About the Project
Our Agreements
Using Gary Zukav’s book, The Seat of the Soul, as a tool along with personal reflections, Brandon and Alexandra will create a 42-card deck with questions and prompts. The guiding statement is: “As we strive for what we want we must ask ourselves if we are embodying it.” The project will primarily be focused in Galesburg, IL, where Hill Correctional Center is located and where Brandon is currently being housed.
The project title, Our Agreements, references the ways in which we all agree to show up in the world everyday to create what we perceive as our values, rules and regulations.
At a time in which jails and prisons are being questioned and we’re asking, “Why prisons?” we would like to push beyond that and ask, “What are we embodying that allows for spaces like this to exist in our cities?” The latter question strives to get away from blame and judgement directed at one particular person or institution but for a moment turns our energies inward, which are then reflected back onto the world around us.
Learn more about this project at ouragreements.blog.
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About the Artists
Alexandra Antoine
Alexandra Antoine is an interdisciplinary artist based in Chicago, IL. Her work examines traditional artistic practices throughout the African Diaspora with a focus on healing traditions, identity and culture through the use of collage, portraiture, and most recently, farming. She uses the portrait as a tool to re/present individuals of the African diaspora while exploring her relationship to them within the larger narrative of her Haitian identity.
Alexandra holds a Bachelor in Fine Arts and Arts Education from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Her work has been exhibited throughout the U.S. and is part of the Arts in Embassies program in the U.S. Embassy in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.
Learn More and Follow Alexandra
Brandon Wyatt
Brandon V. Wyatt is a “Universal Truth Seeker” who welcomes any involvement and indulges in progressive, productive, and peaceful affairs and developments. He is currently 38 years of age, and continues to defy the assumptions that come with age, race, and gender.
Despite being incarcerated for a significant amount of time, Brandon has made notable achievements in the realms of academics, social understanding, and personal development, which stems from his ability to be firm in knowing that his identity is established in a substance of unconditionality and infinite possibility.
Brandon has been a contributor to Envisioning Justice and many other programs and ventures, and has walked away each and every time with a heightened sense of accomplishment and an appreciation for being able to lend a voice to such weighty and urgent issues as mass incarceration and social inequities.
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About Illinois Humanities' Envisioning Justice program
Envisioning Justice brings Illinois together to examine and reimagine the criminal legal system through the arts and humanities.
Envisioning Justice leverages the arts and humanities to envision alternatives to the enduring injustice of mass incarceration. This Illinois Humanities initiative works with communities and people impacted by mass incarceration to spark conversation and illuminate community-based strategies that address our racist and unjust criminal legal system.
From 2017 to 2019, Envisioning Justice was concentrated in Chicago. Moving forward, Illinois Humanities is expanding this initiative and its attendant activities throughout the state. As a part of this next phase of Envisioning Justice, we will host and document community conversations, provide grant opportunities, and commission projects by artists and humanists working to shift the narrative around incarceration and system impacted communities.
Learn more about the Envisioning Justice program, including upcoming events and grant offerings.
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