Alcatraz, also known as “The Rock,” was a maximum-security federal prison from 1934 to 1963. Today it is part of the Golden Gate Park system, and draws thousands of visitors each day. The purpose of this photograph is to express the mood and meaning of Alcatraz – its sense of isolation, despair, and confinement. I found a brick wall that was laden with the shadows of steel bars, and waited as visitors walked before it. Exposing for the sun lighted bricks, I turned the visitors into abstracted silhouettes. I photographed this particular man just as he enters the frame. His placement on the edge of the image makes him face an even longer row of bars. He becomes an abstract symbol for the thousands of inmates who once passed before this very wall.