Senteneced: Architecture and Human Rights, an exhibit on solitary confinement in United States prisons, opens this Thursday at Art In These Times. A collaborative effort between Architects/Designers/Planners for Social Responsibility (ADPSR) and Uptown People’s Law Center (UPLC), the exhibit aims to show the conditions of solitary confinement, the damage it does on prisoners and to “bring voices of imprisoned people into the dialogue of the struggle to end cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment in the United States.”

In 2012, ADPSR petitioned the American Institute of Architects to change its code of ethics to ban the design of both solitary confinement cells and execution chambers. In 2014, the AIA rejected the petition. Shortly after, ADPSR sent out a national call for submissions from people currently held in solitary confinement in United States prisons, which is estimated to be somewhere around 80,000. The exhibit is a collection of submissions of drawings by prisoners of their cells, as well as their experiences inside, along with art submitted to the UPLC, an organization dedicated to fighting for better conditions in Illinois prisons.

"Sentenced" - Exhibiton Poster
"Sentenced" - Exhibiton Poster - “Their work communicates both the devastation and degradation that these spaces inflict upon inhabitants as well as the resilience of these people despite abhorrent conditions,” said Lisbet Portman,” curator of the exhibit. “This is a way of bringing the people inside into that conversation— highlighting the role that designers play by asking the men themselves to design their spaces of confinement.” The typical size of a solitary cell is smaller than an average bathroom— 4.5 x 10 feet on the small end and 7 x 10 on the large. © Art In These Times