Handkerchief Drawings by Hispanic Inmates in Texas Prisons
A Collection and Essay by Ed Jordan
Paño — Spanish for "cloth" or
"handkerchief," specifically one illustrated with ballpoint pen
and/or colored pencil. Paños are also referred to as pañuelos, and
one of my artists called them pasajes, or
"passages." These are a popular form of Chicano prison
illustration and are a variation of the decorated #10 envelope that originated
in Southwest prisons in the early 20th century.
Designs with ballpoint
pens on white handkerchiefs that the inmate has to purchase from the prison
commissary are often highly detailed and complex illustrations that tell
the inmate's story or visions in art, rather than words. As the Mexican culture
is a visual culture for the most part, the paño prison art
styles and techniques are passed down from prisoner to prisoner. In the
case of the ever-popular Virgen de Guadalupe image, often a stencil is
made and passed on or sold to another inmate. One of these I have seen has probably
been used by several inmates to copy onto a handkerchief. The Disney characters
are also copied this way and then personalized by the artist and sent to a
beloved child.
Much like the images
used by the Kuna Indians of Panama, the paño images are from
calendars, magazines, tattoos, and a variety of other sources. They are
traced onto the cloth and drawn with ballpoint pens, then often colored with
colored pencils. Sometimes if the artist lacks colored
pencils, the paños are stained and colored with coffee,
wax crayons, shoe polish, felt-tip markers, or whatever else might be
available. One artist had a great time with a lipstick, probably stolen
from a female employee of that prison.
The commissary
handkerchiefs are the most popular cloths to use, but if the inmate cannot
afford them, bed sheets and pillow cases of similar texture are used. Please
note the painstaking work on several of these examples that
have fringes made one after another by hand, and then consider the time
this must have taken.
As a collector of this
art form, I was told many times by the inmate artist that the paño I
was expecting to receive had been confiscated in one of the many prison
security crackdowns or raids. The guards would have instructions to raid the
cells, and almost all materials found would be taken and destroyed as the
prison employees searched for illegal contraband.
As the art form has
become more popular, the art has often become more sophisticated, and
the talent inherent in many of the inmates has resulted in some amazing
renderings. Many of the artists started signing their work, and museums, folk
art collectors, and galleries have started collecting them.
I did not start
collecting paños until about 1994. After graduating with a
B.F.A. from The University of Texas and a tour of Europe with the U.S. Army, I
ended up in Dallas and became the art director of an advertising agency
associated with the American Association of Advertising Agencies, where I
handled the advertising for the State Fair of Texas and its many smaller
entities in the 1960s and '70s. While serving as a design director and
troubleshooter for a national packaging firm, I later participated in many art
fairs, as well as nationwide museum and gallery shows (including 25 years exhibiting
at the fabled Laguna Gloria Fiesta). In the summer of 1988, Blinn
College of Brenham called to ask me to become the art instructor at their
"Bastrop Campus," which they admitted was within the Federal
Correctional Institution outside that city. Their current instructor was
leaving for another position.
While teaching, I
became aware of a new art form for me, the paño. Since I was
forbidden to take anything in or out of the prison, it was only after the
school closed down several years later that I was able to begin building this
collection. I contacted one of my former students, Paul Young, who was by then
finishing a term in a Texas prison, and asked him to look for paños for
me. In addition to this collection of paños, I also amassed a
large collection of Mexican folk art. Paul is responsible for most of my
collection and found my best artist, Ruben Magallon, whose many paños you
will see in this exhibit. I would have asked Paul and Ruben to be here to
share credit for this wonderful art form and their work, but Paul died
recently, and Ruben disappeared after his release from prison.
Paños/Pañuelos is on display at Texas Folklife Gallery
August 1 - October 25, 2013
Opening Reception - Sunday, August 18, 2:00 to 4:00 PM
Commentary by Ed Jordan and Refreshments: free and open to the public
