25 Female Inmates Participate In ASU's Journey Home 3/28

On March 28 from 6 to 7 p.m., 25 incarcerated women, ages 18 to 50 from Estrella Jail will participate in ASU Gammage's Journey Home Program. Journey Home is an arts residency program designed to enable incarcerated women to discover a personal sense of constructive identity through performance, visual arts, creative writing and storytelling.

Since 2002, ASU Gammage has worked with nearly 300 inmates through Journey Home. The six-week program works with the women by using choreography, visual arts and creative writing to help them build personal skills and self-esteem. It also shows them alternative methods to destructive behavior, giving the women opportunities through the arts, to see themselves as productive, creative people. This year's theme is Blueprint for Womanhood: Reinventing Ourselves at Every Age and will engage the women in the process of self-exploration and creativity. It will include creative methods used to tap into emotions that may stifle development.

ASU Gammage Executive Director Colleen Jennings-Roggensack says, "Journey Home allows the women to develop tools that help them make positive choices and encourages them to break the negative patterns that lead to incarceration. We are the only theater in the country doing work like this within the prison system; it goes back to our mission of connecting communities".

About ASU Gammage

Located on the Tempe campus of Arizona State University, ASU Gammage is among the largest university-based presenters of performing arts in the world. ASU Gammage is the home theater of M&I Bank Broadway Across America - Arizona and Beyond series. Its mission is connecting communities by providing artistic excellence and educational outreach to the public. ASU Gammage is an historic hall designed by internationally renowned architect Frank Lloyd Wright. asugammage.com