Green Haven art show returns to Vassar

Mally Anderson Arts Editor

It is difficult to imagine that many Vassar students feel as though the school hasn’t broadened their knowledge of people, environments and ideas different from their own. In keeping with this set of values, Vassar brings students the third annual Green Haven Prison Art Show, exhibiting works by currently and formerly incarcerated artists from area prisons. The exhibit, which opened on Tuesday, April 3, works in conjunction with the Green Haven Prison Program at Vassar, a program that brings students and incarcerated people together for interaction and education. The artists educate Vassar students about prison life, and students offer information about events in their world.

This year’s featured artist is Calvin “Peter Black” Frett, who, since his time in prison in the late ’60s and ’70s (he was released in 1990), has continued to produce art in the New York area. The nickname comes from Frett’s time studying under the artist Peter Max and making copies of his work. Frett adapted Max’s style so well that someone started calling him “Peter Black,” a name he liked and still uses professionally. Frett visited campus on Tuesday for the exhibit’s opening reception.

Tuesday’s show, in which Frett debuted his artwork, was packed with diverse and interesting pieces, ranging from portraits to pop culture images by a variety of artists including Frett. A standout piece that Frett also stated was a favorite of his own works in the show—entitled “Seeker of Knowledge”—depicts a rabbi teaching a small child. Frett noted that he created the painting from a photo, and was inspired by the child’s seeming enthusiasm toward learning.

Frett first became involved with art in the early part of his 12-year sentence, when he wanted to make a birthday card for his baby daughter and asked some of the men who knew how to paint for instruction. He learned from watching those other artists and began producing extensive work during his time in prison.

Frett describes himself as a social artist, and said that he paints “things that I see every day that create a history and send a message.”

He noted that his favorite of all the paintings he has created is one that he made in prison for Pope John Paul II. Frett had seen a picture of the Pope in an African village holding a baby, and was inspired by John Paul’s being “the first Pope I [had] seen who practiced what he preached.” He made a painting from the image and sent it to the Vatican City. Six months later, he received a reply from the Pope thanking him for the piece.

“That really touched me,” said Frett. He noted that that experience was important in determining his artistic direction, which was to make art that educated and inspired people, especially children.

Frett cited the Iraq War as his current source of artistic inspiration, which will also be an important theme that connects the works he will exhibit in the Green Haven Prison Art Show. He painted a series about the repercussions for veterans of the Vietnam War during the 1970s, and said that his current work is “trying to show how nothing has changed since then.”

In addition to painting, Frett devotes much of his time to the Peter Black Prison Art Collective, a project that gained nonprofit organization status from the government this week. Frett said that after spending 12 years in prison it was extremely difficult to re-establish himself in society, especially as an artist. The Collective’s goal is to remedy that problem and to help released people “try to make it as artists without judging them [for their criminal pasts]” by purchasing supplies and organizing exhibits such as the one at Vassar. “You could call this a clearing house,” said Frett. “We’re trying to be their patron.”

Frett’s partner in the Collective, a man who goes by the name of Crocker, organizes the administrative aspect of the project. Crocker was also an artist during his time in prison, and painted large murals in Attica and Green Haven prisons during the ’70s. He met Frett in the ’80s and identified with the difficulties of an artist released from prison.

“Many [of the artists] can’t be exposed to the public,” said Crocker, who noted that “what we hope to do is encourage the artists so we can market their work to help them raise money for their families.”

As part of the Saturday, April 7 show, the Green Haven Prison Program will host a day-long reunion for Vassar students and graduates who have participated in the program, giving them a chance to reconvene with participants released from prison (though this event is open to everyone). The reunion, which begins at 1:30 p.m., will consist of lectures, discussions, and workshops, all discussing issues pertaining to prisons in New York and elsewhere in the United States.

Speakers will include a panel of men and women since released from prison, Muslim chaplain Imam Salahuddin Muhammad, and Divine Pryor and Eddie Ellis of the Nu Leadership Policy Group, a public policy think tank run by previously incarcerated professionals. Saturday also marks the last day of the exhibit, which is on display in the Aula every day until then from 9 a.m.-7 p.m.