Saturday, April 27
Keeping the Faith Pat Graney
Plenary session Keynote Speaker – Pat Graney
Seattle-based Artist Pat Graney will speak about the program she has developed in women’s prisons and
work release facilities for the past 20 years. Keeping the Faith—the Prison Project (non-religious) is an arts
residency program designed to enable incarcerated women and girls to discover a sense of identity within
themselves and to develop that identity within the context of community – through the vehicles of dance, writing,
visual arts & performance.
During this workshop Ms. Graney will show a short documentary piece on Keeping the Faith/The Prison Project (KTF). KTF is one of the longest running prison arts programs in the U.S. Ms. Graney will lead participants through a series of movement exercises used in KTF, as well as short writing exercises, and will speak about the various visual arts projects that have been part of KTF. She will also speak about the teaching team structure of the program, and how the program interfaces with the prison environment. There will be ample time for discussion and questions.
11:45-12:45pm
Dance as a Social Art: Interactive panel discussion: Panelists include: Pat Graney, Jefferson James, the creator of a program called Inside/Outside which extends
the arts to residents at Cincinnati’s River City Correctional Center, a diversionary program for adults with substance abuse issues who would otherwise be sent to Ohio penitentiaries. John Giffin and Suzan Bradford Kounta will discuss the work with the Amethyst project. Amethyst is a residential treatment facility for women in recovery. OhioDance is providing dance instruction and a performance opportunity to the women and their children. Bill Wade will discuss his work as an artist in residence for the Cleveland School of the Arts where he
founded the nationally-recognized and awarded after school program the YARD – Youth At Risk Dancing. Ann Cooper Albright will moderate this interactive discussion.
A PFW Grant in its small way has helped make this happen.
