The role of art in the rehabilitation of youth offenders
Posted on | 1/21/11 | No Comments
I was a volunteer guide/translator and then an intern at a gallery in Albuquerque by the name of 516arts a few years ago. This gallery is (was?) a non profit and focused on education rather than sales. They had a very strong education program. I think the coordinator has since left the art world, overwhelmed by the same sense of disillusionment that attacks so many young artists. But before then I learned a great deal from him. One of his (in my opinion) most important projects was a program he set up with a local juvenile detention center to have groups of these young boys brought to the gallery. These were as far as I know, low level youth offenders, not say, murderers or repeat offenders, so they had field trip priviledges. Sadly, the man from the detention center told us that around 80% of these kids were back in the center before a year had passed. This was seriously crushing for me even though I only saw most of these kids once and I was only able to participate maybe 4 times. Today I am going to describe what we would do and why I believe in this type of project and it's role in the rehabilitation of offenders. I also believe it wouldwork with adults and I hope I get a chance to pursue it again at a later date.
