“Walls turned sideways are bridges.” — Angela Davis
Tune in to Lumpen Radio 105.5 FM for a live radio broadcast presented by Silvia Inés Gonzalez, the administrator of POCAS (People of Color Artist Space). This episode features Sarah Ross and Pablo Mendoza of Walls Turned Sideways in conversation about deconstructing power, architecting spaces of healing, and the possibilities formed when walls are turned sideways into bridges. How is space linked to the struggle for liberation? What is the architecture of freedom?
An outgrowth of teaching and learning with incarcerated artists and writers at Stateville prison through the Prison + Neighborhood Art/Education Project, Walls Turned Sideways is an art and community space dedicated to people impacted by incarceration with a focus on collective liberation, healing, and abolition. The organizers seek to more deeply engage the wider community of people impacted by incarceration—the family, friends, and loved ones of people who are currently incarcerated.
Sarah Ross is an artist whose work is centered on the spatial politics of race, gender, class, and control. Her projects use photo, video, and installation, and she works collaboratively with other artists and communities. Since 2006, Sarah has been working with incarcerated artists in Illinois prisons. In 2011, she co-founded the Prison + Neighborhood Arts/Education Project (PNAP), a cultural project that brings together artists, writers, and scholars in and outside Stateville prison to create public projects. For more than a decade the project has hosted exhibitions and painted community murals around the city of Chicago. Also since 2011, Sarah has worked closely with local artists, activists, lawyers, torture survivors, and scholars on Chicago Torture Justice Memorials—a campaign for reparations for survivors of Chicago police torture. This project developed, in part, as a call to artists to imagine a memorial, and ended with a historic reparations package for survivors of torture by Chicago Police under former Commander Jon Burge. In 2024 with Pablo Mendoza, she opened a gallery and community space on Chicago’s West Side called Walls Turned Sideways, dedicated to artists and communities impacted by incarceration.
Pablo Mendoza is a proud father and lifelong student. He is a staunch advocate for the poor and disenfranchised with an eye towards a more equitable tomorrow. Pablo is a prison abolitionist who struggles against the privileges imbued upon him by society. Pablo is directly impacted, having served 22 years within the Illinois Department of Corrections. He’s currently a co-director of Walls Turned Sideways. He is also involved with several other campaigns throughout the state, including the University of Illinois Education Justice Project Reentry Guide Initiative, Freedom To Learn Campaign, Illinois Coalition for Higher Education in Prison, Illinois Reentry Alliance for Justice, Fully Free Campaign, and others.
Sala is an ongoing talk series anchoring the stories of artists in Chicago through topics such as grief, labor, immigration, and movement building. The multimedia project, now in its third season, includes radio interviews, public programming, and an archival self-published zine. It is supported by Hyde Park Art Center’s Artists Run Chicago Fund as part of Art Design Chicago.
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An initiative of the Terra Foundation for American Art in partnership with artists and organizations across the city, Art Design Chicago is a series of events and exhibitions that highlight the city’s artistic heritage and creative communities.
