From Love, an Exhibit at Bethany Arts Community with Sing Sing Family Collective

From Love* is an exhibition focused on human relationships (familial, romantic, and other) through the lens of incarceration. Anchored in family portraiture (photographs, drawings, paintings, and text/audio), created by currently/formerly incarcerated artists and their families, as well as several guest collaborators, the work tells a story about the power of human connection; revealing love as the key component to our survival and collective liberation. 

Exhibit Dates: October 8 – November 5
Gallery Hours:
Mon, Tue, Thu, Fri: 10 AM – 4 PM
Wed (October 19, November 2): 10 AM – 7:30 PM
Sat (October 8, October 22, November 5): 10 AM – 3 PM
Opening Reception: October 8, 2022 4:30-6:30 PM 

From Love is curated by currently incarcerated musician, composer, and SSFC Co-founder Joseph Wilson, in collaboration with Collective member, artist, and curator, Anna Adler, and presented in conjunction with Flyaway Productions Apparatus of Repair, acro-theater piece at Bethany, as part of BAC’s Season of Justice programming. 

*From Love aka From Love Community was created by Joseph & Renee Wilson in 2013, as an extension of their union into their community –Renee & Joseph met and married while Joseph was already incarcerated, together they have a daughter named Faith. Renee recognized the effects of incarceration on Joseph, together they realized that building relationships between incarcerated individuals and community members outside is a key to collective healing. Since then, they have worked together to promote these relationships as a holistic form of resistance to prison pathology; authentic human connection sits in vital opposition to the carceral state. Originally, the phrase From Love referred to their dream of creating an alternative communication system to JPay, (JPay is a subset of Securus technologies, the company that holds the monopoly on families’ communication with their loved ones in prison). From Love envisioned transportation, social media presence, and food/care packages – to keep loved ones connected with one another, hence From Love. Eventually From Love evolved into Renee’s social media account and became a way to connect with other prison families, coordinate bus trips to correctional facilities, and build dialogue and support around the carceral experience; Sing Sing Family Collective is an extension and evolution of that work. 

Photo of Joseph Wilson and daughter, Faith. Photographed by Osborne Association