Biography: Unwritten
Using the Death Penalty Information Center’s extensive database as my primary, starting resource, Biography: Unwritten, considers the issue of wrongful conviction with a focus on the most egregious of erroneous judgements – the death penalty. My goal is to create a book for each exonerated person included on DPIC’s Innocence Database since the early 1970’s (nearly 200 to date). The title of each book is a person’s name, suggesting that the book is a memoir or biography. But the pages are not only empty, they are glued and cemented shut, suggesting the harshness of a prison cell, as well as lost time for those wrongly convicted and sent to death row. It is not until the final page of the book when the viewer discovers some words – the facts of the person’s wrongful conviction and their time spent on death row, many for over 20 years. A simple statement also appears here on this final page. “Missed having a family” or “Missed his dream life, living simply and working hard”. These words have been derived from my in-depth research into each person and suggest a milestone or a simple moment which has been lost. These are the empty biographies of innocent men and women who were incarcerated on death row for crimes they did not commit.
Displayed on floating shelves, each book sits upon untitled books, paying homage to those wrongly convicted but who perished on death row. Viewers are encouraged to pick up a book, bearing witness to its contents or lack thereof. The books tell the “unwritten” stories of people whose lives have not been lived, who upon release from prison struggle to find a place for themselves in a world quite different from the one they left behind. These empty books mimic the fragile lives wasted and lost within a system, hardened, or broken by prison life and denied of content. The collection of lost stories presented in Biography: Unwritten subconsciously prompts us to consider the simple moments so often taken for granted. We reflect on our own lives and wonder how we would be without having had some of the most basic and simple experiences, as well as major milestones. While holding a book, viewers may consider their own lives and the preciousness of these missed moments which become even more profound in their absence. Some viewers find themselves identifying, at least momentarily, with the subject of the biography, imagining the experience of an innocence denied. This simple act momentarily compels us to identify with the helplessness of the wrongfully convicted. It is my hope that my art promotes conversation, encourages questioning, and brings awareness to wrongful conviction, the death penalty, incarceration, and the criminal justice system overall.
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