Department of Corrective Services art collection

Inmate artworks purchased by the Department of Corrective Services.

"If there is something really nice about my art work, it is the freedom I get from it. I spend many hours every evening in my cell creating, building and bringing to life the dreams that go through my mind when I think about my lovely family.

"What really makes it interesting is the way I have to use my improvisation skills to create from scrape of any kind these beautiful constructions. It brings me lots of satisfaction and the peace of mind I need.

"I collect for my work cardboard, wood sticks, paperclips, buttons, plastic containers, transparent chocolate boxes, pins, matches, golden tapes, coffee jars, bottles, nuts, pasta, confetti, thumb tacks, sticky tape, foam, etc - anything I can put my hands on."

'10 Wing' by Javier, Mixed Media, 48cm x 50cm x 98cm, 1997 (LBCC.BGG)

"Art is my inner 'outer'. If only they knew where I go every night the alarms would be ringing and I would be doing a million years for escape!!!"

'Long Bay Hilton Foyer' by Terry, 160cm x 120cm, acrylic on canvas, 2001 (THOM.ST)

"I found the stretchers under a pile of rubbish. The thought took me that inmates and that pile of rubbish had something in common. Men lying on stretchers waiting to be discarded. Death. Injury. Suicide. The stretchers just rubbish also.

"The poem, 'Then Along Came Art' was my way of using a discarded item, to show we all have importance. I have hope. I am no one's rubbish. Art gives me freedom."

'Deaths in Custody' and 'Then Came Art', 2000, by Chris, Ink on Medical Stretchers, 229cm x 68cm each (LBCC.BGG)

'Untitled' by Anthony, 1997, acrylic on canvas, 168cm x 120cm (THOM.ST)

'Light Within', by Jayde, 74cm x 180cm, acrylic on canvas, 2021 (THOM.ST)

'Holding Cell 1', by Quang, 2008, 20 x 23cm, acrylic on paper (THOM.ST)

'Snake Hair Gorgon', by Giovanni, 1996, acrylic on canvas, 148 x 117cm (THOM.ST)

'Clock and Aboriginal Designs', by Steven, 2000, clock and acrylic on canvas, 100 x 75cm (LBCC.BGG)

'8:17', by Chris, 2015, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 80cm (THOM.ST)

'Kangaroo and Emu', by Fredrick, 1992, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 76cm

'Water', by Allan, 1996, 174 x 120cm, acrylic on canvas

'Untitled', by Anthony, 1994, acrylic on canvas, 118 x 137cm (LBCC.RC)

'Innovations of Identifications', by Geoff, 2003, acrylic on canvas, 120cm x 120cm (THOM.ST)

'The Club', by Zig, 2001, acrylic on canvas, 80cm x 65cm

'The Club Long Bay', by Zig, 2001, acrylic on canvas, 91cm x 65cm

'Self Portrait', by Geoff, 2005, Graphite on Paper, 59cm x 42cm (THOM.ST)

'In Sense', by Geoff, 2005, Graphite on Paper, 59cm x 42cm (THOM.ST)

"...this meant seeing the everyday comings and goings of gaol life with a fresh vision. The commonplace became as important and noteworthy as the dramatic. The social customs around me soon coalesced into a 'gaol culture': the yard, with it's cliques and its pacing; the inmates' telephone with its impatient queue; the muster; the weekly 'buy-up' with inmates hanging out for their weekly tobacco, and others waiting in the wings for debts to be repaid; the frenetic activity lining up for food..."

Zig 2005

'Dining In', by Zig, 2000, Linocut on paper, 90cm x 60cm

"My project became the documentation of these social customs. Gaol is a world where property is limited and choices are virtually removed from the individual. Under these conditions, human behaviour adapts itself for survival in ways that are ingenious. It is the same for culture and its customs. It is not that these behaviour and customs are profoundly different, but that they are greatly simplified; the subtleties and social cues are reduced to the minimum required to survive. In documenting this world that most people consider to be so alien, I found that I was holding up a mirror that showed it to be the same world as their own, with the cosmetics removed."

Zig 2005

'Whispers', by Zig, 2000, Linocut on paper, 90cm x 60cm