"Release: From Stigma to Acceptance", George Catlin's Buffalo, Sharon Robinson, and Amplifier Zine

Lisa Blee and Release: From Stigma to Acceptance

In the mid-80s there were roughly 500,000 people serving time in our nation's jails and prisons. Today that number is close to 2 million. Each year tens of thousands of former inmates return home after serving their time.  Release: From Stigma to Acceptance is a fascinating student-curated exhibition going on at the Sawtooth School for Visual Art in Winston-Salem chronicles that often traumatic period of transition. Release features the words and visual art of former offenders who have graduated from Project Re-entry. Through documented interviews with Wake Forest University Public History Course students, they've shared the personal challenges they face re-entering society: adjusting to life outside, finding employment, trusting their support systems outside of prison, and learning to believe in themselves again. 

In today's show, we sample from an original song titled "These Four Walls". It was composed and performed in the Forsyth Correctional Center in Winston by Project Re-entry graduates Stephen McBride and Eric Parnell. Release: From Stigma to Acceptance the student-curated exhibition at the Sawtooth School for Visual Art in Winston-Salem will remain on display through February 28^th. Wake Forest University Assistant Professor of History Lisa Blee spoke with David Ford about what has become a transformative experience for both the students and Project Re-entry participants.

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Elizabeth Chew of Reynolda House and "George Catlin's Buffalo"

Back in the 1830s George Catlin was among the first painters to chronicle the Indian chiefs of the American West, and the Great Plains buffalo upon which they and their tribes depended. Although Catlin was underappreciated and plagued with debt throughout his adult life, he was a visionary whose 500 plus paintings did much to shape our perceptions of 19^th century Native American culture. The Reynolda House Museum of American Art exhibition is titled George Catlin's American Buffalo. 

The exhibit opens Friday, February 13^th. Several related programs and events are planned through May including Elizabeth's gallery talk on Thursday, February 19^th at noon, and on March 5^th it's an after hours exploration of objects from the WFU Museum of Anthropology including beadwork and bow and arrow making workshops with Sawtooth School instructor Dane Snodgrass.  

On April 11^th from 11-3 it'll be Community Day: Pow Wow Cultural Festival on the Reynolda lawn, presented by the Guilford Native American Association. Representatives from NC tribes will share traditional art, storytelling, dance and drumming. On April 16^th the program titled Lakota Voices with young Native American Indian members of the South Dakota tribe share oral histories of their ancestors, and chronicle their struggles to retain their language and culture during a dark chapter in our nation's history. David Ford spoke with Reynolda House Curatorial and Education Division Director Elizabeth Chew.  

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Sharon Robinson

Sharon Robinson is a writer, educator, and former nurse midwife. She is also the daughter of baseball legend Jackie Robinson. After playing with the Kansas City Monarchs of the Negro Leagues, Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in Major League Baseball in 1947 when he joined the Montreal Royals, the farm team for the Brooklyn Dodgers.