The work takes the form of a 24-scene play, each scene a short, abstracted interaction between characters, written during my time as IKON Gallery Residency at HMP Springhill. Each scene is an amalgamation of truths from different conversations I’ve had with prisoners in my studio.

The play operates without hierarchy. Its characters include Cuckoo, Time, Air, Threshold, Prisoner, Artist, Wall… Each is treated equally within the script, given the same weight of speech and attention. Human and non-human voices coexist without clear distinction. In this flattening, time is not a backdrop but a participant; space is not a setting but speaking as the character Air. The result is slightly ambiguous, at times whimsical, at times uncanny. Notably absent are the expected markers of prison authority. Their omission is deliberate. Instead of foregrounding enforcement, the script attends to atmosphere, relation, and interiority. The emphasis shifts from surveillance to presence, from regulation to resonance.

This work invites visitors to become participants, not simply observing the exhibition, but entering it, sounding it out, and bringing its suspended hours into lived time. It blurs the boundary between prisoner and civilian.