they got a brief glimpse of the water in their prison window when a storm blew aside the tarp. when it was covered again they started painting the sea, and boats. that water was freedom. there were no people in the paintings, because they were pictures of freedom, and the painters weren't free. they were prisoners of a country free to do anything it pleases. a picture in their head become a picture in their cell, confiscated by guards and scanned for hidden messages. there was an artist there for fifteen years. there was no trial and no charge, for no crime, until the time he might be no longer considered a threat and released. and i bet he'll carry around that window in his head and keeping struggling to see around that tarp forever now. 
when a lawyer got them exhibited and the response was great the authorities declared all art made in the prison government property. because the art showed they were human beings, and if the artist is no threat, art is, as it describes freedom, and that freedom ain't free, it's imprisoned.
this is guantanamo, but it could be any of the other places of endless detention. 

this is culled from an article, the art of keeping guantanamo open by erin l. thompson, curator, on tomdispatch.com.