In the past when I have discussed prison Polaroids, I have said they are perhaps one of the more significant subsets of American vernacular photography, and that they are not easily found online and that, due to their absence, our perception of prisons and prison life continues to be skewed.
Well, times change and that position now deserves correction. I have noticed a few collections coming online recently. Not least the Polaroids from Susanville Prison on the These Americans website. (Also, check out the new PRISON subsection of the site.)
Online, I have identified some increase in the number of contemporary prison visiting room portraits and, as in the case of These Americans, collections of older, scanned images.
I would suppose that many Facebook users have scanned visiting room portraits and added them to profiles but, only visible to friends, those social network image files have not been reproduced for public consumption or commentary. We might think of Facebook photos and albums as digital versions of the mantlepiece, i.e. seen only by close friends and family.
ONGOING FOCUS
“Prisoner-complicit” portraits (for want of a better term) are taking up a lot of my thoughts currently.
Yesterday, I had a workshop with the #PICBOD students at Coventry University, in which I assigned readings on Alyse Emdur’s visiting room portrait collection, prison cell phones as contraband, prison cell phone imagery as cultural product, a new Tumblr In Duplo that compares publicly available mugshots with publicly available Facebook profile pictures, and the racket that underpins the posting and removal of mugshots to the searchable web.
Particularly with cell-block-cell-phone images, we should anticipate a glut of prisoner-complicit photos in which prisoners – to a greater degree – self represent.
We should realise that this is the first time in modern history that prisoners have presented themselves to the internet and thus permanently to the digital networks of the globe. My hunch is that this may be significant, but really, it’s too early to tell.
We can note that in this video, most of the images seem to originate from the same cell phone camera in the same prison. We might surmise there is no epidemic of illicit and smuggled images yet. To further this inquiry, I hope to get some information from the maker of said video.
In the mean time, I’ve been in touch with Doug Rickard who administers These Americans as well as the wonder-site American Suburb X. I asked him about his recently published Susanville Prison Polaroids:
Any idea who took them? (any marks/prison-stamps on verso?)
Probably a visitor or another inmate? I have a set (10 or so) of the main inmate (“Johnny”) that you see in many of the “Susanville” single poses, posed with “Brown Sugar” (his girlfriend/wife) and his son “Champ”, a boy that grows from 1-3 years old in the various pictures (see below).
What years do you think they span?
I can only find one date, 10-24-80. You would think that they were 90’s, but for sure, it says 80.
What makes this collection so fascinating to me is that the operator(s) appears to have had free reign of cells, tiers and the yard to make these single and group portraits. One of the PICBOD students at Coventry today wondered where their supply of Polaroid film came and then to where the images were eventually dispersed outside the prison.
We could only conclude that this prisoner and his group of friends had special privileges and access. From all of my research into (vernacular) prison photography – specifically prisoner-made photography – this sort of arrangement/privilege does not exist in American prisons today.
MORE ON THESE AMERICANS
http://www.theseamericans.com/media/minnesota-mugshots/
http://www.theseamericans.com/prison/last-prisoners-leave-alcatraz-1963/
http://www.theseamericans.com/prison/visiting-hours/
http://www.theseamericans.com/prison/prison-collection-%e2%80%9cjoliet-state-prison%e2%80%9d-1963/
http://www.theseamericans.com/prison/florida-collection-jack-spottswood-sunbeam-prison-camp-1950/
http://www.theseamericans.com/prison/california-collection-san-quentin-prison-1925-1935/
http://www.theseamericans.com/prison/polaroid-collection-mcneil-island-prison-wa-1970s/
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Thanks to Peg Amison for the tip.
8 comments
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February 10, 2012 at 1:14 am
Jonathan Worth (@Jonathan_Worth)
This was a fantastic #picbod session and it’s great seeing how content we’re used to seeing live on your blog, translates into such inspiring workshops and thought-provoking seminar / discussions.
Fabulous, please come back and see us soon. jw
February 10, 2012 at 2:01 am
Pete Brook: Prison Photography and Self Representation « PICBOD – A free and open undergraduate photography class
[…] you watch the video, this has been included underneath. Also of interest: last night Pete produced this blog post looking further into the prison Polaroids discussed in […]
February 10, 2012 at 2:33 am
Jonathan Worth (@Jonathan_Worth)
Here’s the class session :
http://www.picbod.covmedia.co.uk/2012/02/10/pete-brook-prison-photography-and-self-representation/
j
February 10, 2012 at 8:25 pm
Patrick
I have to comment on the whole idea of needing to develop Polaroid. Those images should have been instantly available to the shooter and subject, yes?
February 11, 2012 at 12:47 pm
dona junta
I have many friends and family with loved ones in prison who have had their fair share of Polaroids throughout the years. The whole Polaroid in prison ended like maybe 4 or 5 years ago. Thanks for sharing these pictures, I will link your post to the prison groups I belong to.
February 12, 2012 at 12:51 pm
petebrook
Thanks Dona. It is true prison Polaroids have been phased out in most states. I was told by prisoners in New York that they still have Polaroids; they laughed that it was so archaic!
February 12, 2012 at 12:53 pm
petebrook
Patrick, yes, of course. It was a typo; I used developed instead of dispersed. Corrected that embarrassing mistake now.
May 2, 2013 at 3:01 pm
Prison Yard to Paris Photo LA: Art Market Hustle and Flow Puts $45K Price-Tag on Prison Polaroids | Prison Photography
[…] down with the polaroids, leafing through them, and beginning research. As I have noted before, prison polaroids are emerging online. I suspect this reflects a fraction of a fledgling market for contemporary prison snapshots. Not […]