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Chetumal, Mexico
Douglas used to be a scuba diver, but now he makes furniture. His workshop testified to his genius at reproducing pieces his clients had seen in photos or retail shops: tall, graceful armoires; coffee tables with a satin sheen; chairs and tables crafted from mahogany, cedar, rosewood.
He teaches others his skills, and their works also filled the shop: a cradle waiting to be rocked by loving hands, display cases for high-end stores, desks where bosses would one day preside over meetings.
His students had learned well, but then, they were a captive audience. So, for that matter, was Douglas.
I found the workshop in the southern Yucatán town of Chetumal in the state of Quintana Roo, about half an hour from the Belize border. I immediately recognized the concrete block, the barbed wire, the guard towers and fencing as a prison. I approached the guards and asked whether the facility sold prisoner art.
It did.
Some travelers shop for designer clothes. Others haunt china shops, jewelry stores or load up on cans and jars of exotic foods. My passion is prisons and specifically their art.
As a longtime volunteer in a juvenile detention center, I knew that prisoners were highly creative, in spite of -- or maybe because of -- their surroundings. Art, prose and music provide the escape, albeit mental, they need.
In my peregrinations, I began to visit prisons to ask whether they sold prisoner art. Often they did, and I would buy a piece or two -- Christmas cards, a key chain or an etching on leather -- because I knew what the inmates earned would usually help support their families.
In some prisons, there is contact with the artists and in others, the work is sold in a shop by prison personnel. I have always felt safe and fascinated, rather than fearful.
No violence. Really
At the entrance gate the guards at Chetumal asked for identification, and as I handed over my driver's license, I saw a man standing in the run-down reception area. It was the director, Victor Terrazas Cervera. I told him, in kindergarten Spanish, that I was an American journalist, and he invited me to his office, from which he presides over a medium-security facility with 1,100 inmates in for rape, robbery and murder, among other crimes.
The small office with its large wooden desk was full of cartons of prisoner-made art. When I admired a shiny wooden duck head that rested on a rectangular wooden box, he showed me that the duck's neck was a nutcracker.
"A gift," he said. I thanked him.
When he told me there had been no inmate violence there in a decade, I laughed.
"Really," he said. "You can ask my assistant."
A baby-faced guard in civilian clothes who had entered the room concurred. "No violence," he said. "Nothing."
The director sensed my incredulity.
"Come with me," he said, "and I will take you on a tour."
I followed him and his assistant down the stairs and into a vast open courtyard with grass, plants and trees. The yard was lined with ramshackle buildings and cement pavement that ran through it like a sidewalk through a park. Terrazas and his assistant, both unarmed, walked easily down the path and greeted the inmates.
Douglas used to be a scuba diver, but now he makes furniture. His workshop testified to his genius at reproducing pieces his clients had seen in photos or retail shops: tall, graceful armoires; coffee tables with a satin sheen; chairs and tables crafted from mahogany, cedar, rosewood.
He teaches others his skills, and their works also filled the shop: a cradle waiting to be rocked by loving hands, display cases for high-end stores, desks where bosses would one day preside over meetings.
His students had learned well, but then, they were a captive audience. So, for that matter, was Douglas.
I found the workshop in the southern Yucatán town of Chetumal in the state of Quintana Roo, about half an hour from the Belize border. I immediately recognized the concrete block, the barbed wire, the guard towers and fencing as a prison. I approached the guards and asked whether the facility sold prisoner art.
It did.
Some travelers shop for designer clothes. Others haunt china shops, jewelry stores or load up on cans and jars of exotic foods. My passion is prisons and specifically their art.
As a longtime volunteer in a juvenile detention center, I knew that prisoners were highly creative, in spite of -- or maybe because of -- their surroundings. Art, prose and music provide the escape, albeit mental, they need.
In my peregrinations, I began to visit prisons to ask whether they sold prisoner art. Often they did, and I would buy a piece or two -- Christmas cards, a key chain or an etching on leather -- because I knew what the inmates earned would usually help support their families.
In some prisons, there is contact with the artists and in others, the work is sold in a shop by prison personnel. I have always felt safe and fascinated, rather than fearful.
No violence. Really
At the entrance gate the guards at Chetumal asked for identification, and as I handed over my driver's license, I saw a man standing in the run-down reception area. It was the director, Victor Terrazas Cervera. I told him, in kindergarten Spanish, that I was an American journalist, and he invited me to his office, from which he presides over a medium-security facility with 1,100 inmates in for rape, robbery and murder, among other crimes.
The small office with its large wooden desk was full of cartons of prisoner-made art. When I admired a shiny wooden duck head that rested on a rectangular wooden box, he showed me that the duck's neck was a nutcracker.
"A gift," he said. I thanked him.
When he told me there had been no inmate violence there in a decade, I laughed.
"Really," he said. "You can ask my assistant."
A baby-faced guard in civilian clothes who had entered the room concurred. "No violence," he said. "Nothing."
The director sensed my incredulity.
"Come with me," he said, "and I will take you on a tour."
I followed him and his assistant down the stairs and into a vast open courtyard with grass, plants and trees. The yard was lined with ramshackle buildings and cement pavement that ran through it like a sidewalk through a park. Terrazas and his assistant, both unarmed, walked easily down the path and greeted the inmates.
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