Credit: Kisha Bari

Black History Month at the North Carolina Museum of History in Raleigh. Named a Top 20 Event by the Southeast Tourism Society since 2015, the 18th annual African American Cultural Celebration will feature more than 75 musicians, storytellers, dancers, chefs, historians, playwrights, authors, artists, reenactors, and more.

Gwen Frostic School of Art, Western Michigan University. The Jumpsuit Project Downtown Kalamazoo, EPIC center lobby.

Cleveland was founded by three women in 1968. According to Megan Reich, deputy director at MOCA, they believed that blending art with social issues is a concoction for change. MOCA continues this tradition by hosting "For Freedoms: Faith, Art and (in)Justice."

The discussion will focus on various topics, including faith, incarceration and redemption. The panel will include local artist Gwendolyn Garth, Lutheran Metropolitan Ministries CEO Andrew Genszler, North Carolina artist Sherrill Roland and the Rev. Osagyefo Uhuru Sekou, an activist, musician, artist and theologian from St. Louis.

Pitt Law Black Law Student Association and Pitt Graduate and Professional Student Government hosted the Jumpsuit project. Sherrill Roland's work can be found at the intersection of law, advocacy and fine art. Like so many of the BLSA speakers we've heard from this year, Sherrill has taken control of the situation that he was put in, and channeled his energy into positive change. He speaks about issues of mental health, racial injustices, and how disproportionate the American incarceration system is. What is different about Sherrill is the tool that he is using to instigate policy change: Art.

A NIGHT OF PHILOSOPHY AND IDEAS is an all-night marathon of philosophical debate, performances, screenings, readings, and music.

This all-night philosophy event (7 pm to 7 am) featured dozens of acclaimed philosophers, social critics, and thinkers, including Simon Critchley, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Joan Halifax, Jack Halberstam, Bruno Bosteels, and others. Co-presented with the Cultural Services of the French Embassy.

Fictions is a survey of recent work by nineteen emerging artists of African descent who live and work across the United States. The artists in the exhibition engage with a variety of media—including video, photography, drawing and sculpture—with some combining multiple artistic practices to create large-scale installations. The works in Fictions investigate questions at the core of The Studio Museum in Harlem’s mission to be the nexus for artists of African descent locally, nationally and internationally, and for work inspired by black culture. They draw inspiration from diverse sources—such as everyday objects, childhood memories, current and historic events, and the body—often creating parallel or alternate narratives that complicate fact, fiction and memory. 

The exhibition is the fifth in a series of emerging artist exhibitions presented by the Studio Museum, following Freestyle (2001), Frequency (2005–06), Flow (2008) and Fore (2012–13). Like its predecessors, Fictions illustrates the diversity and complexity of artistic practices by artists of African descent. Tracing the artistic developments since Fore, Fictions emphasizes the development of narrative content in contemporary art over the past five years. From the personal to the political and the everyday to the imagined, Fictions examines the stories that form the foundation of these artists’ practices.

Photo Credit: Rebecca Alice Bennett

2017 Correctional Education Association of Ohio Conference, Keynote Speaker.


Photo Courtesy of Wayne Perry

LACE: Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions

Hollywood Blvd., Los Angeles, CA

North Carolina-based artist Sherrill Roland performs The Jumpsuit Project in Hollywood for two days only. Located outside the doors of LACE, Sherrill shares his personal story and engages in conversation about incarceration with passersby on Hollywood Boulevard.
 

Brooklyn Public Library

The Jumpsuit Project is a socially engaged art project inspired by Sherrill Roland’s personal experience in the prison system. Roland was wrongfully convicted of a crime and spent nearly a year in state prison before the conviction was thrown out. A year-and-a-half after being released, he was exonerated of all charges. As a response, Roland began The Jumpsuit Project: he wears an orange jumpsuit,  similar to the one he wore while in prison, in public places in order to spark conversation about incarceration and its impact on individuals, families and communities.  Over the course of three days, Roland will bring his project to Central Library. The public is invited to ask him questions, share their stories and experiences with the criminal justice system and start to combat the stigma surrounding incarceration.


Photography by Rebecca Alice Bennet and Gregg Richards

Art, Activism, Race and the Law

This cross-disciplinary panel inspired by themes in the exhibition "Nina Chanel Abney: Royal Flush" will discuss the complex dynamics of race and the law, public policy, the justice system and art activism. With Jillian Johnson, Durham City Councilwoman and director of operations at Southern Vision Alliance; Sherrill Roland, artist, activist and creator of the Jumpsuit Project; Trina Jones, Duke law professor; and William A. Darity, Jr., Samuel DuBois Cook Professor of Public Policy at Duke. Free and open to the public.


Photography by Todd Turner

Open Engagement 2017 — JUSTICE is presented in partnership with The School of Art & Art History at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and marks the second year of a three-year cycle that situated the conference in the Bay Area (2016 — POWER) in partnership with the Oakland Museum of California and the California College of the Arts, and will complete in New York in partnership with the Queens Museum (2018 — SUSTAINABILITY).

OE is the largest artist-led conference dedicated to expanding the dialogue around, and creating a site of care for, the field of socially engaged art. Founded in 2007, OE has evolved into an unparalleled hub for practitioners and audiences to assemble. OE employs an inclusive open call model that supports emerging and established artists and organizers, highlights the voices of students alongside professionals, and collaborates closely with national institutions to further the networks of support for socially engaged art. OE is committed to the power of art to enact radical social change.

Oakland City Hall

The Jumpsuit Project is a socially engaged art project inspired by SHERRILL ROLAND’s personal experience in the prison system. Roland was wrongfully convicted of a crime and spent nearly a year in state prison before the conviction was thrown out. A year-and-a-half after being released, he was exonerated of all charges. As a response, Roland began The Jumpsuit Project: he wears an orange jumpsuit, similar to the one he wore while in prison, in public places in order to spark conversation about incarceration and its impact on individuals, families and communities. The public is invited to ask him questions, share their stories and experiences with the criminal justice system, and start to combat the stigma surrounding incarceration.


Photography by Meg Allen

I received the Martin Luther King Jr. Service Award at the UNCG Campus Activities & Programs, 2017 Excellence Awards Banquet.

University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC

This exhibition features new work by seven MFA candidates in the UNCG School of Art: Caroline Bugby, Codey Gallas, Kate Gordon, Julia Caston, Joyce Watkins King, Sherrill Roland, and Charles Williams. Reflecting a variety of studio areas, their work represents the culmination of each student's unique experience at UNCG. The exhibition demonstrates the research, reflection, experimentation, critical thinking, and artistic skills honed by these artists while in the program.


Photography by Laath Martin

James B. Dudley high School
Greensboro, NC

"Thank you, Sherrill, for coming and spending your day with some of the students at James B. Dudley High School.. I know that having you step through our doors, put on your jumpsuit, and talk to our kids left an impact. We may not "see" the outcome today, tomorrow, or ever, but just know the students heard your message. You and your work are appreciated more than you will ever know."  - Kayte Farkas


Photography by Todd Turner

'Art in Response to War' Honors College course. 
University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC

'The Making of the African Diaspora' Honors College course.
University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC

'Criminal Justice : 317'
University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC

'Sociology 225 ( Race, Class & Gender)' 
University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC

'Art and Politics', Honors College course.
University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC

'HSS 198 Honors Colloquium Class I,' Honors College course.
University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC

'Philosophy of Art 322'
University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC

During Free Press! the Art Department will open up the print shop for Guilford students, faculty, alumni, and staff to create rally flyers, stickers, patches, postcards, and signs. With the help of many creative minds from the Creative Writing and Art Departments we have several signs and flyers ready to go--and we will help you print your own to take home. There will also be the opportunity to custom make your own designs and share them with your community. Sponsored by the Honors Program and the Greenleaf Cafe.


Photography by Laath Martin

Real Talk : The Jumpsuit Project
Guilford Technical Community College | GTCC Medlin Campus Center

Government & Justice Studies at Appalachian State University 

Panel on Wrongful Convictions featuring Mark Rabil and Sherrill Roland. Mark Rabil is a Defense Attorney, Associate Clinical Professor of Law, as well as the Director of the Innocence and Justice Clinic at Wake Forest University. Sherrill Roland is a Exoneree, an MFA student at University of North Carolina at Greensboro and the Founder of the Jumpusuit Project.