Unfinished Sentences is a series of oil paintings developed through close collaboration with formerly incarcerated artists. The works are rooted in personal archival photographs they shared with me, many taken before they or their loved ones were incarcerated. These images serve as entry points into lives that existed long before confinement, grounding the exhibition in memory, intimacy, and lived experience.

The exhibition considers how the carceral system interrupts personal narrative. In legal terms, a sentence is imposed. In language, a sentence unfolds over time, shaped by what comes before and what is permitted to follow. This tension informs the work, which resists closure and the singular definition that a carceral sentence attempts to enforce.

Rather than depicting incarceration directly, the paintings return to moments of childhood, tenderness, and the quiet beauty of ordinary life. By foregrounding early memory, the work invites recognition before judgment, asking viewers to sit in proximity to lives too often held at a distance. These images insist on complexity, emphasizing continuity over rupture.

The exhibition is accompanied by a poem written by currently incarcerated writer Mark Springer, hand-painted directly onto the gallery walls. The poem unfolds in fragments across the space, narratively guiding viewers through the paintings. It explores the ripple effect of incarceration, addressing both the lived experience of confinement and the ways it continues to shape life long after release. Together, the paintings and text provide voices from both formerly and currently incarcerated individuals, creating a layered dialogue that expands the exhibition’s emotional and narrative reach.

At its core, Unfinished Sentences seeks curiosity and understanding. By centering personal histories over confinement, the work reframes inherited assumptions about incarceration and asks viewers to look again, and with greater care. Lives are not fixed truths, but ongoing, complex human stories, deserving of attention, dignity, and space to unfold.