American writer and poet James Baldwin once said "Life is more important than art and that’s what makes art so important."

And it is not unusual for fine arts gallery director Mark Johnson to quote Baldwin when asked about his discipline, associate curator and gallery manager Sharon Bliss said.

From conviction to trial, from prison life to prison labor, “Criminal: Art and Criminal Justice in America,” the exhibition, which opens Feb. 16 in the Fine Arts Gallery, covers all these facets. Organized by SF State’s art department, the exhibit explores different aspects of the criminal justice system using artistic reactions and reflections about incarceration and its impact on everyday life.

The relevance of the subject is evident. In 2006, the Department of Justice revealed there were an estimated 501 sentenced prisoners per 100,000 U.S. residents, the numbers are part of a decade-long trend during which prisons across the country saw their population steadily increase. As of Jan. 30, 2008, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation reported a prison population of 170,777 inmates.

According to Johnson, a third of his art students have family or friends who are incarcerated.
“Incarceration impacts all of us,” he said.

Elspeth Tozier, an art industry major and the event's publicist, said she was very impressed by the exhibit’s stimulating and educational potential.

"I am an artist myself. It's cool when people use art to make a statement about society," Tozier said.

Days before the opening of the exhibit, the deafening sound of electric drills and hammers coming from the fine arts gallery is leaving no doubt that the department is in full preparation mode.

Dozens of unidentified artworks, ranging from photographs and paintings to audio and video devices, are lying on the floor of the gallery, carefully bubble-wrapped and waiting to be installed or hung on one of the immaculate white walls surrounding the room, waiting to finally deliver their full power.

As part of an exhibition design class, students, under the supervision of Johnson and associate curator and gallery manager Sharon Bliss, are helping install the pieces that will be on display at the gallery located in the Fine Arts building on Feb.16.

From last year’s “Witness to War” which revisited Vietnam through an exploration of contemporary art, to “Criminal," the Art Department is interested in thematic exhibits, Bliss said.

Bliss wants the exhibition to encourage people to not pass judgment but encourage discussion, thus helping establish a dialogue about the criminal justice system.

“What art is able to do is take something in another format and make it visual, in a format that we hope will be accessible,” she said.

Johnson added that he wants gallery visitors to be moved emotionally.

"The exhibit will encourage people to think about [the prison system] philosophically," he said.

One of the installations will feature work by Portuguese artist Ricardo Gouveia, also known as “Rigo 23,” consisting of works made by California inmates as a means to occupy their time.

"Inmates get to express their remorse, their thirst for revenge or intentions of further mayhem [through their handiworks]," Gouveia said. “But there is a lot of redemption value to them.”

Among some of the other works to be exposed are Clarence Lin’s life-sized model of a correctional facility cell and "The Last Supper," a collection of 383 painted China plates by artist Julie Green. Each piece depicts the last requested meal of death row inmates about to be executed.
From a birthday cake to a simple hamburger and fries, each plate is humanizing and raising awareness about the penal system, said Santa Rosa artist and SF State Museum Studies graduate Spring Maxfield, who helped install the plates.

The multidisciplinary exhibit features the work of 14 artists coming from across the country including paintings, photographs, videos, sounds and installations.

“Criminal” is a collaborative project among the university’s Project Rebound, the art department, the Poetry Center, the criminal justice program and others, all of which worked together in an effort to provide better understanding of the criminal justice system.

C. Jason Bell, director of Project Rebound, an on-campus program proposing education as an alternative to incarceration that will be leading workshops about re-entry in March, believes that students would greatly benefit from the event.

"They’d learn a lot. They have a lot of preconceived ideas [about the prison system]," he said.

Indeed, in addition to the main exhibit and during what promises to be one of the highlights of this four-week event, a day-long symposium about the prison system will be held on March 1 at the Cesar Chavez Student Center in Jack Adams Hall.

It will feature discussions, lectures, workshops and focus groups centered on the prison system, including cultural and social issues. The event will bring together students, members of the community, artists, as well as social activists like renowned anti-prison advocate Angela Y. Davis, who will deliver a keynote address.

Located in the Fine Arts gallery, the free exhibit will be opened to the public from Feb. 16 to March 15. Go to http://gallery.sfsu.edu/ for more information about the exhibition, or visit The Intersection Web site to register for the March 1 event.