Insanity is Calling

This was a letter to self written by a prisoner in Pelican Bay’s SHU Program

Last night I received a visit from an old adversary. I was just about to fall asleep when, suddenly, Insanity came calling to do battle. I fought diligently and at no point in time did I yield, however, thousands of emotions were violently killed during my struggle to overcome. I was very much unprepared. The attack was rather ruthless, coming swiftly me without warning. Once the premise was set the fighting began with my thoughts, subsequently advancing to my respiratory system. Durng this time, my mind was being bombarded with thoughts of sorrow, utter despair and desperation. I was experiencing difficulties breathing; Insanity had me in the depths of its clutches, choking out every breath that I took was great persistency and patience, in spite of a opposition. I became exceedingly frightened; terrified to say the least.

My biggest fear is that one day I will undoubtedly succumb to my enemy and relinquish every once of sanity that I have. But wait. Why should I be so fearful? When total sanity is gone, so goes my suffering so goes my sorrows. It is only my existence (my self-awareness) which tells me that I’m suffering. If I’m am to continue to exist in a constant state of oppression, why then should I remain aware of it? Under these circumstances, insanity is the preferred selection while death is an alternative.

Certainly my death is not the worst possible outcome. The worst thing about dying is living to know about it. I do not live in the same sense as one who physically experiences life from day to day. I merely exist within my own consciousness. To the world, I am dead. I am very much aware of my death because I am “the living dead.” The only thing tangible about me is my awareness of myself. Realistically, there are no other physical attributes required for this physical form of existence. I see no reason for even wanting to exist in such a state. I am aware of only myself; outside of this ever contracting coffin which I’m confined to, nothing else seems to exist.

I have absolutely no concept of time. Every day is the same as days passed; today is tommorrow, tomorrow is today, and the past is my future. Sadly, I see no end in sight as I struggle everyday to maintain my sanity. It is a battle in which I feel, ultimately, I shall lose; perhaps even a loss that I shall look forward to.

Insanity has many weapons of mass destruction, including those of biochemical warfare. How can I possibly prepare myself for battle in an environment consisting of utter chaos, hatred and sorrow? In which direction do I turn for Hope in a world where even my Keepers look down on me with contempt and aversion, simply because I am an “inmate” and not a human being?

Why should I continue to live in darkness? Even my shadow knows better than that.

by Theo Wilson

Neo Jim Crow: Black Art Movements and Its 21st Descendants

Donald “C-Note” Hooker

In 2010 Michelle Alexander’s book The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness was published. If someone were to use an internet search engine and typed in, “Jim Crow Art,” they will be sorely disappointed in what they saw. History has a tendency of repeating itself when we fail to keep the cultural records necessary from repeating. In 2014 I began documenting the drawings, writings, sound recordings, and videos of incarcerated African Americans, and called this work Neo Jim Crow Art. It functions as a cultural record of incarceration on the Black experience in America, and acts as the artistic expression of New Jim Crow. The artistic record differs from the historical record in that, the historian records facts; while the artist records feelings. What did it feel like to be traumatized by Jim Crow?

In 2017 scholars from various academic disciplines and institutions gathered at Yale University for an interdisciplinary conference titled: “The Arts in the Black Press During the Age of Jim Crow.” If Jim Crow art, that is art that was created during Jim Crow and is an expression of Jim Crow is not readily discernible by African-Americans, is there any wonder why Blacks failed to recognize Jim Crow in its new form, mass incarceration. Similarly, nobody refers to post-slavery, mass incarceration, as a result of the Black Codes as slavery; however, it was. In fact, the 13th Amendment authorizes slavery upon the duly convicted. The art that is presented online as Jim Crow is so embarrassing you would think that Blacks were incapable of creating Fine Art during that period. Using 21st century technology, Neo Jim Crow Art is the digital pushback; inspired by the imprimatur of the Jewish Holocaust Remembrance to “Never forget.” It’s motto, “Do future Americans have a right to know, about this generation Jim Crow?”

C-Note has written for Prison Action News, California Prison Focus, and has been in People Magazine, Public Television-Los Angeles (KCET), and ABC-Los Angeles (KABC). He is also a poet, playwright, painter, and performing artist, whose works have either been exhibited, performed, or sold, from Alcatraz to Berlin. In 2017 Google Search Engine results listed him as both “America’s most prolific prisoner-artist,” and the “World’s most prolific prisoner-artist.“

THE UNTAPPED POTENTIAL OF PRISON ART

By Donald “C-Note” Hooker

If the 2.3 million American prison population were a city it would be the fourth largest behind New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago, all known for very vibrant art scenes. The American prison culture is a part of the American Street culture. Street art is the biggest art movement in the history of the planet. This is because street art has many points of entry. There is the visual art most commonly known as graffiti art. The legalized form of graffiti is called street art. There is its literary expression in poetry and urban novels. There is an expression in dance, and it’s musical expression in rap. Recently, with the commercial success of the Broadway play Hamilton, even in theatrical works, including spoken word. Its nearest rival would be during the Baroque period. Unbeknownst to most, the father of the American Graffiti movement is Daryl “Cornbread” McCray. Cornbread was exposed to graffiti while in a juvenile prison. There he honed his craft and acquired his artist name, Cornbread. Prison graffiti birthed graffiti which birthed street art, it’s legalized form. Works by America’s top graffiti and street artist in-print-form can go for $100,000 easily. But what about their imprisoned counterpart? The prisoner artist receives no such public support, yet they rival, if not surpass, these artists in their craftsmanship. The prisoner-artist and his or her use of expression is fundamental to rehabilitation and the Restorative Justice movement. Prison art is a primary method of raising funds for legislative reform, prison reentry programs, and to support families with a loved one behind bars. Yet the prisoner is on their own when it comes to acquiring supplies for these endeavors. They receive no monies and very little recognition for their yeoman’s work. This leaves untapped, art, as a potential for rehabilitating the whole person. Art is a means of reforming the prisoner. Before I became a volunteer in the Prisoner Restorative Justice movement, I did not possess this sentiment. Creating art is a very lonely and internal process. It is an applied science. It’s all about figuring out and working out problems of expression. Contrast that, to the prisoner who feeds their senses with a healthy diet of entertainment, from playing cards, playing dominoes, watching television, or listening to the radio. But the artists and their art has to grow independent of this type of diet. When you can get a prisoner interested in the arts, you get a man or woman seeking for a deeper meaning. The imprisoned poet or writer wants to know the etymology of words. The imprisoned visual artist studies the geometry of shapes. Learning english or math because you want better outcomes in your craft, so that readers, seers, or hearers understand you better is transformative. But if America fails to acknowledge her talent gesturing inside her prisons, she is wasting an opportunity for better outcomes in her criminal justice system. I was the brainchild of an art exhibit that combined the works of two men’s prison, and a women’s prison. The women artist were precluded from having their names associated with their art. These artists were gender discriminated because of their sex. The most important element to an artist imprisoned or not, is to get their work out, and their name associated with that work. Failure to receive recognition can stunt the growth and kill the dreams of any inspiring artist. For the prisoner-artist this is especially challenging. Their greatest challenge is to get their work over the prison wall. When we are failing to tap into the therapeutic aspects of art, is there any wonder why our women prisoners have exceptionally high suicide rates? When we are failing to tap into the intellectual development that comes with wanting to improve as an artist, is there any wonder why are prisoners are ill-prepared for reentry? We must upgrade the status of this art form and the artist who apply themselves. Rewarding this type of behavior incentivize other prisoners to model this behavior. I know from experience trying to get other prisoners to participate in art, or to contribute works for fundraising, I am commonly asked, “Why should I?”

C-Note has written for Prison Action News, California Prison Focus, and has been in People Magazine, Public Television-Los Angeles (KCET), and ABC-Los Angeles (KABC). He is also a poet, playwright, painter, and performing artist, whose works have either been exhibited, performed, or sold, from Alcatraz to Berlin. In 2017 Google Search Engine results listed him as both “America’s most prolific prisoner-artist,” and the “World’s most prolific prisoner-artist.”

Black Love Matters: A Painting to Express Black Love in the Era of New Jim Crow

by Donald “C-Note” Hooker

Black Love Matters (2016)
5.5″x8.5″ (14×21.6cm)
Collage and ink on paper
Donald “C-Note” Hooker

Recently I have began to make Charity donations of some of my favorite and long-held works of my art. This particular work, Black Love Matters, I am donating to the national office of Critical Resistance. Critical Resistance is a national grassroots organization building an international movement to abolish the prison industrial complex. CR publishes a print publication three times a year called the Abolitionist. When most people hear the word abolitionist they think of slavery. The 13th Amendment to the United States Constitution which ended slavery states: “Slavery shall be abolished unless duly convicted.” That means slavery has not been abolished in the United States but it’s still legal for all its prisoners. If you don’t know who I am, or are unfamiliar with my work, my name is Donald “C-Note” Hooker, or better known as C-Note. I am also known as the King of Prison Hip Hop, or the American Ai Weiwei. So named after the former Chinese prisoner, dissident, activist, and probably the biggest contemporary artists on the planet right now. You can look me up on Google, and if you were to ask Google, “Who is America’s most prolific prisoner-artist?“; or “Who is the world’s most prolific prisoner-artist?” I would be ranked number one. I have asked several persons or groups with websites or other social media platforms if they would publish the background story in the making of Black Love Matters.

Black Love Matters is a painting that was specifically produced for an epic poem I had written entitled It Must End! (BLACK FEMALE BOYCOTTS AGAINST BLACK MEN IN THE PEN). The poem is about the intimate relationship between the incarcerated Black man, and the free Black woman in the era of Black Lives Matter. It is an exemplary piece of work that exemplifies Neo Jim Crow Art. For the uninitiated, Neo Jim Crow Art is a prisoner lead art movement by African-Americans. Neo Jim Crow is the drawings, writings, sound recordings and videos of incarcerated African Americans, and functions as a cultural record of incarceration on the Black experience in America. It is the artistic expression of New Jim Crow. The poem was initially titled I Hate Black Women but because I don’t hate Black women but love Black women I felt some sort of visual was needed to neutralize the harshness in the poem’s title. Much debate went into the title of the poem with fellow prisoners; until I eventually settled on the title being Dear Black Women. The painting was then published under that title. After some more back and forth with other prisoners who felt my gut instinct to the title I Hate Black Women was correct, I decided to change the name back to I Hate Black Women. Also it didn’t help that the name Dear Black Women, was too much akin to Tupac’s Dear Mama. In other words my title, Dear Black Women lacked originality. When it dawned on me that Google and Facebook algorithms would probably only see the title of this work, and deem the work as hate speech, once again I had to change the title of the piece. I finally settled on its current incarnation of It Must End! I then republished the painting under this new title. As a result of the Millions for Prisoner Human Rights March, and the length of the title, I change the paintings name again, this time to Black Love Matters. Since you can purchase the piece on canvas or in greeting cards, this name change was commercially more appealing. The painting is my very first collage. I look to using collages as a visual medium of expediency when I already have some literary piece finished, but I want to publish it with a visual, as in a Paintoem.

The prison bars was done with multiple colored ink pens. Ink is a traditional medium for prison art. The woman is of a darker-skinned Black woman, and that was by design. Historically, it’s been the lighter spectrum of Blackness as being held up to epitomize Black feminine beauty in America. This implication being her hue is nearer to White feminine beauty. This narrative of Black feminine beauty has been perpetrated even when Blacks control the casting, especially Black males, e.g., music videos. Because this is a known complaint in the Black community, that our light skinned sisters are our go-to girls, I could not participate in that. This is a painting about love for the Black woman, and for me, the darker hued sister leaves no ambiguity that Black Womanhood is being held up as a standard of beauty. As to the photo, it was a photo I had took in the auts after the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitations lifted a 10 year ban on prisoner photo taking within the institutions. Obviously, the picture just fits.
[Editor’s Note]: You can purchase Black Love Matters online in print, on canvas, clothing, greeting cards, and other fine products at Fine Art America.

Other collages by this artist at Fine Art America:

Life Without the Possibility of Parole Donated to the California Prison Focus. Also this work was turned into a paintoem (painting+poem), under the same title Life Without the Possibility of Parole and a prison play, under the same title Life Without the Possibility of Parole (A Prison Play).

Strange Fruit Doanated to the California Coalition for Women Prisoners. This work was also turned into a paintoem under the same title Strange Fruit

Coffee Bar Donated to Prisoner Express

Other recent charitable donations by this artist

Black August Los Angeles Donated to Partnership for Re-entry Program (PREP) -the Archdiocese of Los Angeles This work was also made into a paintoem of the same name Black August Los Angeles.

My Dilemma Donated to PREP. This work also was made into a paintome of the same name My Dilemma

Incarceration Nation Donated to California Prison Focus. This work also was made into a paintome of the same name Incarceration Nation

Mprisond Donated to the Prisoner Arts.      and this work also was made into a paintoem, and was the first one created Mprisond

Critical Resistance NationalOffice.                   1904 Franklin Street                                               Suite 504                                                            Oakland, CA 94612                                              Phone: (510) 444-0484                                            Fax: (510) 444-2177         croaklandd@criticalresistance.org wwwcriticalresistance.org

WHAT ARE PAINTOEMS?

Paintoems- are poems inspired by paintings or drawings; or paintings and drawings inspired by poems. They are combined together as a single work of Digital art. All paintoems are classified as a Creative Commons (CC). This means the public has the right to freely use these works as long as the artist or artists are acknowledged.

Paintoems come out of the world of prison art. The early 21st century has seen a turnaround regarding the purposes of incarceration. No longer viewed solely as punishment for crimes, but now can encompass rehabilitation. The strong emphasis on rehabilitation of the incarcerated derives from the restorative justice movement. A social advocacy movement with the belief that those who are incarcerated, didn’t just get there by accident. There were social, political, and economic factors that may have contributed to unlawful behavioral choices. In some communities, especially those of color, there can be a lack of opportunities, like access to good-paying jobs, and a decent education. These factors can have a devastating effect on a person’s options. As one longtime resident of South Los Angeles put it, “the only businesses they allow us to have around here, are liquor stores and churches. Liquor stores to make you sin, and churches to forgive your sins. The cycle begins the next morning at 6:00, when you bail Shorty out of jail.” [Editor’s Note: Bailing Shorty out of jail is an euphemism to mean a small/short can of beer, but can mean any kind of liquor, i.e., Shorty. Then freeing Shorty, or bailing Shorty out of jail, by buying his freedom from the liquor store.]

The restorative justice movement believes while incarcerated, let’s provide this person with the opportunity to have a successful re-entry back into society. If government, while they have these men and women in their custody won’t do it, once released, advocates will. This can include transitional housing, job training, education, jobs, substance abuse, or domestic abuse services. In addition to helping restore the whole person back into the community, restorative justice advocates are also active in changing laws. This can require lots of trips to the State capitol. Petition drives, to get petition signatures for putting measures on the voting ballot. This includes all the efforts that are required to get a measured passed. Restorative justice advocates don’t solely help prisoners, but give aide to family members of those incarcerated. Restorative justice takes a holistic approach to America’s mass incarceration problem. “It really takes on a whole new approach how we see one another,” says one advocate.

Prisoner artist, and Prisoner Restorative Justice Coordinator, Donald “C-Note” Hooker, created paintoems in 2016.
“I had found that prison art exibitions weren’t solely about the visual arts. There was always some literary component to it. Be it creative writing, poetry, or small plays. So the curators who were putting on these exhibits equally felt, having the public hear in their own words, the prisoners voice, greatly enriched their prison art exhibitions. Then there are the prisoner publications, which can be newsletters, newspapers, or magazines. They also in their publications want to publish, preferrably, politically inspired drawings, paintings, or poems. So in 2016, I came up with the idea, let’s put them together. Let’s create vignettes of poems inspired by paintings, or paintings/drawings inspired by poems; package them together, and give them to the public without ever getting our expressed written permission to do so. So now, a curator can just download from the internet, one of these paintoems, and enlarge it to whatever size they choose, and use this combination of painting + poem as part of their exhibit. Publishers, or anyone else, can use these paintoems however they want. We have one caveat, they can only be used as long as the artist or artists are acknowledged. When these works are published they always contain the artist name. Often times it’s two different artists, because one has contributed to the visual, the other the literal. As a Prisoner Restorative Justice Coordinator, I get artists together from different disciplines to create these works of art. Prisoner artists are vital to the restorative justice movement. Prison art is an invaluable part of charitable fundraising, for legislative reform, prison reentry programs, and aide to families with a loved one behind bars.”

Editor’s Note: Here’s a link to the world’s first paintoem.
Mprisond
If you know of any prisoner who would like to have their Paintoems published, or any non-prisoner, we’ll publish them on one of our poetry platforms.
Mprisond Poetz
The Street Poetz
Just inform us if they were created while incarcerated, or free, and send them to:
mprisondpoetz@gmail.com