Angola, Louisiana 11 - 1999

Deborah Luster made this tintype photograph, "Angola, Louisiana." Luster's choice of the tintype process invites us to think about photography's past. The material conditions of the artwork connect it to 19th-century portraiture and documentary photography. But why is the artist using this outdated process? Luster is thinking about how the history of photography intersects with the history of incarceration. The subject here is an inmate at the Louisiana State Penitentiary, also known as Angola. This prison was built on the grounds of a former slave plantation. With this fact in mind, we might consider how photographic portraits of inmates participate in a longer history of representing oppressed people. To understand this artwork better, we would need to research the history of the prison system and the place of photography within it. By bringing to light the historical and institutional contexts of the artwork, we can explore its social meaning.