 My life was here and none of myself was born like myself All this craziness can't be good for my Well I think I've done a bunch of ideas I break up on it That's appellate I'm Chester's mother And this is Chester's daughter So it's untrainable Transplant That's a no I don't know what that means I'm going to volunteer to be a volunteer I can tell you this is my leg You want to wear that? I don't want to be I'm going to talk to people They already accepted Is there a volunteer type? I'm not interested in women That's a lie Women don't know how to say no No, we care about it I'm standing in the gallery as you can see and I have spent many long days and nights here surrounded by your beautiful work and I feel extremely lucky that you have trusted me with your artwork things that are so personal to you. I feel really fortunate to have met you because I know all the people here who come in every day are so touched and moved by your work. It means so much for people in completely different situations that you are to hear and see and relate to your experiences. I'm blown away every day I come in here. I learned something new about you and about your art and what it means and in this space you guys have all come together to produce something absolutely amazing. I have people come in here every day saying yeah it's about art but it's about so much more. Oh okay, oh so you're watching. You know what's happening. Okay great, yes. I did not expect this tonight. Walking by we were just truly captivated reading all of the poems and all of the writing and looking at all of this truly remarkable artwork and it just completely and totally moved by it and moved by not only the talent but the hope and art is truly healing and it's evident and clear that that doesn't know any borders and I'm really glad that we stopped and saw this show tonight. I'm really glad for you know what this what these people are doing because it's it's extremely important you should never be defined by the worst thing you've ever done and the fact that art is giving you know these people hope is it's moving it's remarkable so thank you. That's been amazing is when people come in when I'm here and we start talking about the show they start opening up about their experiences either with incarceration loved ones who have been inside and also just their feelings about prisons as a whole and regardless everyone comes in and says how can this continue how can I get them art supplies it's amazing that they can make art in the first place and people are so excited by seeing what you create it's it's awesome to see people just light up when they look at your painting your drawing your poem it's it's super cool. I just want to say it's incredibly moving many of the pieces not all of them are of the same content for me in particular ones where a person has been incarcerated for a long time and has discovered that art is a way to get through it I've always worked with homeless people for my entire career and many of those are folks who have come out of incarceration and have not been prepared or given what they need to be in the world outside after long periods of being in prison and I just think anything that helps people become creative find themselves and their own value in the world and art is one way to feel good about yourself and to recognize who you are anything like that is so valuable and I just was incredibly moved I think this is a great exhibit and I think the work that you're all doing up there is hopefully as healing to you as it is moving to me. Looking at the exhibit today to be a human being and have all of these different types of experiences that we have and how amazing it is that we can all just remember beauty remember nature have imagination be able to create and especially seeing the the art that is just amazing the woodwork this the self-taught nature of so many of you who have created incredible incredible things that will outlive you you've already done so much because you've given people something that will outlive them even the youngest of us those wooden pieces will be there for a very long time and then the windows out to nature I really love that and the scraps made out of brown paper bag just to show us that we can make art anywhere and that we can send messages out to the world in so many different ways so thank you so much you've filled me up today. I used to measure myself based off of my material materialistic items and people that I have known that to what I was but I didn't realize that I was captive to these perceived perception that I had of myself that I was only worth that I wished I was surrounded by I have come to understand that in captivity after losing all that I've ever had anybody I have ever known I am now free free to be myself free to be able to stop being what everybody else wants me to be free of all the past hurts that I had ever known free of everything else that has ever helped has that had me shackled to what everybody else wanted me to be it is my prayer that through these words it provokes thought inside an individual so that they can think to themselves that are we being who we are because they want us to be who we are or are we being who we are based on who we truly are are we being held captive by our friends are we being held captive by our money by our technology are we being held captive by all these things that are unnecessary or are we truly being ourselves so I ask that you answer yourself this question are you being yourself are you being captain to that of which somebody else wants you