Online Exhibition: 13 – 30 July
No to Prison Life is a series of new works on paper by Stanley Whitney, presented in a special online exhibition to coincide with World Day for International Justice 2020 on 17 July. The statement, “No to Prison Life” is the artist’s protest against the U.S. judicial system's promotion of arrest, incarceration, and other forms of imprisonment, in particular highlighting the disproportionate number of African Americans in U.S. prisons. While this is a long-standing project that Whitney has incorporated into past paintings and drawings – including recently for Kansas City Art Institute's Project Wall (2019-2020) – this is the first time the works have been displayed publicly as a series. Many of the works in the exhibition have never been seen before, with most created during the last few months of quarantine in New York.
The exhibition is presented in collaboration with the Art for Justice Fund, an organisation founded by Agnes Gund to drive criminal justice reform. 10% of proceeds from the sale of each work in the exhibition will go to the fund, supporting artists and advocates focused on reducing prison populations – working with partners to reallocate government funding to tangible investments in communities hardest hit by poverty, violence and incarceration – shortening sentences and changing the narrative through art. Art for Justice believes in the transformative power of art to expose the pain, injustice and racial bias in our criminal justice system, to give voice to people erased from the conversation and to create the compassion and empathy necessary to drive social change. The charity was founded in 2017 by Agnes Gund, who sold her Roy Lichtenstein painting to donate $100 million to launch the fund. In her home, Gund replaced the Lichtenstein painting, which used to hang above her fireplace, with a painting by Stanley Whitney.
On the occasion of the exhibition, Whitney's son, William, spoke with his father about this work and the state of criminal justice reform. As the younger Whitney notes, "My goal in conducting this interview was to have an open and honest conversation with my dad about how the America he grew up in is different from the one that we both currently live in."
