Red Times #090298, 2023 (1 of 6)
Oil based ink with Kool-Aid pigment and spot varnish, relief printed on black Somerset 280-gram cotton rag paper, with embossing
Roland has created a series of six prints based on an article from the Associated Press published in his local Asheville newspaper in the late 1990s about California’s inmate firefighter program. Shaped like flags, the prints incorporate red Kool-Aid, indicative of the warm glow of fire, and embossed varnish, symbolizing dimensions of smoke. Here Roland makes explicit the extremity despair that incarceration produces, prompting inmates to choose potentially fatal work over penal time in prison. Fighting fires becomes a path to freedom. For these works, Roland studied the California carceral system’s relationship to the inmate firefighter program, which began in 1946 and is still active today. Through this initiative, prisoners opt to undertake dangerous, grueling work as first responders and rescuers to battle wildfires throughout the state. As the fires have grown increasingly prevalent since the program’s inception, they are still paid minimally for their service. In this exhibition, Roland posits the conception “trial by fire,” an effort to burn away the public’s perception of guilt through enacting the role of heroism.