Chris Steele Perkins – The Punishment of a Prison Cell 1988

Chris was born in 1947, Rangoon, Burma. His family moved to England when he was two. He joined the University of Newcastle where he served as a photographer and picture editor for a student magazine. After graduating, he worked as a freelance photographer. He became a full-time photographer with interests in urban issues, poverty, events, wars and disasters.

Steele-Perkins joined Magnum Photos in 1979 and soon began working extensively in the developing world, in particular in Africa, Central America and Lebanon, as well as continuing to take photographs in Britain

Chris Steele-Perkins has been involved in a number of cultural projects around the world. Many of his photos show problems in the third world. He’s able to show his view and perception of himself in relation to the world. He moves between specific and designed conceptual art and photojournalism in a quick manner, entrancing the people who see his images.

“This was part of a larger reportage on crime and punishment in the Soviet Union. It was the first time a westerner was allowed to photograph police and prisons. I felt the access was better than had I tried to do the same story in England. For me, this is an archetypal prison picture: bare walls, shaved heads, a look of boredom.” – Chris Steele-Perkins, Magnum

This photo makes me feel worried and sad. The men in prison look close to my age. They seem uncertain of their future. Russian history and its communism is perceived as horrific, inhumane and bleak.

It shows their stunned, expressionless, pasty faces standing hopelessly behind iron bars. The small fraction of light in the background comes from a tiny window depicting a glimmer of hope for not only these men, but also the system. The choice to do this photo in black and white increases the contrast. The graininess of the photo leads one to see the walls as crumbling and the iron bars as rusting. The monochrome palette demands your focus