Summer Nights: Art & Resistance Night

Image: Pyrrhic Defeat: A Visual Study of Mass Incarceration, © 2024, Mark Loughney. Presented in Collaboration by Mural Arts Philadelphia and Eastern State Penitentiary Historic Site.

Free admission for Eastern State members! Join now.

Creativity can be a powerful catalyst for change—both inside and outside prison walls. Learn about the role that art and ingenuity played at Eastern State from the healing power of painting to the resourcefulness of unique escape plans. Plus, consider the continued impact of art as resistance today.

• Behind The Screams: Halloween Nights
  Meet members of our Halloween Nights team and learn more about the magic that makes our Halloween festival of epic proportions possible each fall. Get up close and personal with props and watch a live special FX makeup demonstration!
   
• New Leash on Life USA
  Meet an adoptable dog that received a fresh start thanks to our community partner, New Leash on Life USA. Learn more about their life-changing rescue programs and how animal companionship supports healing and rehabilitation for justice-involved people.
   
• Drop in Make and Take Art Activity
  Join ReVision artist-in-residence Cody Stuhltrager for a hands-on, drop-in art activity exploring the meaning of labor in our lives, institutions, and society. Through layered mixed-media techniques and a variety of materials, participants will create personal artworks inspired by how work can serve as everything from routine and restriction to a vital source of skill, survival, and self-expression.
  
  All supplies are provided, and no prior art experience is needed. No reservations required. Visitors may drop in at any point during the workshop and stay as long as space allows.
   
• Mini Tour: Chaplain’s Office Murals
  Explore the Catholic Chaplain’s Office and get an up close and personal look at the 23 murals created by Lester Smith while incarcerated at Eastern State in the 1950s. Learn more about Eastern State’s religious foundations, and consider the impact of faith, resilience, and community behind prison walls.
   
• Mini Tour: The Tunnel Story & Other Escapes
  In 1945, Clarence Klinedinst, “Slick Willie” Sutton, and other people incarcerated at Eastern State devised a bold escape plan, digging a tunnel through a cell and under the penitentiary’s perimeter wall. Learn more about their scheme and other escape attempts over the wall, under the wall, and through the gatehouse. Though often sensationalized, these historic escape attempts can also reveal deeply human stories of creativity and resistance.