Sherrill Roland
Durham, NC
Sherrill Roland is an interdisciplinary artist who creates art that challenges ideas around controversial social and political constructs, and generates a safe space to process, question, and share. He was born in Asheville, NC, and received an MFA in Studio Art from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. Inspired by his experience in prison for a crime he did not commit, he founded The Jumpsuit Project to raise awareness around issues related to mass incarceration. Roland’s socially-engaged art project has been presented at Open Engagement Chicago, Oakland City Hall, and the Michigan School of Law. He was awarded the Center for Documentary Studies Post-MFA Fellowship in the Documentary Arts at Duke University in Durham, NC, and the Rights of Return USA Fellowship. After completing the Fountainhead Residency in Miami, Florida, Roland returned to North Carolina as an artist-in-residence at the McColl Center of Art + Innovation.
Installation view of Sherrill Roland’s The Jumpsuit Project. Photo credit: Jason Mandella.
Photo of Sherrill Roland engaging with individuals for The Jumpsuit Project for the exhibition “Fictions” at The Studio Museum in Harlem. Photo credit: Rebecca Alice Bennett.
Photo of Sherrill Roland engaging with individuals for The Jumpsuit Project at Alcatraz. Photo credit: Baldemar Arroyo.
Photo of Sherrill Roland engaging with individuals for The Jumpsuit Project in Washington, D.C. Photo credit: Christian Carter Ross.
Photo of Sherrill Roland engaging with a group for The Jumpsuit Project at Brooklyn Public Library. Photo credit: Gregg Richards.
The Jumpsuit Portal
Sherrill Roland is an interdisciplinary artist who creates art that challenges ideas around controversial social and political constructs, and generates a safe space to process, question, and share.
Artist BioThe criminal justice system in the US is intentionally fragmented and often invisible to those who do not have a direct connection with it. In The Jumpsuit Project, Sherrill Roland wears the iconic, orange prison jumpsuit and engages people in conversation, disrupting spaces in the art world, higher education, and other places where issues around criminal justice do not normally appear. As a socially-engaged performance, the work centers around making connections both within and outside of the incarceration system through performance and a digital hub. Roland aims to build a new narrative around criminal justice, working toward lasting national policy changes by disrupting the local incarceration system.