There is a difference between seeing and looking at something: to see is when something without any intention comes into your view and you become aware of it existing, like a bird flying over the sky… But to look at something is to observe and discover it in all different angles and know it in the best way.

YB

The Jessiefield Collection is an imaginary museum which grew out of a year-long collaboration with people in prison at HMP Dumfries.

‘Jessiefield’ is the local name for the fields on which the prison was built in 1883. Co-creators began by discussing existing photographs of the prison from the Historic Environment Scotland Archives. They traced the parts they found interesting and listed the things they felt were missing. What could or should be remembered about this place? The group then used a range of photographic methods to respond to this question, moving from tracing the images to tracing the institution itself by making rubbings on paper towels, to studio photographs documenting everyday gestures, to installations of work in progress. When we discussed the artwork, we found that circles were often mentioned, and began cropping the images using this shape.

Co-creators installed their artwork in the prison Learning Centre, Visits Room and garden. Photographing these temporary displays transformed them, along with the surrounding fabric of the place, into permanent ‘exhibits’ in our museum, which can now travel outside the prison. These images blur the distinction between process and finished work, forming an incomplete record of a complex creative conversation. The result is a textured record of a place. It is also a collaborative meditation on what it is to record, to document and to co-create, and what it means to do so whilst imprisoned. – Alice Myers

The project focuses on traces and echoes of prisoners… We tried to capture the physical and emotional perspectives of being incarcerated… It is hoped that through this project, the prison can communicate with the audience, and allow a deeper understanding of the complex life inside. Additionally, it can act as a way to capture the present for future use.

SW

Project by YB, AK, SW, PD, BMB, JP, SP, GD, WL, Anon, BM, NC, NT, KF, TA and Alice Myers.