2019 Press Room Events
Watch the full video of our latest Press Room event below:
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Information Wants to Be Free & So Do We
A Pop Up Library on Communication, Control & Mass Incarceration
The Guild Complex presents a Press Room event
Incarcerated: Stories, Poetry and Perspectives
With Read/Write Library at the Justice Hotel
Tuesday, October 29, 2019
6108 North Kenmore
7:00 – 9:00 p.m.
In collaboration with Read/Write Library, the Guild Complex brings the stories from the formerly incarcerated.
“Information Wants to Be Free & So Do We” asks audiences to question the idea that social, emotional, and intellectual control are necessary for public safety, rehabilitation, and justice.
The event will explore several different perspectives on the subject of incarceration with the following participants:
A black, female former corrections officer from Wisconsin, Velvet Rose Moore-Owen, will be reading an excerpt from her upcoming book, Incarcerated: A Memoir.
In addition, we will have representatives from the group, Black and Pink. Black and Pink: Chicago is an open family of GLBTQ prisoners and “free world” allies who support each other. Our work toward the abolition of the prison industrial complex is rooted in the experience of currently and formerly incarcerated people. We are outraged by the specific violence of the prison industrial complex against GLBTQ people, and respond through advocacy, education, direct service, and organizing.
Our inaugural program event will be a film screening of the documentary, U-Turn, by Guatemalan filmmaker, Luis Argueta
October 16, 2019
6:30pm – 9:00pm
Chopin Theatre
1543 West Division
Co-sponsored by the Chicago City of Refuge
The program will consist of an introduction of the film by the filmmaker and the 55-minute screening, followed by a brief panel discussion with the filmmaker and performance from local artists and authorities on the topic of immigration.
The film, U Turn, tells the story of a group of Guatemalan immigrant women and children who broke the silence about the abuses committed against them at the Agriprocessors, Inc plant in Postville, Iowa and—thanks to the solidarity of the community that accompanied them and to the U Visa—transformed their lives.
Luis Argueta is a film director and producer whose work spans features, documentaries, shorts and episodic TV. He has also worked as commercial director, lecturer and teacher in the United States, Europe and throughout the Americas. Born and raised in Guatemala, Argueta is a US Citizen and has been a resident of New York since 1977. His film The Silence of Neto (1994) is the first Guatemalan film to have been submitted to the Academy Awards in the Best Foreign Language Film category. In April 2009, the British newspaper The Guardian listed Mr. Argueta as one of Guatemala’s National Living Icons, alongside Nobel Laureate Rigoberta Menchu and singer/songwriter Ricardo Arjona.