Tuesday night, January 5, 2009

Well our trip to the prison was uneventful, Wendy drove her small red Scion packed to the gills with us and a mountain of supplies. I neglected to tell the prison all of the supplies we would be bringing in --including our paint. There is a new sheriff in town and the rules have changed. We were allowed to bring in nearly everything except the paint. Luckily my art cabinet is still lovingly stocked with paint and other supplies.
Because of our lack of a list for all of the supplies it took us almost 20 minutes to get in, thus we were late. Luckily all of our students were able to come and we had a great class. I went over the research component of the project and asked the women to sign an IRB consent form if they were interested in participating. They noted that my title according to the IRB was Principle Investigator. That has very negative connotations for people in prison. I made a mental note to myself to let the IRB know about this. Next we briefly discussed the difference between a memoir and an autobiography. "R" one of our students said, "I've read tons of autobiographies, because I love to know about other people's lives, and let me tell you some are so boring.!" She went on to give us a quick review of a memoir she is currently reading. Later, I passed around a short chapter about writing a personal essay about a memory for homework. Finally we asked the women to bring pictures next week that they want to incorporate into their portraits.
Our main activity for the evening was to paint. The women each received a 16x20 primed wooden panel. They were instructed to cover up all of the white with a color that they mixed. We spent about 20 minutes creating under paintings and then cleaning up.
Next week Jefri, Riley, Rebecca, Lisa,Kristin, and myself hope to share a bit more about memoir and continue to work on the paintings. We also hope to give the women copies of memoirs from and about women in Iowa.
Today I am at the Iowa Women's Archive finding examples to share.