Mesmerized by the prison cells on Alcatraz Island
by Matthew D. Wittmer
Last updated June 2016
Thinking about the Alcatraz cell house has occupied years of my life ever since grade school. The idea of the prison on the island as a young person inspired me to create many images and models of that prison, usually of the cells themselves. Even in sixth grade I mimicked Clint Eastwood, star of the movie “Escape from Alcatraz,” by slowly chiseling a part of my school’s wall away with a spoon handle.
In 2001 I started making a huge miniature replication of the Alcatraz cell house. Specifically of B-Block. B-Block is a doubled faced, three-tiered run of over 170 individual prison cells that are in the heart of the Alcatraz cell house. The scale of this miniature is 1” = 1’. That miniature is based on my direct face-to-face measurements and photographs created during various trips I had made to the cell house. I photographed the original escape artifacts from the famed, 1962 escape attempt as well. These artifacts are now archived in the Maritime Museum at Fort Mason across from the island. Those fake portions of the cell walls the prisoners made to conceal the holes they had made in their cell walls helped me ascertain the exact paint color that the prison was painted in 1962. For several years I constructed this model from scratch as a side project to my day job.
In 2014, after several years of not being able to finish this large cell house project, I decided to live with – and share – this particular model differently than exhibiting it as a whole piece. As a result, I began the process of dissecting the model into smaller sections of cells. I started painting these sections and then shared them with others to be used as furniture. I painted several of these sections with lavender and off white color scheme. The original color scheme of the prison was cucumber green and more of a sock white color scheme. These sections of the cell house now are in New York, various locations in California and Missouri.
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Alcatraz island.
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From the mainland.
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A small recreation of the fake wall grill modeled after the larger one made by the 1962 escapee Frank Lee Morris.
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Another shot of the small grill along with a smaller grill modeled after the Clint Eastwood movie grill that I made in high school.
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Looking upward at the walk way hand rails of B-Block.
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The gun gallery.
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B-Block from the gun gallery. Thank God for the volunteers on the island that afforded me access to all the areas that the rangers would not permit me to go.
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In the cell house in the mid 2000s.
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My original plan for recreating B-Block, structure wise.
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One fourth of my miniature version of B-Block, one inch equaled one foot.
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All four sections assembled.
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Stairwell.
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Adding poured concrete ‘board’ textures with specially measured jigs I created the same widths of the boards.
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Another shot.
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One half of the model assembled.
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One fourth of the model with a vitamin bottle for scale.
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A redrafted sketch of what the model could look like if exhibited on the island.
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Poured concrete in the form of the boards used to hold the concrete can be seen here.
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The reverse side of one fourth of the model, behind the cells.
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Visiting the Fort Mason Center across the bay to examine the actual escapee artifacts the FBI kept from the 1962 escape.
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One of the escapee face wall vents – it has broken from the box and the board now sits behind the grill box.
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My cell colors were modeled after the colors of the escapee artifacts.
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My cells.
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January 2015 – I decided to abandon the idea of completing all the cells.
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So I cut all four pieces into chunks.
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With a handsaw, this took months.
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Three of the sections were not painted.
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I found photographing the destruction interesting.
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I decided to find homes for chunks of the model, so that people could live with a miniature portion of the Alcatraz cell house.
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Doing all this meant I had to find storage facility to store the chunks.
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I created a memorial color scheme for the chunks, totally unrelated to the original colors of the actual prison.
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Close up of the new color scheme.
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One section became a doll house for a friend of mine’s daughter.
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Another section of the stairs as I painted it.
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Without the middle tier walk way.
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This section went to a tattoo artist.
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Tattoo artist Latisha Wood has the end section with stairs in her studio space.
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Long Island artist Jeffrey Price has used his section for storing materials in his studio.
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I crafted Hannibal Lector doors for one large chunk that I kept.
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This is a mash up of Hannibal Lector doors on the miniature cells from B-Block.
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Tatto Artist Picasso in Lake Forest, California uses his chunk for storing materials.
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Another section is used by a friend as a bed side table.
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I created wall shelving out of some sections of the model.
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Another bed side table.
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Make up and Special Effects Artist Mike Strain Jr. with his section of the cell house in Springfield, Missouri.
Some references
Bruce, J. Campbell. Escape from Alcatraz. Sausalito, California: Comstock Editions. 1963. Print.
Babyak, Jolene. Breaking the Rock: The Great Escape from Alcatraz. Berkeley, California: Ariel Vamp Press. 2001. Print.
Siegel, Don, dir. Escape from Alcatraz. Paramount Home Video. 1979. DVD.