Last month, the Pentagon partially lifted the Trump administration’s ban on the release of artwork made by prisoners at Guantánamo Bay. Prisoners will be able to take “a practicable quantity of their art” if they are transferred out of the prison. It’s unclear what “practicable” means, and whether this ambiguous term means prisoners will only be allowed to take a small portion of the artwork they have created during years of captivity.
In Guantánamo, from the very beginning, we made art. We had nothing, so we made art out of nothing. We drew with tea powder on toilet paper. We painted our walls with soap, and carved Styrofoam cups and food containers. We sang, danced, recited poetry and composed songs. We were always punished for making art or singing.
In 2010 the rules changed: we then had real paper, pens and paints – colours we hadn’t seen for years. We no longer had to hide our writings, paintings, poems and songs, which had meant hiding parts of ourselves. We no longer were punished for painting or singing. We could reveal parts of ourselves that were long hidden.
Art was our way to heal ourselves, to escape the feeling of being imprisoned and free ourselves, just for a little while. We made the sea, trees, the beautiful blue sky and
— source theguardian.com | Mansoor Adayfi | 11 Mar 2023