Jesse Krimes Created Art Behind Bars—Now He’s Advocating For Change

Philadelphia artist Jesse Krimes created one of his most striking artworks behind bars; while serving a 70-month prison term, Krimes used contraband materials to create a 39-panel mural, “Apokaluptein:16389067.”

“Apokaluptein:16389067” has since made its way to the world of fine wine, with the piece featured in the wraparound label of The Prisoner’s “Corrections” release.

Krimes spoke to me about the collaboration, his experiences of prison life and his thoughts on the role of art in influencing political discourse.

Krimes served five years of a six-year sentence in a federal penitentiary after being convicted of a non-violent drug offence. While awaiting sentencing, Krimes was placed in solitary confinement, where he began crafting his first prison artwork, “Purgatory,” using the materials available to him.

“When I was in solitary, I realized fairly quickly that the one thing that they couldn’t take from me was my ability to create,” Krimes said. “And that was something that was core to who I am as a person and core to my identity.”

Solitary confinement is widely considered to be a form of psychological torture, and is all too common in U.S. prisons — a 2023 report from Solitary Watch and Unlock the Box estimated that more than 122,000 individuals are held in solitary confinement in state, federal prisons and local jails on any given day.

As with the overall prison population, people of color are disproportionately represented in isolation units; numerous studies show the severe psychological effects of long-term solitary confinement.

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Artistic depictions of prison life tend to be reactionary, feeding into negative stereotypes about incarcerated people. Prison turned out to be a vastly different experience from what Krimes was expecting.

“The media does a great job of sensationalizing, turning every single person who gets incarcerated into some kind of criminal mastermind, or monster that we should be fearing,” Krimes says. “So when I first went into the prison system, I was expecting these grotesque narratives to be true. What I experienced was that everyone in prison is just a normal person, with normal hopes, dreams, fears and families.”

Krimes noted that the guards didn’t care to stop him creating small pieces of art using pen and paper, but as his work became more ambitious, it had to be done in secret. As Krimes puts it, he was “using the materials of the prison against itself.”

“I was using prison-issued soap and transferring images onto it, and because I was taking bedsheets and tearing them, transferring images and drawing on top. Those were considered contraband because they’re prison property, which is why I had to do my work covertly,” Krimes explained.

Krimes wasn’t alone in his artistic ambitions. He noticed that every prison or jail that he spent time in housed a “vibrant community of creatives,” and describes a variety of incarcerated artists working on poems, screenplays and books, with “every kind of creative discipline” reflected within prison walls.

Krimes found the variety of artistic work being done behind bars to be “quite telling,” prompting him to reflect on how many creatives are being stifled by the demands of the modern world.

“We are all caught up in this system that requires us to work for very little pay, to have food and shelter and all the things that we need to live with a basic amount of dignity. But when people have time or unfettered time, which prison in a f**ked up way provides, everyone’s creative. Everyone is artistic.”

The clash between negative media depictions, the complex realities of prison life and the challenges faced by incarcerated people is something Krimes hopes to highlight with his art.

Krimes notes that his partnership with The Prisoner ensures that his artwork can be seen outside of galleries and museums, placed directly into people’s homes.

“Partnering with The Prisoner on their second release of Corrections and featuring Apokaluptein, the work that I made while incarcerated, really pushes back against everything we’ve just touched on. That’s very much what I was hoping Apokaluptein would do, is to challenge negative stereotypes to humanize people who are incarcerated.”

Krimes sees the American prison system as focused on punishment over rehabilitation, noting that “every prison I’ve ever been in, every counselor, every psychologist, every administrator, everybody I’ve ever come across in every prison, their point of questioning is always making sure I know how I messed up. At no point did anyone ask me what I’m interested in, what I’m good at, what I need to actually move forward.”

Krimes envisions “building facilities that are less barbaric, less about punitive ideology and more about rehabilitating people … so much of the population who is incarcerated are committing crimes of poverty.”

Studies show that growing up in poverty greatly increases the likelihood of becoming incarcerated; Vox summarized these findings with a provocative headline: “Want to stay out of prison? Choose rich parents.”

Krimes emphasizes that he is no expert or statistician, but speaking from personal experience, he believes the biggest problem with the U.S. prison system is that there are simply “too many people locked behind bars.”

The numbers speak for themselves; by the end of 2023, the United States had the highest number of incarcerated individuals worldwide, with almost 1.8 million people.

Krimes reckons that numbers alone can’t convince the public of the need for change.

“We intellectualize it, we understand it, but we don’t necessarily feel it,” Krimes says of statistics. Krimes sees art as a unique gateway to empathy, a path to understanding that goes beyond numbers.

“For me, artwork is the cornerstone of how we move a population to actually care about something … Which is part of why I started the Center for Advocacy, because so many of the stories that are funded out there are the negative ones.”

The Center for Art and Advocacy aims to provide financial support for artists impacted by the criminal legal system, enabling formerly incarcerated artists to tell their own stories.

“We’re intentionally funding formerly incarcerated artists who have lived experience, who can create projects out in the world, telling their stories from a different perspective,” Krimes says.

Krimes is cautiously optimistic when it comes to the art world, having seen increased “access for people who have traditionally been excluded,” but is mindful to not take progress for granted, “because things can shift when they’re not appropriately pushed for.”

Krimes sees art as a vital tool that can dispel negative stereotypes and communicate that incarcerated people “are your neighbors, your brothers, your sister-in-laws. They’re literally your community.”

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