The Vectors project I chose to look at was Public Secrets b After scrolling through a few projects I chose to examine this one because of its interesting subject matter and relatively simple to navigate interface. The site examines public secrets as it gives voice to women incarcerated in central California and their thought on the war on drug crime, the criminal justice system, and the prison industrial complex.
“Public Secrets reconfigures the physical, psychological, and ideological spaces of the prison, allowing us to learn about life inside the prison along several thematic pathways and from multiple points of view. Through a thoughtful and respectful framing and layering of the voices of individual women, we get a view from inside but also a view in context.”
When you enter the space you are greeted with audio that descries the prison’s appearance, as visuals abstractly construct blocks that appear to be prison walls, however it is unclear. After the intro is over, the blocks remain with statements of women who are incarcerated, the words reveal themselves and then disappear fairly quickly, I believe this lends itself to the overall theme of the site “public secrets”
When you click on one of the quotes audio begins and you are directed to select either life inside or life on the outside depending on the quote you chose. Once you select inside or outside you are lead to more quotes with sub-genres like “violence” or “health”. There is also a side bar on the side that makes the navigation less maze-like.
While the site was fairly easy to navigate I could feel myself being drawn further and further in and being sucked into a never ending maze which I think the site wanted viewers to feel. The site’s use of quotes and audio really shows its tempt to give women on the inside a voice. I think the project was very successful in doing this and revealing secrets of women who have been incarcerated. you see the connections between thing like malpractice and how tit affects the women incarcerated and how many quotes have discussed this issue. I think that the aspects of the site which made it more difficult to use where intentional and demonstrated the difficult harsh realities of the prison system.