Honouring Creativity and Courage at Arohata Women’s Prison

On the last week of June, the Home Ground team returned to Arohata Women’s Prison for a powerful three-day project that marked both a celebration and a farewell.

Collective artwork

This was our first and last performing arts workshop at Arohata, and also our final workshop there for the foreseeable future. It closed a chapter that has spanned years of creative collaboration within its walls. We worked with an amazing group of women who were generous, honest, and deeply engaged. They brought humour, heart, and courage to every moment of the process.

Over three intense and joyful days, we moved, wrote, improvised, and connected. The room quickly became a space of trust, playfulness, and powerful expression. From quiet reflection to bold performance, the energy was electric and deeply moving.

We always make a collaborative poem, crafting a piece of writing that captures the spirit of the space we build together:

FLOW STATE

I see us

Organised chaos & energy,

Being free, like young & kindy.

Stars, bubbles & hurricanes.

It looks like a map

To Neverland

With cosmic clothes

And splatters of darkness under the colour.

We make darkness look good.

But the colour overrides it

Even though it’s still there.

You can’t have light without the dark.

That’s the rainbow wave.

This was our last project inside the prison for now. Home Ground is continuing to support wāhine through remote creative packs and resources. These packs are sent out once women reach out to us by letter. Each pack includes paper, stickers, card making kits, and a personal note written in response to their letter. We currently have four editions of the art packs. Once a woman receives her first pack, she can request the next edition, keeping the connection and creative expression flowing beyond the workshop space.

This "Last Project" held particular weight. Though it is the end of this particular stream of work inside the prison, it is not the end of our commitment to supporting the wāhine and their ongoing creative journey.

Sacha from Java dance performing "A colourful life".

We are incredibly grateful to the women who trusted us, to the staff who supported the kaupapa, and to our funders and community who continue to believe in the power of creative spaces in places of restriction.