“Prison Reform: A Bird’s Eye View” (2025) Page 2

This piece features ten found photographs arranged to depict three female peafowls trapped in a pit while five males loom above them. Peafowls were chosen for their symbolism, as the male’s striking tail feathers have earned it the title “King of Birds,” representing authority and power. According to the Council on Criminal Justice, female inmates are two to four times more likely than male inmates to experience sexual assault by both staff and fellow prisoners. A subtle filter effect distorts the scene, reflecting the public’s misunderstanding or disregard of this reality.

This piece consists of just two found photographs, recontextualized to depict a solitary Gambel’s Quail perched on an uncomfortable bed inside a jail cell. The original background photo has been altered to render the walls a striking shade of green. The work is layered with irony: the Quail, a symbol of community and group harmony, is shown in isolation. The green walls serve as a visual metaphor for the absence of natural environments in carceral settings. This absence of trees, grass, and open sky has been shown to negatively impact mental health, prompting initiatives like California’s Rehabilitation Through Beautification. Founded by infamous inmate Lyle Menendez, the program includes The Greenspace Project, which aims to bring nature into prisons to support psychological well-being and promote healing.

This photomontage, composed of fifteen found images, features Woodpeckers, symbols of persistence and labor, working industriously on a tree. As they toil, disembodied hands emerge to collect the wealth generated from their efforts. The work draws inspiration from prison labor systems in the United States, where incarcerated people often perform menial, hazardous tasks for negligible or no pay. While this labor yields billions in economic value for both public and private sectors, it offers few rights or rehabilitative benefits to those performing it. This collage critiques this exploitative dynamic, exposing the disparity between the workers’ effort and the profits reaped by others.

This photomontage is composed of nine found photographs, arranged to depict three Ravens confined in a cardboard box guarded by two cats. In one of the barred windows, a Barn Owl, selected for its signification of intuition and insight, tries to see what is happening inside, representing the minority of the U.S. population who recognize the problems within the U.S. prison system and want to do something about them.

The Ravens, chosen for their associations with bad luck and ominous fate, symbolize incarcerated individuals. The cats, natural predators of birds, represent the punitive prison system, reinforcing the power imbalance and abuse inmates often face. Set against the backdrop of a dim basement, the scene evokes how society pushes the realities of incarceration out of sight, reflecting public apathy and the marginalization of those behind bars.

This piece is composed of fourteen found photographs arranged to depict a cramped cage filled with black birds of various species. The overcrowding has left some birds visibly agitated, reflecting the psychological toll of confinement in such limited space. This collage draws attention to the widespread issue of prison overcrowding in the United States and the severe lack of privacy incarcerated individuals face. These conditions are known to heighten tensions, contribute to mental health deterioration, and increase the risk of violence, self-harm, and suicide behind bars.

This piece is composed of fourteen found photographs, collaged to depict a violent confrontation in a prison recreation yard. In the foreground, a Blue Jay attacks a Cardinal, while various birds—other Blue Jays, Cardinals, Pigeons, Ducks, Sparrows, and Finches—gather in segregated groups to witness the altercation. Each species remains within its own cluster, symbolizing the racial and ethnic divisions that define gang structures in the U.S. prison system.

The birds were not selected for their individual symbolic meaning, but rather for their visual contrast when grouped, underscoring the constructed separations that mirror real-world dynamics. While prison officials have made efforts to dismantle gang affiliations, these groups persist—often maintaining order through intimidation and violence—highlighting the complex and contradictory role they play within carceral institutions.

This work features four bald Cardinals enclosed in a stark cellblock, an unsettling image meant to reflect the 15–20% of incarcerated individuals living with severe mental illness. The bald Cardinals, though not actually unwell, were chosen for their harsh, jarring appearance to symbolize how mental illness is perceived and how the mentally ill are punished.

The piece references the aftermath of mid-20th century deinstitutionalization, when state psychiatric hospitals closed en masse without adequate replacement by community care. As a result, prisons have become the default mental health institutions in the U.S. Carceral systems are fundamentally unfit to provide meaningful mental health care. Within them, people with mental illness often endure solitary confinement, neglect, and worsening symptoms, revealing the deep overlap between systems of punishment and systems of care.

This photomontage, the first in a series of five photomontages that explore the ways in which a human's brain changes when subjected to solitary confinement, is composed of three found photos. I experimented with layering and blending techniques to achieve the final composition. Once again, the bird was chosen not for its symbolic meaning but for its appearance. The subject, a Guillemot—a diving seabird—represents a struggle for survival. The depths of the ocean mirror the depths of depression and the isolation of solitary confinement. The bird frantically swims toward the surface, but in the distance, a Great White shark looms—an apex predator embodying the overwhelming and inescapable weight of depression.

This work is the second in the Solitary series and is composed of two found photos, featuring a Seagull as the central subject due to its distinctive, piercing scream. The bird stands alone in a dark tunnel, symbolizing the isolation of solitary confinement. As the Gull cries into the abyss, its image is enlarged, slightly rotated, and faded in opacity, visually conveying the disorienting downward spiral of anxiety.

This piece, the third in the Solitary series, is composed of two found photographs, one of which is duplicated and layered in varying sizes and opacities to surround the head of a single, ordinary Pigeon set against a stark black background. The central Pigeon, chosen as a bird that symbolizes vulnerability, represents an incarcerated individual living with mental illness, while the surrounding Victoria Crowned Pigeons symbolize the intrusive voices or hallucinations that often accompany such conditions. This collage addresses two urgent mental health crises in the U.S. prison system: the disproportionate incarceration of individuals with mental illness, and the psychological harm that carceral environments can inflict—sometimes inducing mental health issues in people who previously had none.