Tamms is a Supermax prison in Southern Illinois that has been condemned in its human rights abuses by Amnesty international, Human Rights Watch, and New Yorker. The maximum-security portion of Tamms holds prisoners in constant solitary confinement leading to horrific mental deterioration. This prolonged solitary confinement is state sanctioned torture. I was especially compelled to collaborate with the campaign to reform Tamms Prison after reading testimony from prisoners held there. Prisoner testimony, and other information can be found at the Tamms Year 10 website, http://www.yearten.org/
To support the efforts of Tamms Year 10 campaign, myself, and a few other Milwaukee artists cut stencils and brought them to Chicago to post in a tactical media campaign. The idea to raise public awareness about Tamms through the use of mudstencils came from Nicolas Lampert, member of Just Seeds Radical Art Cooperative. This is the first time I have used mudstencils to address an issue that is not directly related to natural environments. Using mud gave us the freedom to post work during the day. We had a total of 30 volunteers working in groups of 3-4 to post stencils throughout Chicago. No one was even stopped by police. Working during the day allowed us to Dialog with community members. My group ran into several people who had friends of family in Tamms prison. They were happy to see that there are people who care about prisoners.
I just saw your work the other day on FreeSpeechTV. I was really favorably impressed, which led me to Google it…and—here I am! You’re certainly on to something, here. Just keep it up, is all I can suggest. You obviously have a lot of compassion and a lot of good views. Combine those with appropriate action, as you show you are quite capable of, and nothing can stop you. You are very inspiring. Keep the faith!
Tamms is a Supermax prison in Southern Illinois that has been condemned in its human rights abuses by Amnesty international, Human Rights Watch, and New Yorker. The maximum-security portion of Tamms holds prisoners in constant solitary confinement leading to horrific mental deterioration. This prolonged solitary confinement is state sanctioned torture. I was especially compelled to collaborate with the campaign to reform Tamms Prison after reading testimony from prisoners held there. Prisoner testimony, and other information can be found at the Tamms Year 10 website, http://www.yearten.org/
To support the efforts of Tamms Year 10 campaign, myself, and a few other Milwaukee artists cut stencils and brought them to Chicago to post in a tactical media campaign. The idea to raise public awareness about Tamms through the use of mudstencils came from Nicolas Lampert, member of Just Seeds Radical Art Cooperative. This is the first time I have used mudstencils to address an issue that is not directly related to natural environments. Using mud gave us the freedom to post work during the day. We had a total of 30 volunteers working in groups of 3-4 to post stencils throughout Chicago. No one was even stopped by police. Working during the day allowed us to Dialog with community members. My group ran into several people who had friends of family in Tamms prison. They were happy to see that there are people who care about prisoners.
http://www.yearten.org
http://www.justseeds.org
Thanks to Nicolas Lampert, Jacob Flom, Paul Kjelland, Stephanie Bollow, Tams Year 10 members, and all the Chicago volunteers.
Links to reports and articles, more photographs and video on this action to come.
Please sign this petition and forward it to others: http://www.juliehamos.org/tamms
We need your action!
video’s are up
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyezEF_lV1I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpL1izswJ-M&feature=related
i think your ideas are amazing..
i am from argentina, buenos aires- chivilcoy (a little city in the west of buenos aires)
i will do ecologise stencils !! and then i will tell you about it !!
heres is another of my websides momentosc.blogspot.com
I just saw your work the other day on FreeSpeechTV. I was really favorably impressed, which led me to Google it…and—here I am! You’re certainly on to something, here. Just keep it up, is all I can suggest. You obviously have a lot of compassion and a lot of good views. Combine those with appropriate action, as you show you are quite capable of, and nothing can stop you. You are very inspiring. Keep the faith!