Bogotá Prison Pageant, Part III

Every year, the national women's prison in Colombia puts on a beauty pageant in which each cell block elects its own candidates to represent them - a queen and a queen mother. Our artists were down in Bogotá for the pageant in 2011, and what you're about to hear is from the interviews with the contestants and inmates there. This material was performed and recorded live at 92YTribeca in NY. First up is Donnetta Lavinia Grays as Jeimi (Willy) and next up is Florencia Lozano as Jessica. Maria Elena Ramirez closes out this episode as Ana Yolanda, Queen Mother for one of the cell blocks. Interviews for this episode were conducted by Adriana Mejía. The performances you just heard were directed by Steven Cosson. Thanks for listening. Subscribe, rate, review!

Click HERE for our research photos from the pageant!

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Bogotá Prison Pageant, Part I

The beauty pageant that takes place in the national women's prison in Bogotá, Colombia is the subject of this week's podcast episode. Steve Cosson spent a month visiting the prison during the lead up to the pageant, working with a group of Colombians, playwright José Rivera, and songwriter/musician Hector Buitrago of the Latin Grammy Award-winning band Aterciopelados. They interviewed the pageant's contestants, other inmates, and prison staff. In this podcast, you’ll get a chance to hear some of our raw interviews, which were translated into English and performed for the first time at the 92YTribeca in June of this year. Our first interview, performed by Vanessa Aspillaga, is with a woman serving time for being part of one of the various guerilla groups who are part of a long-standing armed conflict with right-wing paramilitaries. Next up is Carolina Ravassa playing an inmate who is incarcerated for her part in an attack on the presidential palace in Bogotá in 2002. The attack did not succeed in hitting then President Alvaro Uribe, though one missile overshot the palace and landed in the nearby neighborhood of El Cartucho, killing a number of people. To close this episode, our Associate Artist KJ Sanchez performs an inmate who, while she proclaims her innocence, was convicted of working for the paramilitaries through her political office. These interviews were conducted by Lorena Lopez and Alejandro Jaramillo. Thanks for listening - subscribe, rate, and review us!

Click HERE for our research photos from the pageant!

TO SUBSCRIBE TO THE LET ME ASCERTAIN YOU PODCAST SERIES ON ITUNES, PLEASE CLICK HERE!

Simple Gifts

In September, Steve Cosson and a team of artists were in Colombia conducting research and interviews about the beauty pageant that happens every year in the national women's prison in Bogotá. They spent about three weeks talking to the women in the prison, including the participants in the pageant (one woman is selected to compete from each cell block), the women watching, past winners, the prison staff, and more. They learned a lot about both the pageant and day-to-day life for the inmates. One of the pretty striking aspects of the daily routine at the prison is that the women don't have easy access to some things that are pretty important to daily life, like toilet paper. There are two ways that the women can get toilet paper and other similar items: if they have money, they can purchase them from the prison store, but more often, the women will have a family member or friend who will visit once a week and bring them what they need. So those who don't have family nearby are left to figure out how to get this stuff on their own.

So Steve and the team went to the Bogotá version of Costco, where they raised some eyebrows by buying around 560 feminine napkins, hundreds of rolls of toilet paper and bars of soap, and lots of laundry soap and bocadillo (a Colombian guava candy).



They put divided up all the stuff into bags (each including two rolls of toilet paper and seven feminine napkins, plus the soaps and candy), and divided the bags by cell block for distribution.











As you might recall from earlier posts, it's not that easy to get into the prison. Each bag had to be individually checked by security before the team was allowed to proceed to the Education Building to distribute everything. Each interviewee and international inmate received a bag. To claim their bag, they got a piece of paper from the prison staff with their name on it. When their name was called by the prison staff, they were allowed to enter the courtyard, walk to Steve who was stationed in the center, hand Steve their slip, he would hand them their bag, and they would then proceed to exit the courtyard and return to the Education Building. The Japanese inmate, who didn't speak much Spanish, seemed pretty confused about the whole thing.

Check out the skyline in the background! 

And be sure to take a look at our photos posted this week on Flickr HERE of the pageant! Here's a few to whet the appetite - they're really incredible!

Check out the detail on this sequin work; it's  incredible!

Costumes are made from recycled materials.

From the folk dancing competition

Bogotá Prison Pageant: Intro to the Investigation

From Steve Cosson in Bogotá:

I've been here in Bogotá for a couple weeks now leading the investigation for our new Bogotá Prison Pageant show (working title of course. Saying that title out loud kindof feels like coughing).  I'm just now getting a chance to catch my breath – both literally and figuratively.  Bogotá is about a mile and a half up in the air which I'm aware of every time I have to climb stairs. The city is quite a metropolis—it stretches North and South with the Andes bordering the city on the East. The wealthier people live to the North, the poorer to the South. I'm living somewhere in El Centro which as you might guess is in the middle of the two – 31st street to be exact at the intersection of two main drags – Carrera 7 and 13. Carrera 7 is almost completely dug up with construction which is a big drag. Por ejemplo, last night jack hammers were working till about 1 am.  Apparently the construction had a lot to do with corruption and kickbacks of Bogotá's last mayor.  Which is part of why he is no longer mayor.

But why I'm here: I'm leading a group of 5 Colombian actors/theater artists in an investigation of the annual beauty pageant that takes place each year here at El Buen Pastor, a women's prison. Sadly there is no pageant at the men's prison.  After much to-ing and fro-ing with the national prison bureaucracy we got access to El Buen Pastor about ten days ago and the group has been visiting each morning conducting interviews with the inmates – some contestants some not.  El Buen Pastor has 9 "pavellones" or cellblocks.  Though a straight translation would be "Pavillion" which sounds much more fun.  It's really not a fun place. The beds are concrete slabs and often women sleep on the floor.  The prison was built to hold 1,000 and currently holds 1,800. Each cell just has bars on the windows so it's fairly exposed to the elements. Oh, did I mention Bogotá is COLD. Or at least for a cell exposed to the night air it gets down to 40 degrees. From these 9 pavellones there are 12 contestants.  Three of the pavellones are grouped together since the population of each is fairly small.  So from the six, a "reinita" or young queen and a "reina madre" or older/mother queen is elected. 

There's a lot of pressure on each of these women to compete and win, of course. But unlike a traditional beauty pageant the emphasis is on the group and not just the contestant. So each pavellon (aka patio) has to work together to build a float according to a theme, and a group of women from each patio learn a traditional dance and make costumes to accompany the presentation of their reinas.  

The theme this year is "the planet." As one of the psychologists of the prison told us, the administration wanted to raise awareness of environmental issues and global warming (see here for The Civilians play about all that). So of the six patios each is assigned a region of Colombia (determining their dance and costumes) and a planet-related theme:  air, water, fire, earth, living planet, dead planet.  We spoke to one of the queens having to represent the "dead planet" and initially she was fairly bummed at her patio's theme. I've been informed though that as of yesterday she figured out how to make a really killer outfit that's both glamorous and scary so now she is psyched.  

The theme is also key for the "Desfile de Carrozas," or the Parade of Floats.  Here for example are the carrozas for the National Miss Coffee pageant:  http://www.calarca.net/nacional/carrozas/index.htm 
(Did I mention that beauty pageants are a big deal here?  There's a pageant for just about any place, food, product or abstract idea you can imagine).  The carrozas at El Buen Pastor are a big effort – weeks of work to make spectacular floats out of shopping carts, recycled materials and some paint. 

I'm hoping by the time of the Desfile de Carrozas that I'll get permission to take photos.  So far no luck there.  

Here however, are a couple photos of our team of interviewers waiting to enter the prison. This is a fun ritual they get to do every morning at 8AM.  In future blog postings I'll be introducing you to the Colombian Civilians.  

Un abrazo!