Art, architecture, and incarceration collide in essays on prison design from the Panopticon to the Golden Gulag.
As unprecedented hunger strikes continue at Guantánamo Bay and in California federal prisons, two recent features on Places explore the politics and aesthetics of prison design.
In an essay adapted from his book Corrections and Collections, Joe Day compares the proliferation of American prisons and museums since the 1960s and finds intriguing parallels in how institutional architectures have responded to cultural movements from Minimalism to post-Millenialism. Art and crime collide in buildings from Jeremy Bentham's Panopticon through Frank Lloyd Wright's Guggenheim to contemporary work by Peter Zumthor, Rem Koolhaas and others.
In Geographies of Detention, adapted from an exhibition at the California Museum of Photography, Catherine Gudis and Molly McGarry present art and documentary work, by Sandow Birk, Alyse Emdur, Richard Ross and the Guantánamo Public Memory Project, that investigates prison landscapes.
FULL STORY: Corrections and Collections
Eastern State Penitentiary: A Class about the Past Speaks to the Present and the Future
Built as an embodiment of the ideals of prison reformers, the Eastern State Penitentiary had running water and central heating before the White House, and housed the first synagogue built in an American prison.
Do the 'Art Everywhere' Billboards Support Art, or Advertising?
With so many eyes trained obsessively on mobile phones, the outdoor industry is supporting a campaign to place famous art on billboards around the country. Will people notice? Should they?
Coming to a Billboard Near You: The 'Art Everywhere' Project
Voting for a new project called "Art Everywhere" is currently open to the public on works from five of the country’s largest and most respected museums. The vote will help decide which images get placed on some 50,000 billboards this summer.
‘Forward Together’ Bus System Redesign Rolling Out in Portland
Portland is redesigning its bus system to respond to the changing patterns of the post-pandemic world—with twin goals of increasing ridership and improving equity.
Plan to Potentially Remove Downtown Milwaukee’s Interstate Faces Public Scrutiny
The public is weighing in on a suite of options for repairing, replacing, or removing Interstate 794 in downtown Milwaukee.
Can New York City Go Green Without Renewable Rikers?
New York City’s bold proposal to close the jail on Rikers Island and replace it with green infrastructure is in jeopardy. Will this compromise the city’s ambitious climate goals?
700-Acre Master-Planned Community Planned in Utah
A massive development plan is taking shape for lakefront property in Vineyard, Utah—on the site of a former U.S. Steel Geneva Works facility.
More Cities Ponder the End of Drive-Thrus
Drive-thru fast food restaurants might be a staple of American life, but several U.S. cities are actively considering prohibiting the development of new drive-thrus for the benefit of traffic safety, air quality, and congestion.
Air Pollution World’s Worst Public Health Threat, Report Says
Air pollution is more likely to take years life off the lifespan of the average human than any other external factor, according to a recent report out of the University of Chicago.
Placer County
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HUD's Office of Policy Development and Research
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