On Jan. 24, the Cantor Fitzgerald Gallery unveiled its latest show, Prison Obscura, with a reception and a talk by curator Pete Brook, the Portland, Ore.-based writer and editor of Prison Photography.
No country incarcerates a higher percentage of its population than the United States. In fact, more than 2.2 million people are currently locked up in the U.S.—a number that’s more than quadrupled since 1980. But sadly, the lives lived behind bars are all too often invisible to those on the outside. Prison Obscura sheds light on such experiences and the prison-industrial complex as a whole by showcasing rarely seen surveillance, evidentiary, and prisoner-made photographs. The exhibit, which through March 7, encourages visitors to ask why tax-paying, prison-funding citizens rarely get the chance to see such images, and what roles such pictures play for those within the system.
For more information on the exhibit: exhibits.haverford.edu/prisonobscura.
Photos by John Muse, except where noted.