Brownsville, Brooklyn — Est. 2023
A weekly art and music program for young people and their staff in pre-trial maximum security detention at the NYC ACS Crossroads Juvenile Center. Communal studio time with live music to change people's lives.
About the Program
The Crossroads Art Club is a biweekly open studio for young people ages 12 to 21 held in pre-trial detention at the NYC Administration for Children's Services Crossroads Juvenile Center in Brownsville, Brooklyn.
Brothers Jacob and Max Cohen bring drawing materials, musical instruments, and open studio time into the facility every week. Jacob draws and plays a hand-built electric cello. Max works in visual arts. The sessions are non-prescriptive and voluntary. There is no fixed curriculum. Staff and administrators join alongside the youth.
The group is one of the only mixed-gender programs at the facility. Everyone is welcome. The work belongs to whoever makes it.
Art Club changed my life.Art Club participant, Crossroads Juvenile Center
The Work
Drawings, paintings, poems and studies made by young people at Crossroads Juvenile Center during open studio. Nothing here was assigned. The work belongs to whoever made it, and is shown without names.
No photography of young people is permitted inside the facility. The work is how the room becomes visible.
Recent Work
In 2025, Art Club published its first comic book, created by the young people in the program and the building staff that work with them. The comic grew out of collaborative drawing sessions at Crossroads and became a document of imaginations at work inside a place that it is not expected.
The book was exhibited at the Church of the Incarnation and at Art on the Ave in New York City, and at the Center for Art and Advocacy in the summer of 2026.
Available on request — $10 suggested donation per copy
Support the Work
Art Club runs on art supplies, instruments, and the time of two people who believe this work matters. Your support goes directly toward materials for the youth and sustaining the program week after week.
Crossroads Art Club is fiscally sponsored by Oyate Group, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit based in the Bronx.
@crossroadsartclub • All donations go directly to the program
For larger tax deductible gifts contact us at max [at] crossroadsart [dot] club
Partners & Sponsors
