JO'AN DUNN

Jo’an Dunn often describes herself as a “KOOK”, or Keeper Of Odd Knowledge. Her range of talents is reflected in her roles as an artist, heart-worker, and founder of Queers United In Equitable Treatment (QUIET), a group that works to “mend bridges” among imprisoned people to make life safer for trans women. Jo’an’s work utilizes her multilingual imagination and vivid sensory awareness to craft meaning through vast, richly layered symbols. With materials she gathers from an archive of everyday objects circulating in captivity, Jo’an repurposes broken or discarded items in a process that is as much art-making as it is self-making. Jo’an’s creations are also a testament to her ingenuity. Without conventional art supplies, Jo’an’s inventive methods include using dental floss to cut glass and plastics, carving objects from soap, and using coffee or other food items as pigment in her work.

“Like an antidote made from the poison it’s designed to cure,”

 Jo’an understands her careful dedication to self-transformation as something that materializes subversively from the very same violent conditions that circumstanced her into being. Jo’ans’ art is both invitation and refusal. A refusal to the conditions of imprisonment that designates people as disposable, and an invitation to others living under those conditions to participate in her KOOK-ey strategies for transformation. You can write to Jo’an at:

John Dunn

V29876

California Medical Facility

P.O. Box 2000

Vacaville, CA 95696-2000

GALLERY