Tomoka Correctional students curate Stetson exhibit through ed program

Students who have never set foot inside the Homer and Dolly Hand Art Center at Stetson University, never mind curated an entire exhibit, are the minds behind the gallery’s latest exhibition.

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“No One Here But Us,” which will be displayed through Dec. 5, is “a dynamic selection of artworks, including folk and outsider art curated by students enrolled in Stetson’s Community Education Project,” according to a press release.

The CEP, a grant-funded program, offers liberal arts education to Florida state prisoners. More than 25 Stetson faculty members have participated by offering “semester-length courses, lecture series, workshops and guest lectures in anthropology, computer sciences, communications and media studies, digital arts, education, English, film studies, history, Latin American and Latino studies, mathematics, music, philosophy, food studies, Portuguese, public health, religious studies, Russian, East European and Eurasian studies, sociology and Spanish,” the release stated.

The CEP takes place at the Tomoka Correctional Institution in Daytona Beach, 15 miles from Stetson’s campus, according to the release.

Natália da Silva, Ph.D., director of the Homer and Dolly Hand Art Center, was the faculty adviser for the exhibit curation.

“The artists on view are exceptionally talented,” she said in the release. “Each artwork on view tells a story, but as intended by the curators, we invite visitors to formulate their own perspective.”

The students made every decision related to the exhibit’s curation, from its concept to the notations next to each piece.

The students “share a commitment to personal expression, and largely, an unwavering desire to create … curating the outside from inside, we challenge prejudices in the art world and beyond,” the curators’ statement reads. “We invite visitors to explore the exhibit, and in the process, embrace the truth that we are here. The artists, the curators and the visitors, too. There is no one here but us.”

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Stetson professor Nathan Wolek, Ph.D., contributed tactile and sonic media to design accessible learning resources for visually impaired audiences.

“If it’s done thoughtfully, accessible technology should feel integrated into the whole,” he said. “It’s not a late add-on. It’s just part of the overall design that happens to make this experience more accessible for diverse audiences. That’s my goal for this project, and I think that’s what we achieved.

“Along the way, we created some unique learning experiences for the students,” Wolek continued. “It started by creating text descriptions of the pieces. Natália used this as an assignment in two different courses, giving the students writing assignments with a clear purpose. I took some of these text descriptions and had my beginning audio students recording the narration and enhancing them with sound design. Again, students knew going in that their work was for an exhibit at the campus art gallery, giving them a clear audience for their work.”

The artworks displayed in the exhibit are courtesy of the Museum of Art-DeLand, the Walker Collection of Florida Self-Taught Art, and collectors Beth and Greg Milliken, David Cutrell and Gary Monroe.

For information, visit handartcenter.org/calendar

This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Tomoka Correctional students curate Stetson exhibit through ed program

Reporting by Ashley Varese, Daytona Beach News-Journal / The Daytona Beach News-Journal

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This story was originally published September 14, 2026 at 5:09 AM.