Shank = Survival (2013)
Shank = Survival
This project is inspired by the mono-mythological stages of initiation, survival, and return. My intention is to align these archetypal ideas with the lived realities of time served in prison. Within many impoverished communities, incarceration functions as a rite of passage. I metaphorically situate prison within the mythic stage of the "Belly of the Beast," where, through violence and acts of endurance, heroes are born or reborn.
Central to the work is the shank/shiv, employed as a metaphor for heroism while simultaneously evoking the violence and homoerotic undertones often associated with prison life. I am also interested in concealment and disguise—where, from a distance, color and material camouflage gender, identity, and the latent danger of each object.
The project also draws from myths and fables throughout history, in which the hero, called to adventure, must forge or be gifted a weapon—often bejeweled or ornamented—by an aid or mentor to prepare for the unknown. In this way, the prison shiv becomes both weapon and talisman: a tool of survival and a marker of transformation.