PRISON ARTS PROGRAM
Dell'Arte in partnership with the California Arts Council's Arts in Corrections
For questions, inquiries, and to participate on our returned citizens committee, please contact Program Director Janessa Johnsrude at janessa@dellarte.com
Dell’Arte offers weekly ensemble theatre classes at Pelican Bay State Prison on all General Population yards throughout the year. Dell’Arte is now in its ninth year of engagement at the prison which is supported by California’s Arts in Corrections Program. This program brings professional artists into prisons to teach their art form to incarcerated people in support of their rehabilitation and education. Through established performance exchanges with Dell’Arte’s students and teaching from invited guest instructors/Dell'Arte Faculty, our incarcerated participants have worked with artists from India, Mexico, Israel, Zimbabwe, Sri Lanka, Canada, Guatemala, Spain, England, Brazil, and the United States.
Participants in the Arts in Corrections Theatre Classes at Pelican Bay work in ensemble to explore the creative act of generating theatre through the study of storytelling, character, improvisation, and original play development. Healing-centered facilitation guides work with participants focused on self-awareness through a creative lens, trauma-informed and body-based artistic exploration in writing and movement, performance and collaboration, and play.
Many participants have graduated from the program and continue classes as mentors, as courses commence every spring and fall. As programming develops, various ensembles have created original performances for invited public audiences. Several former students that have been released also serve on the Returned Citizens Committee, acting as advisors to the program.
Dell'Arte is grateful for the support of the California Arts Council, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, and the Community Resource Manager's Office at Pelican Bay State Prison.
UPDATES
Dell’Arte Prison Arts Theatre Program Update: Winter 2024
Spring 2024 marked the beginning of our 9th year of programming at Pelican Bay State Prison with Dell’Arte’s Prison Arts Theatre Program! As we head into 2025, we wanted to share out about the past year and reflect back on all of the hard work and successes of our program participants, joyful gatherings we’ve participated in and what we are doing to sustain and grow alongside the artists that take part in our program.
First off, congratulations to our Spring and Fall Program Graduates and welcome to Dell’Arte’s Alumni network! Program participants attend weekly classes on A, B, and D yards in the prison and we have been lucky to work with many people this year! We honor their dedication, commitment to the work, and the mutual support we see develop each term in our classes. We are happy and grateful to celebrate coming together as a community each week - growing, sharing, and learning.
Guest teachers/performers have continued to offer unique training opportunities and performance at the prison in addition to our regular weekly classes. We are very grateful for the staff and administration, particularly the Community Resource Managers’ office led by Robert Losacco, for helping us coordinate getting visitors inside. Bringing in working artists to circle up with everyone and talk about craft, processes, and how we all are weaving making art into our existence are some of the best conversations we have in the program. Mutual inspiration abounds when we can meet together as creative minds and celebrate that part of our collective human experience. We’ve had some amazing people come in to work with our participants.
Amica Hunter brought their solo show, “Anatomica” early in the year and led workshops in ensemble building and performance. The viewing of Amica's original touring piece lent itself to some fantastic discussion about solo creation, telling your story, and being in the present moment. While creating their own piece, our D-yard participants were able to engage with Amica’s show from the perspective of being in the middle of their own creative process and we shared about what it’s like to go from a “blank canvas” to “making a thing”...and all the possibilities this presents.
“I learned about myself in all aspects. I have left behind a person that was so nervous and embarrassed. Now, in this present time, I am comfortable and outgoing. I’m prepared to put myself in a vulnerable situation.” - Bryan Flores, 2024 Dell’Arte Prison Arts Theatre Program Participant
Dell’Arte’s Arts Engagement Director, Julie Douglas, taught a weekend workshop in Alexander Technique, opening up exploration of habitual response and somatic communication. Dell’Arte faculty member, Espaço Oliveira Mendes, traveled to Pelican Bay to facilitate classes in Capoeira. This was Espaço’s 3rd time at the prison and it is always a treat when he brings his mad mad skills and music to the spaces we gather. We used instruments, like berimbaus and the agogo, got into the history of the form, and danced.
Dell’Arte’s Head of Training, Tony Fuemmeler, came in in the fall to lead a multi-class exploration of mask performance and participants created their own designs to play in. Line, emotion, and character came together as we played to discover how to bring a mask to life in preparation for the focus of the fall, which was a study in Commedia dell’Arte.
Our teaching artists, Samantha Williams-Gray and Janessa Johnsrude, who also serves as Program Director, have been implementing their training with Justice For My Sister’s “Trauma- Informed Storytelling” workshop series throughout the year and have worked with program participants on personal storytelling projects and productions. The D-Yard class developed their work into a variety show called “Burgerman”, which premiered to a group of visitors in late spring. The cast made props, wrote scenes, made proposals for short interludes, and self-directed the piece coming together to coordinate an exchange class and showing for friends of Dell’Arte who traveled up for the day. Thank you to our visitors who came up! 
Photo: D-Yard in action presenting “Burgerman”. Courtesy of PBSP.
We also had an incredible community exchange experience on Dec. 1 which our B-yard participants facilitated. They welcomed visitors, staff, and friends of Dell’Arte for a day of conversation, play, and collaboration. Artists meeting artists where they are. The day also included a performance of the B yard ensemble's original piece “The Variety Pack” which was a culmination in study of collective theatre making and featured raps, poems, and scenes. Thank you to the incredible group of people who came up to witness the work of our incredible B-yard group! Filmmakers from Runaway Kite Productions also attended the event in anticipation of our new mini-documentary which spotlights the B-yard ensemble and their artistic work. Look out for the film being released in early 2025!
“It’s the time I can be free” - Mr. Martinez, 2024 Dell’Arte Prison Arts Theatre Program Participant
Dec. 1 Exchange! Photo courtesy of Runaway Kite Productions.
December 2024 will also see the release of our program’s 3rd Playwriting Zine in November (check out Vol. 1 & 2 here). Dell’Arte has organized a fundraiser in partnership with our program participants for the Pacific Redwoods Missing and Murdered Indigenous Peoples Crisis Action Fund. We are partnering with local businesses, including the Bodega in Eureka, to sell the zine and donate all proceeds to the fund, which was selected by contributing artists. Get a copy via our website or stop into the Bodega or ask for one at one of Dell’Arte’s upcoming events.
Gus, Dana, Joaquin, P.R.C, and Armando (L to R) are some of the Artists that contributed to the 2024 Zine! Photo by Malcolm DeSoto.
Ongoing training of our teaching artists is important to serve the needs of our programming. Janessa is currently working on becoming a certified Integrated Trauma Practioner™and Somatic Experiencing® Practioner to deepen the integration of therapeutic body-based somatic practices into the work done in our classes. Janessa also presented alongside Tim Cunningham, former health system vice president, humanitarian clown, and nurse, at the 2024 NorCAN conference this November in a panel titled “Creative Pathways: The Arts and Community Wellness” on the the role arts play in reimagining, reinventing, and driving powerful change. Thank you to Janessa for her tireless work as our program director, her teachings, and her continued effort to champion artist exchanges and development at the prison.
Congratulations to Samantha who completed her practitioner training with the Tamalpa Institute this year in the Life/Art Process®! In addition to her regular classes, Sam taught a special weekend intensive “Empowering the Creative Self” using movement, drawing, reflective writing, and witnessing practices to generate new thresholds of creative exploration and expression. Sam has brought so much to our program and we are grateful for her teachings.
Thank you to the California Arts Council's Arts in Corrections Program, CDCR, RIGHT grant, and the Community Resource Manager’s Office for supporting Dell’Arte as we continue this work.
Dell’Arte International Prison Arts Theatre Program Update!
We’ve had an eventful spring at Dell’Arte, and we wanted to share with you some updates about our Prison Arts Theatre Program…
Dell’Arte has continued it’s work at Pelican Bay State Prison in 2023 through funding from the California Arts Council’s Arts in Corrections Program. After long-standing support from the William James Association, Dell’Arte applied directly as a coordinating organization to the CAC and was selected to implement theatre programming and continue working with people currently incarcerated at Pelican Bay. Working with the Community Resource Managers Office lead by Robert Losacco, our Teaching Artists traveled to Pelican Bay to teach weekly workshops with participants on both A and D yard this winter and spring.
We are excited to announce that Samantha Williams-Gray joined the program this year as a Teaching Artist, bringing with her in-depth experience as a movement educator and artist and applying her experience with Indigenous psychology and wisdom to the program curriculum. We are so very lucky to have Sam on board! Janessa Johnsrude is continuing her work as Program Director and a Teaching Artist and is excited to see how the program develops as we bring in more artists and create more exchange opportunities for our participants inside! Sam and Janessa are focusing their work with participants on self-awareness through a creative lens, trauma-informed and body-based artistic exploration in writing and movement, performance and collaboration, and play.
In April and May, Dell’Arte faculty member Espaço Oliveira Mendes, traveled to Pelican Bay to teach classes in Capoeira. Using berimbaus, tambourines, and the agogo, participants made music and filled the spaces with dance/sick moves during the time together. Check out these live drawings of the class with our D-facility group by multi-talented artist by Anonymous Magone, one of our participants.
The fascinating history and philosophy of Capoeira was explored in the classes and the conversations had around peaceful engagement, non-violence, anger, partnership and play went deep.
“This program gave me insight into who I am and who I could be.”
Paul Latanzio,2023 Program Participant
On April 25, 2023 Faculty and students from Dell’Arte joined with participants from our Prison Arts Program for a day of artistic exchange. We played, showed work, clowned around, and shared about our practices as artists. Participants on each yard prepared original pieces to show. The piece on A Yard was filled with poetry and was a masterful example of collaboration - it explored choices we make in our youth and what paths we walk. The piece on D yard had audience members busting a gut- it was a variety show packed with funny skits featuring fashion pirates, lonesome bananas, and original commercials.
“You let us be us. That is something I will never forget.”
- Derek Adam, 2023 Program Participant
Images courtesy of Robert Losacco , Pelican Bay State Prison CRM
Prison walls are thick and the stigmas that incarcerated people face can feel impenetrable - both during and after incarceration. These exchanges help us to simply connect as the beautiful humans we are, celebrate that, and see each other as such. It is our hope that this ripples out to you today to consider how we all can look past our stigmas and biases to see one another - human to human - with compassion and heart!
"This class has helped me socially and has given me the tools to express myself the way I never knew I could"
- Michael Williams, 2023 Program Participant.
Both Williams-Gray and Johnsrude joined teaching artists from around the state this spring in a training series through Arts in Corrections and Justice for My Sister called “Trauma-informed Storytelling”. The workshops saw participants through sessions to expand the use of trauma-informed facilitation, nonviolent communication, and strategies in their teaching practices to encourage students to reframe their personal experiences of trauma into narratives of resiliency and healing, while centering their voice and choice in a culturally-relevant way. We are grateful for the opportunity to continue to develop our practices and support our teaching artists at Dell’Arte as we learn so much from our friends in the field.
Check out Volume II of our Prison Arts Program Zine featuring explorations in playwriting, inspired writings, and artwork from our program participants in 2022/2023! It takes a lot of courage to share work that is this vulnerable and open up - especially when living in an environment that is not conducive to freedom of expression. We are proud of the work our participants share and create openly both in class and outside of it. Please support them by having a gander at our Zine!
And finally, congratulations to all of our 2023 spring program graduates! 24 individuals graduated from Dell’Arte’s Prison Arts Program this spring and we celebrated the day by celebrating each other, circling up to big up the members of our program collectively. We welcome them to Dell’Arte’s alumni network. We had such an incredible time working together this spring and look forward to our fall program, beginning in August 2023.
“We can be free spirits, we can express inner creativity and it raises our emotions. Personally I’ve been able to express myself more dynamically outside of class to friends and family.”
-Anonymous Magone, 2023 Program Participant
Thank you to the California Arts Council, CDCR, and the Community Resource Manager’s office for supporting our work.
In June of 2022, Zimbabwean artists Cadrick (Khe Khe) Msongelwa and Ronald Sigeca toured to Dell'Arte with their piece award-winning piece "Zandezi", directed by Lloyd Nyikadzino, which tells the story of several men imprisoned in Zimbabwe. During their time in Blue Lake, they began working with Dell'Arte's Andrew De La Pena on a sequel titled "Next". In an exchange event on June 14, these three artists, along with Dell'Arte faculty member Cleo DeOrio, came to Pelican Bay for a day of artistic exchange, a workshop performance of "Next", and seeing pieces created by our program ensembles.
Check out this article from the Lost Coast Outpost about the exchange. Exchanges within Pelican Bay with Dell'Arte artists and guests alike are important to our programming inside and we'd like to thank the community for their support!
Dell'Arte has begun another year of programming at Pelican Bay State Prison in partnership with the William James Association's Prison Arts Project with funding and support from the California Arts Council and the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. We are excited to continue our work with many talented artists inside Pelican Bay as well as our partnerships with supporting organizations. Our hearts go out to the incarcerated individuals and their families who have been greatly impacted by COVID-19 and we continue to wish them health and light.
In-person programming was halted in the spring of 2020 due to the pandemic. Since then, Dell'Arte has been offering classes through paper packets for participants enrolled in Dell'Arte's Theatre Arts Prison Program. Our engagement this past year has focused on a series of collaborations to create a diverse array of lessons for our participants during the suspension of in-person programming. Program participants began distance learning in an exchange with California-based Playwrights Project and Executive Director Cecelia Kouma to create a playwriting zine called "The Jam" (check it out here), which was distributed to the writers to share with their families and loved ones. In turn, Dell'Arte created packets to exchange with participants as part of the Playwrights Project Out of the Yard Playwriting Program at Centinela State Prison. Participants in each program were given personal feedback and we are overjoyed at the opportunity to have worked with the Playwrights Project and their incredible students!
Dell'Arte was then able to create an international exchange with our Balinese faculty led by Dayu Juni Newman in partnership with Dell'Arte Theatre Arts Prison Program Director Janessa Johnsrude. Normally, Dell'Arte runs a study abroad program in Bali every year. Again, due to the pandemic we were not able to go, but connected with our friends and partners in Indonesia for a different kind of project. Janessa, who also serves as the associate Bali Abroad Program Director, and Juni crafted a series of videos, edited by Malcolm DeSoto, which were broadcast into the institution via the prison's institutional channel and available to anyone with access to a television inside. The videos featured lessons by Juni, Pak Wayan Mardika (Music and Shadow Puppetry), Pak Wija (Shadow Puppetry), Nyoman Setiawan (Mask Carving), Ida Bagus Gustu Wirabumi (Dance), and Ida Bagus Ketut Rajastra aka Gustut and his Kecak crew (Kecak Chanting). Program participants wrote stories and designed shadow puppets, which Pak Wayan Mardika crafted into a gorgeous set of puppets! Long-time Bali Program partner and Bali-based mask maker Newman took on collating a script from the writings and worked with Juni, Pak Wayan Mardika and a team of Balinese artists to produce an original full-on Wayang Kulit (shadow puppetry) show accompanied by a live gamelan orchestra. The show, titled "My Luminous Self" was filmed and broadcast back to participants via the institutional channel. Participants also got copies of the script with images from the show. We are glad to have such incredible friends and faculty in Bali who shared their immense talents and gifts with program artists and for the beautiful work the participants shared with one another through the exchange! The puppets were included in a ceremony in Bali and are awaiting placement in a gallery before they make their way to the U.S. below are images from "My Luminous Self" with puppets designed by program participants and brought to life by our Balinese partners with a live gamelan orchestra.
Our program participants then spent the summer months working with a former faculty member and Ecuadorian theatre artist Carlos Gallegos to write solo monologues and were able to see a couple of Carlos's own solo shows via the institutional channel and read a script from his original play "Kaleidoscope Neighborhood". We are hoping to bring Carlos's play into Pelican Bay one day in person! Carlos's expert feedback helped shape participants' writing and allowed them into his personal creative process.
Photos by Peter Merts, Collin Smith, Malcolm DeSoto, and courtesy of CDCR
- Check out Pelican Bay Unlocked, a podcast from the Media Arts class at Pelican Bay.
- Purchase "My Brother's Keeper", a book of writings, poems, and art from The Writers at Pelican Bay
