Showers, Diagnostic Unit, Texas, from the portfolio Danny Lyon

Artist Danny Lyon (American, born 1942)

Date1967-69 (negative); 1979 (print)

MediumGelatin silver print

DimensionsImage: 13 × 8 3/4 inches (33 × 22.2 cm);
Sheet: 14 × 11 inches (35.6 × 28 cm);
Mat: 18 × 14 inches (45.7 × 35.6 cm)

ClassificationsPhotographs

Credit LineGift of Dr. Carl Melcher

Terms

Photographs
Portfolio
Gelatin silver prints

Object number83.125.001.016

Label CopyIn 1969, photographer Danny Lyon published Conversations with the Dead, a book documenting his fourteen months of nearly unrestricted access to the Texas Department of Corrections’ various prisons, which ranged from the Diagnostic Unit—an inmate’s first stop—to Ellis, a prison reserved for the most unmanageable cases. During this time, he befriended several of the inmates; their correspondences with Lyon and prison records of their cases are also included in the book, as are drawings by one, Billy McCune. In the forward to the book, Lyon observes, “I am greatly relieved not to visit the prisons anymore. In the letters and drawings of a supposed madman, I have found someone much more eloquent than I to explain to the free world what life in prison is like.” The showering man’s tattoo is of the Virgin of Guadalupe, patron saint of Mexico and of the Americas, and a popular tattoo choice among Mexican Americans. She is believed to offer protection to her bearer. ("This is no Less Curious: Journeys through the Collection" cocurated by Sonja Gandert, Alexandra Palmer, and Alana Ryder and presented at the Johnson Museum January 24 - April 12, 2015)

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