Kitchen Garden

Since 2020, Bergen-based artist Stacy Brafield has worked on a socially engaged art project with the women’s section of Bergen Prison, in collaboration with Bergen Kunsthall and Festspillkollektivet. Together with the women living in the prison, Brafield has transformed an unused part of the prison surroundings into a Kitchen Garden, a green space for mental and physical health, for tactile focus and creative imagination. The project works with the creation of culinary ideas in all their phases. The physical form of the Kitchen Garden is an allotment, greenhouse and herb garden. After the design and building process, the Kitchen Garden will be a self-sufficient project run by the women living in the prison.

Brafield is currently working on a book that documents the project, including the methodologies for inclusion and participation, the recipes they have cooked together, the architectural model, drawings and photographs. The book will open this project to a wider public, outside of the context of those working with and in the prison and will be launched at Bergen Kunsthall once the ground has thawed in spring 2024.