Koestler Arts marks the 60th anniversary of the Koestler Awards with an ambitious exhibition of art by people in the UK’s criminal justice system, curated by Ai Weiwei.
The Koestler Awards is an annual programme encouraging people from the UK’s criminal justice system to change their lives through the arts. The vision for this year’s exhibition is inspired by Ai Weiwei’s visit to the Koestler Arts building, which currently holds over 6,500 artworks entered into this year’s awards.
Taken aback by the quantity of artworks and the range of categories on display, the artist’s concept evolved to be as inclusive as possible and to let the artwork show how humanity responds when put in extreme circumstances.The aim is to not ‘translate’ the work but to retain the wholeness of it. Ai Weiwei explains this idea with an analogy: he wants to present the forest, not just a branch that comes from it.
The volume of artworks on display in Freedom at the Southbank Centre is an immense celebration of artwork coming out of criminal justice settings. Ai Weiwei’s design comprises of fifteen cell spaces that are based on the size of a typical cell in a UK prison, which roughly measures 1.8m by 3m. Each cell contains a multitude of work, with the smallest containing 78 and the largest containing 131. Alongside paintings and drawings, visitors will see artworks from a variety of artforms including calligraphy, graphic design, hairstyling and needlecraft.
Visitors might also notice unusual materials in place of traditional ones; prison bedsheets used as canvases, Marmite used to create a portrait or sand used to create a landscape. Artwork will be purposefully left unframed to further respect the original environment within which it was made.
There will be moments during the day when quotes from displayed artists will be played out loud in several cells. These quotes are read by individuals currently involved in Koestler Arts’ Mentorship Scheme where artists who are now in the community are paired with a mentor to help develop their practice.
These intermittent recordings aim to reflect the sounds of unplanned comings and goings that enter prison cells unexpectedly – through the pipes of a shared plumbing system, through the bars on the window or through the slat in the door. Unplanned sounds that consequentially link the people inside the cell with life and activity outside it.
