Artist’s Choice: Disobedient Images

Artist and activist Mark Strandquist explores how art can be a collaborative vehicle and tool to transform the criminal justice system. Join Strandquist for a conversation with Richmond youth participating in a new project focused on radically reimagining public safety in our schools and communities.

Mark Strandquist has spent years using a multitude of mediums (from virtual reality, to parades, to immersive installations) to amplify the voices, dreams, and demands of youth and adults impacted by the criminal justice system. His work goes beyond simply representing issues by by most impacted by mass incarceration to co-design campaigns, police trainings, and national projects that create impacts on personal and systemic levels.

Strandquist has received multiple awards, fellowships, national residencies, and reached wide audiences through the NY Times, the Guardian, NPR, the Washington Post, PBS NewsHour, VICE, and many others. He currently directs the People’s Paper Co-op in Philadelphia, PA, and the Performing Statistics project in Richmond, VA. In 2016, he and his partner Courtney Bowles were awarded A Blade of Grass fellowship for Socially Engaged Art to begin the Philadelphia Reentry Think Tank.