A newly released trailer for Redemption Time, a 70‑minute multimedia concert film directed by David Gonzalez, focuses on jazz violinist Christian Howes and poet Jimmy Santiago Baca, both of whom were formerly incarcerated.
The film combines music, spoken word and visual art, presenting a collaborative exploration of incarceration, identity and artistic expression. It centres in part on Howes, now an established jazz violinist, whose early experience of imprisonment shaped his subsequent career.
Howes grew up in Columbus, OH, and began violin lessons at the age of five. At the age of 20, he was sentenced to six to 25 years in prison for a drug trafficking charge, and served four.
Santiago Baca was incarcerated as a young man and taught himself to read and write while he was in prison. Following this, he gained a PhD in literature and received the American Book Award for Poetry.
Structured as a multimedia concert, Redemption Time interweaves performance with reflection, placing artistic practice alongside autobiographical narrative. It combines spoken word, music and visual art as a response to lived experience, moving through distinct themes: innocence, the fall, complicity, guilt, violence, the code, hurt, thirst, freedom and love.
Project materials describe the work as addressing ’the trauma of incarceration and the redemptive force of art’. The film situates both artists’ careers within broader personal histories, emphasising transformation and resilience. The project’s stated aim is to encourage discussion around justice, rehabilitation and social change.
Redemption Time will be livestreamed on 16 June 2026, at 2pm and 8pm Eastern time, followed by a live online Q&A.
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