Prison life in 1960s Texas, documented in Danny Lyons's iconic 'Conversations with the Dead'

Legendary photographer Danny Lyon spent 14 months documenting life inside the Texas penitentiary system from 1967 to 1968. Click ahead to see what he captured. Legendary photographer Danny Lyon spent 14 months documenting life inside the Texas penitentiary system from 1967 to 1968. Click ahead to see what he captured. Photo: Courtesy Of Danny Lyon/Edwynn Houk Gallery Photo: Courtesy Of Danny Lyon/Edwynn Houk Gallery Image 1 of / 89 Caption Close Prison life in 1960s Texas, documented in Danny Lyons's iconic 'Conversations with the Dead' 1 / 89 Back to Gallery

When Brooklyn-born photographer Danny Lyon moved to East Texas to spend a year documenting life inside of the penitentiary system, he had every intent on destroying the system.

This was the 1960s. Lyon had just begun his career with powerful images from the emerging Civil Rights Movement, and he followed it up with a seminal work 'The Bikeriders,' an insider's portrait of the notorious motorcycle gang the Chicago Outlaws.

"From my involvement in the civil rights struggle, I knew the best way to get good pictures was to get involved. I was a participant who also happened to be a photographer," Lyon said in an interview with the Guardian.

Lyon's style of photography was a conscious break from the classic images of balanced journalism that were popular in Life magazine at the time. He's a recognized pioneer of the New Journalism movement, a now common documentary style that combines literary or fictional devices with passionate personal perspectives to portray real events.

Hunter S. Thompson, a contemporary of Lyon's, was rocking the scene with his similarly-styled book 'Hell's Angels: The Strange and Terrible Saga of the Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs.'

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At the time, the Texas prison population was around 12,000, according to Lyon, who gained unprecedented access to the six Texas prisons — including the Ellis Unit, where death row inmates were kept until 1999.

Lyon explains in his book: "I tried with whatever power I had to make a picture of imprisonment as distressing as I knew it to be in reality."

Texas author Larry McMurtry became friends with Lyon during that time and he told the New York Times in an interview: "To some, he's idealizing people who really are not good people at all — they're just criminals... But to Danny maybe they're good people who just never had a chance."

First titled 'Born to Lose,' the unfinished portfolio of photographs from the inside sold for a few bucks in the prison store. Holt published Lyon's completed photobook 'Conversations with the Dead' in 1971, and it was hailed by critics as provocative, visceral follow-up to his iconic work in 'The Bikeriders.'

The book had been out of print in America since 1972, until Phaidon recently released a digitally remastered edition; now on the market for $69.95.

A selection of photographs from this edition are featured in the above gallery.

Now in his 70s, Danny Lyon lives in the desert of New Mexico. He continues his work as a photojournalist, writer and filmmaker, and you can learn about him on his blog Bleak Beauty.

jmscott@mysa.com