Kris Aman

Kris Aman will use their grant to continue the research and development phase for a feature-length documentary. The project is a response to the artist’s experiences serving as a support for survivors of sexual assault. In this work, Aman has found a lack in local resources for dealing with abusers outside the criminal justice system. In the process of trying to establish an accountability process for one of these abusers (at the request of the survivors and the recovering abuser), Aman came across the community-based strategies of transformative justice and community accountability. These practices are survivor-led, trauma-informed, and a necessary alternative to navigating the criminal justice system.

The project is a continuation of Aman’s pursuit of using multi-disciplinary art as a direct response to violent oppression, expressing new possibilities around healing and resistance. With this documentary, they wish to gather stories from communities who have successfully used these methods to address sexual violence, serving as a resource to any person who has done harm, any survivor, and any community that has felt previously disempowered to address violence outside of state systems.

Kris Aman is a poet, performance artist, musician and media-maker living in Tucson, AZ. They are the drummer for the band Vasectomy, and the creator of the TV series Channeled Poetry, which aired on Creative Tucson. They have a vision of a world where no one is disposable.

Photo by Adam Cooper-Terán.