Street art takes its creators to unpredictable places: skyscrapers’ facades, abandoned power plants, foreign nations, or any combination of the aforementioned. It can even take one to jail if they paint without permission. In his quest “to continue the conveying of his extraordinary views and art in the most peculiar places” Barcelona-based street artist PEJAC brought his talents to Spain’s oldest prison, the Penitentiary Center of El Dueso.
A press release for the project explains that this iconic location sits “at the entrance of artist’s hometown of Santander, overlooking the Cantabrian sea and surrounded by marshes.” It was constructed from the remains of an antiquated fort used by Napoleon.
PEJAC discusses the project’s significance further, stating, “a prison itself is a place wrapped in harsh reality and at the same time, I feel that it has a great surrealist charge. It is as if you only need to scratch a little on its walls to discover the poetry hidden inside.”
“For 11 days, its walls, courtyards, and corridors became the artist’s workplace, giving life to the Gold Mine project in that sense…The project integrates three singular pieces, which as a whole represent the value of the human condition, its resistance to adversity, the need to create, and its desire, above all, to leave a mark.”
PEJAC’s biography highlights his ability to transmit profound messages through his versatile artistic mastery. The Spanish artist stands out for his ability to code switch between “different visual languages” whether he’s “reaching for unconventional tools, or finding alternative ways to present the finished work.” Most importantly, though, it notes, “the fact that he keeps his voice recognizable despite diverse variety of styles and concepts, is surely one of his biggest strengths, rarely seen in the art world.”
THE SHAPE OF DAYS
This component to the project transforms the difficult realities of prison life into something beautiful. The artist says, “this mural speaks about perseverance as one of the most valuable virtues between El Dueso’s walls.” One can imagine that tenants at the institution are aware of their sentences ticking down, day by day, minute by minute. The waiting must be excruciating until it becomes just another silent aspect of existence. PEJAC illustrates the omnipresence of time by painting hash marks until there are so many that they form a blooming tree. “We painted thousands of them,” he says, “playing with shapes and superimposing them to create volumes that finally represent the shape of an immense tree that contains the passage of time and hope. Each day inside is a day that brings you closer to the freedom and the holm oak forest behind the walls of this prison.”
HIDDEN VALUE
PEJAC’s simplest work for the project adds a lighthearted note to the prison’s atmosphere. Harnessing what his biography calls an ability to “[minimize] his work to bare silhouettes or shadows when needed,” the artist employed a powerful touch of trompe l’oeil to create the illusion of a mundane backboard peeling away to reveal the gold behind its facade. The result is a playful piece, built on a piece of equipment meant for leisure, showing “that sometimes it is gold that does not shine.” PEJAC says, “I like the idea of transforming an everyday object into a luxury object so that the inmates can use it and play with it daily. Creating luxury within everyone’s reach.”
HOLLOW WALLS
PEJAC’s final piece for the prison confronts the simple fact that the people there are forcibly confined with an attack of romanticism. He explains, “when I first saw this corridor with only cement and barbed wires, I felt I needed to add a poetic element that would detract from the hardness and pressure of those who pass between these walls daily.” To this end, he again utilized the force of trompe l’oeil to reimagine the space’s imposing walls as a sliding, hollow armoire opening up to the outside world. A bird with outstretched arms symbolizes liberty as it flies through the conceptualized opening. Stripped of their freedoms, prisoners are only left with their thoughts. They deserve, at least, the right for the inside of their minds to be beautiful.
PEJAC’s work at El Dueso makes a bold move towards embracing prisoners as living, breathing, multi-faceted members of the human populace. Too often, we are fooled into believing that those who commit crimes are entirely evil, writing them off for good. In reality, people are the product of circumstance, and because they are fellow members of our society we should always believe in the potential for rehabilitation. PEJAC’s gift of three murals for El Dueso and its prisoners embodies this commitment to embrace everyone, regardless of their background or past. As long as you are alive, you can feel. That feeling makes us human.
The project was set up and completed with special thanks to Eva Ranea, General Director of Culture for the Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports of the Government of Cantabria. The artist also offered “special thanks not only to the inmates, who with their response, attitude and involvement have made this possible, but also to the El Dueso Penitentiary Center’s management and its educators who have put so much enthusiasm and effort into it.”
