NO EVACUATION PLAN
2020 - Ongoing, In collaboration with Sarah Schmitt
IN 1930, A FIRE WAS FOUND UNDERGROUND ON RIKERS ISLAND.
IT HAD BEEN BURNING FOR AN ESTIMATED 18 YEARS.
THE FIRE, WHEN FOUND, CLARIFIED THE MYSTERY OF WHY WHEN SNOW WOULD FALL
AND STICK ON NEW YORK CITY, IT WOULD MELT ON RIKER’S ISLAND.
NO EVACUATION PLAN considers the history of Riker’s Island to examine carceral logistics and their “slow violent” relationships to the cities that house and hide them. ‘Reclaimed’ through garbage deposited by New York City inmates, Municipal Farms swelled from 90 acres (1890s) to the 440 acre Riker’s Island (1930s). To this day, the trash that makes up the foundation of the island still releases noxious methane gas.
NO EVACUATION PLAN inquires into the island’s unquantified methane gas output, the hidden-in-plain-sight jails where inmates will be relocated by 2026, the labor conditions that built and perpetuate the jail, and other imperceptible toxicities that act as metrics for institutional violence. These conditions reveal the deep entanglement of carceral and ecological violence.
By resurrecting the history of Rikers Island, we imagine its dismantling and the future of prison abolition. NO EVACUATION PLAN calls for an alternate trajectory for our future--one without the violent traditions of human hierarchy.
NO EVACUATION PLAN inquires into the island’s unquantified methane gas output, the hidden-in-plain-sight jails where inmates will be relocated by 2026, the labor conditions that built and perpetuate the jail, and other imperceptible toxicities that act as metrics for institutional violence. These conditions reveal the deep entanglement of carceral and ecological violence.
By resurrecting the history of Rikers Island, we imagine its dismantling and the future of prison abolition. NO EVACUATION PLAN calls for an alternate trajectory for our future--one without the violent traditions of human hierarchy.
THE FARM GREW INTO A PRISON, A PIECE OF AN EVER-ACCELERATING PUZZLE-CITY THAT THOUGHT IT NEEDED HUMAN CONFINEMENT IN ORDER TO SURVIVE. THIS HUMAN CONFINEMENT BEGAN WITH THE PUBLICK WORKHOUSE AND HOUSE OF CORRECTION (1735), THEN THE CITY OUTGREW IT AND BUILT THE BELLEVUE ESTABLISHMENT (1736), THEN THE CITY OUTGREW IT AND BUILT NEWGATE (1796), THEN THE CITY OUTGREW IT AND BUILT SING SING (1826) THEN THE CITY OUTGREW IT AND BUILT BLACKWELL’S ISLAND WORKHOUSE (1832) (RENAMED WELFARE ISLAND IN 1921) THEN THE CITY OUTGREW IT AND BOUGHT MUNICIPAL FARMS(1890) WHICH WAS SWOLLEN INTO RIKER’S (1930) BY LABOR STOLEN FROM INMATES CONFINED ON BLACKWELL’S ISLAND.
MUNICIPAL FARMS SWELLED FROM 90 ACRES (1890S) TO THE 440 ACRE RIKER’S ISLAND (1930S). THIS SWELL WAS CAUSED BY TRASH, SORTED AND PLACED BY NEW YORK CITY INMATES. TO THIS DAY (2019) IT STILL SWELLS, AS IT HAS OVER LIFETIMES, FROM NOXIOUS METHANE GAS RELEASED BY THE TRASH THAT WAS USED TO MAKE THE ISLAND. UNDERGROUND, THE METHANE GAS COMBUSTS AND SHIFTS THE EARTH, BREAKING HAPHAZARDLY BUILT INFRASTRUCTURES LIKE THE WATER PIPES. AFTER THE PIPE BREAKAGES, INMATES HAVE BEEN LEFT WITHOUT WATER FOR UP TO THREE DAYS.
RIKER’S ISLAND, BUILT BY INMATES(1890-1930) TO HOLD INMATES(1930S-NOW) THAT CAN’T PAY CASH BAIL(1930S-NOW), INMATES THAT ASSIST IN RESCUE OPERATIONS ((THE GENERAL SLOCUM FIRE (1904), LGA PLANE CRASH (1957), HURRICANE SANDY (2013)) FOR A CITY THAT HAS NO RESCUE PLAN FOR THEM AND HOLDS THEM ON A FLAMMABLE, GASEOUS ISLAND ACCESSIBLE ONLY BY A TWO LANE BRIDGE
(SINCE 1966, BEFORE THEN, THE GAS-ISLAND WAS ONLY ACCESSIBLE BY FERRY.)
AN ISLAND SWELLS, A CITY STACKS.
CALL TO ACTION: