“Do you have any idea what it feels like to get a standing ovation when you’ve been told your whole life that you are worthless?”
Arts in Prison provides opportunities for inmates to prove that they are more than the sum of their crimes. By providing arts education and experiences for inmates in state prisons and detention centers, these members of society, who have been locked away and often forgotten, are given a chance for self-reflection and an opportunity to create something beautiful. Whether it is a song, a stage performance, a photograph or a painting, they have created something that brings joy to others.
A positive experience allows an incarcerated person to begin to have hope and hope is what allows them to believe that they will get out of prison and that they will lead positive and productive lives on the outside.
The recidivism rate among former East Hill Singers, our longest running program, is 18% as compared to 32% for the state of Kansas and greater than 50% for the United States.
Arts in Prison is about inspiring and motivating positive change in the incarcerated.
Our Founder
After a notable career in choral music, Kansas native Elvera Voth left Alaska and returned to Kansas City to fashion her retirement and begin her third act. She determined that after spending her career making music for those who could afford to enjoy it she would most like to bring music to those who did not have the same opportunity. A friend suggested the prison in Lansing and a choir was born.
With the support of facility staff Elvera formed the East Hill Singers, a men’s choir in the minimum security unit at Lansing Correctional Facility. Eventually, she brought volunteer singers from the outside into the facility with her to provide vocal support to the inmate singers. Of course this coupling provided not only musical harmony but also a much needed connection to the outside world for the inmate singers. By 1996 the choir was traveling outside the prison walls to perform concerts in Kansas City, Topeka, Johnson County and Wichita.
Additional programs were added to the Arts in Prison portfolio and soon there were Arts in Prison classes offered in all units at the prison. In 1998 Elvera recruited her friend Robert Shaw to lead a sing along at Bethel College in Newton, KS to raise funds to incorporate and grow Arts in Prison. Maestro Shaw passed away a few months later.
Elvera saw the arts as a way to bring humanity to a place where little is thought to exist. The arts could be a way up and out for some. “I just didn’t want to give them one more failure in life. Why not invest yourself in other people’s lives? Why keep everybody at arm’s length?” “You know”, Elvera said, “they are coming home sooner or later. Do you want them to come back with hate in their eyes or hope in their hearts?”
Our Mission
Arts in Prison uses the arts to inspire positive change in the incarcerated, to reduce recidivism, and to reconnect offenders with their communities.
Our Core Beliefs
• We believe that it is possible for inmates to change their lives;
• We believe that in addition to new skills and attitudes, offenders need an inclusive, non-judgmental atmosphere in order to change;
• We believe that involving trained community volunteers delivering arts classes and programs provides effective mentoring that helps offenders shape their behavior patterns;
• We believe that powerful experiences through various art forms can help transform the thinking and aspirations of offenders, volunteers and community.
Cyrano de Bergerac - Bare Island Repertory an Arts in Prison program
Volunteers and Donors
Arts in Prison provides programming in Kansas State Prisons and detention centers. We receive no money from the state for providing program to the residents in their correctional facilities. Arts in Prison is funded by individual donations from community members and grants from foundations. When you donate to Arts in Prison you make the difference that changes the lives of incarcerated men and women.
Board of Directors
Kirk Carson, Board Chair
Shawn Wyckoff, Treasurer
Brian Daldorph, Member at Large
Ward Holmquist, Member at Large
Staff
Executive Director
Leigh Lynch
Leigh came to Kansas and Arts in Prison in 2007. She will tell you that she never expected to be living in the midwest and she certainly never thought that working with the incarcerated would become such a passion. Leigh explains her story like this - “The first time I had to go out to Lansing to escort a facilitator I didn’t even know where to go in the prison. I hadn’t been to training yet! I was accompanying a facilitator for the Talk About Literature Kansas program. The men found their way to the classroom with the last one running in and tucking in his shirt simultaneously. I come from a youth development background. It was like the school bell ringing at the end of the day with everyone racing to their after school program. That’s when I knew, “I got this!”. Leigh attended Wells College in Aurora, NY and holds an MBA from New England College. She is the 2020 recipient of the Donnelley College Delta Award.
East Hill Singers Artistic Director
Kirk Carson
Conductor, Kirk Carson, began with the East Hill Singers as a volunteer singer, and became its conductor in 2008. He is formerly a leading tenor with opera houses in Europe and the United States, including Chicago Lyric Opera, Chicago Opera Theater, Lyric Theater of Oklahoma, Dupage Opera, Augsberg Oper, Bremen Oper, Ulm Stadtstheater, and Graz Oper. He has performed with major symphony orchestras including, Deutschland Symphonic Radio Orchestra, Bavarian State Radio Symphony, Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, Music of the Baroque, and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. In 2001 he created the role of Sheriff Jack Potter in the operatic world premiere of Showdown on Two Street and can be heard on the original cast recording. He received his Bachelor of Music and Master of Performing Arts degrees in Choral Conducting from Oklahoma City University and also attended the American Institute for Musical Studies in Graz, Austria. Kirk has directed both opera and musical theater productions during the past 20 years for many different theaters. In addition to his work with the East Hill Singers, Kirk is Director of Music at Colonial Church in Prairie Village, KS, and performs as percussionist and singer with the Ole’ Flamenco Performance Troup.