В штате Вермонт открыли музейную выставку лоскутного одеяла, созданного заключенными

BRATTLEBORO — A quilt started by incarcerated men made the rounds through the local community and will have its own museum exhibit before heading back to the prison for permanent display. Marie-Pierre Py, reentry coordinator at Interaction: Youth Services & Restorative Justice, said she believes the project shows "our programs work." "This is the stuff of hope," she said. "I think the quilt is a really powerful symbol for transformation and hope." Py works with people in prison and people who are just coming out. She facilitates the Circles of Support and Accountability program and helps participants find work, housing and ways to reduce recidivism. Interaction has hosted restorative reentry circles at Southern State Correctional Facility for about three years now, Py said. The program offers support and builds accountability. Interaction ran a workshop from September 2025 to April in which men were taught to quilt. Sewing machines and material donated by the community were brought into the prison. The quilt is titled "Fractured Not Broken." Py said the Prison Research and Innovation Network (PRIN), a program at the University of Vermont, wanted to support the making of the quilt. Interaction also received financial support from the Vermont Arts Foundation. After the incarcerated men created the patchwork, Py said, it became apparent that the project wanted to be bigger. At community events, local residents were invited to add to the quilt. Py said the project supports the idea that "building trusting relationships and community inclusion are transformative." For incarcerated people to reenter community, she added, "they need to be held in community." All the programs at Interaction are about keeping people connected to their communities or connecting or reconnecting them and reducing involvement in the criminal justice and child welfare systems, said Russell Bradbury-Carlin, executive director at Interaction. "We saw the quilt as this opportunity to really demonstrate and build community between the incarcerated men who made it and the community members who are going to welcome them home," Py said. Workshops were held at Gallery Walk, the Brattleboro Food Co-op and Brooks Memorial Library. More than 100 people contributed to the quilt, Py said. "It's been really sweet how much the community has been interested ... in participating and learning more about the realities of incarceration in Vermont and how we work with folks who are incarcerated to help transform their lives," Py said. Those contributing to the quilt were encouraged to be creative. They made designs such as a turtle and zigzags, and wrote messages such as "Repair is possible," "Change is possible," and "You are a valued member of the community." "These are the messages that will then return to the prison with the quilt," Py said. After being displayed at Brattleboro Museum & Art Center this fall, the quilt will be put in the visiting room at the prison. A dozen incarcerated men made the sun prints included in the quilt, and six others designed the quilt and created the patchwork. Art allows for expression and taps into healing, Py said. "I was drawn to fabric with images of liquor bottles because I was drawn to the colors and because drinking and partying had so much to do with my past behavior and how I ended up in prison," an artist said in a statement. "I stopped drinking after I saw the negative things I was capable of when I was drunk. I am working on changing the other behaviors I now know lead me to behave negatively. I used half square triangles to create two pieces that mirror each other, but with the colors inverted, to show you can get completely opposite results working from the same stuff." Another artist said he painted "a phoenix, breaking free from captivity and emerging in full glory." "This is my hope for all of us," he said. Another artist credited quilting with helping with grief experienced after his younger brother died. "I added my poetry to the piece to convey that I have learned every choice I make shapes my future," another artist said. "I had to mature to comprehend that change is a natural part of life, which is why I am asking for one chance, one opportunity to show who I really am." Since the project involves sharp objects, the prison is careful about who could participate, Py said. She described the room being "completely silent" when the men were at work. "There was just total focus and dedication to the quilt," she said. "The prison really appreciated that we offered this workshop because they saw how making art in this way really grounded the men and regulated their nervous systems." Seeing the importance of having an art space in the prison and making connections in the community, the plan is to offer painting and drawing at the prison soon. Py said the prison is "really supportive of us running a new art program that involves more people just because it makes their work easier when the men are regulated." "This was the first visual arts program in the prison in quite a while," she said. "I think COVID stopped a lot of the stuff that was happening." Interaction's partners at Greater Falls Community Justice Center started a music program at the prison in which one of the quilters also participates. He wrote a song that was recorded by a Circles of Support and Accountability graduate and will be featured alongside the quilt at the museum. Alli Cooper-Ellis, a UVM student conducting a prison climate survey at Southern State with PRIN, played viola when the quilters were working. "She was so moved by how well they were collaborating," Py said, "that she ended up composing a piece of classical music in their honor." Py said the music was performed at the UVM Philharmonic spring concert and notes from the score were incorporated into the border of the quilt. A recording also will be part of the museum exhibit. Given the quilt and all its related contributions, Py said, "It's this piece of art that's truly a piece of community art." Interaction's work can be "depleting" at times, Bradbury-Carlin said, given the political climate and growing complexities for clients. A project demonstrating "the positive things ... has been really enriching to me," he said. "At a staff meeting, we had a whole presentation on the quilt there," he said. "People were crying. It's really inspirational." Bradbury-Carlin said he feels people are "extremely thirsty for more of those experiences, whether they happen here or elsewhere in the community." "Accompanying people through the hard stuff, we really do see transformational stuff happening," Py said. "Transformation is hope."