Artists and Incarceration: Jesse Krimes, Russell Craig, and Halim A. Flowers

On August 25th from, the San Jose ICA hosted a panel discussion about prisons in the United States with artists Jesse Krimes, Russell Craig, and Halim A. Flowers, each of whom have spent time in the carceral system and are working now, from the outside, to help others. The speakers were joined by Karen Altree Piemme, the director of Red Ladder Theatre Company whose programs have served participants with backgrounds that often include racial segregation, economic hardship, teen pregnancy, developmental disability, housing insecurity or incarceration. The online panel presentation is inspired by the presentation of two of Jesse Krimes’ large-scale quilts, “Phoenix” (2020) and “Wolf Point” (2021), from his Elegy Quilts series on display at the ICA