I Want U 4 Prison (13th Amendment)

This work reimagines the iconic image of Uncle Sam, but here his face is fractured—his eyes crossed out, his mouth gagged. The familiar call of “I Want You” is transformed into an accusation: a system that doesn’t recruit for freedom, but for imprisonment. By invoking the 13th Amendment, the piece points directly at the constitutional clause that abolished slavery “except as punishment for crime,” laying bare the pipeline between patriotism, profit, and mass incarceration.

The bright red, white, and blue of Uncle Sam is undercut with prison greens and dollar signs, reminding us that incarceration is not simply about justice—it is about economics. The cartoonish figure is grotesque, absurd, and tragic, a national symbol stripped of dignity, mirroring the way incarceration strips dignity from millions.

The work asks us to confront an uncomfortable truth: in America, the language of freedom is often used to disguise systems of control. By twisting a recruitment poster into a prison notice, the artist reveals how deeply incarceration is woven into our national identity.