Convicted Killer Makes Artful Designs Using Candy ‘Paint’

By Mark Hoerrner

Donny Johnson is not a man most would admire. Convicted in 1980 for second-degree murder for a drug-related killing, he’s spent the last two-and-a-half decades in jail. He would have been eligible for parole were it not for a vicious attack on two prison guards in 1989 where he assaulted one and slashed the throat of another.

The 46-year-old inmate is currently serving out a life sentence at Pelican Bay State Prison in Crescent City, just south of the Oregon state line. With no hope of parole, Johnson is looking for some way to create purpose in what many have called a wasted life. He’s turned to art, but in a very unconventional way.

Inmates are not allowed many conveniences at Pelican Bay, especially not wood and metal paintbrushes which could be turned into weapons by creative convicts. Johnson has manufactured his own brush out of foil, plastic wrap and bits of his own hair, according to an article by the Associated Press.

Each month, Johnson has the ability to buy 10 packs of M&M candies. He then puts the candies in water to melt off the colorful dyes and uses the "water colors" as his painting medium.

Most of his artworks are done on postcards he’s able to procure and use. His art has been getting some attention outside the prison and he’s been able to make a few sales. What money he’s earned has not been kept but funneled to a charity for the children of inmates.

That altruism didn’t stop the warden at Pelican Bay from scheduling a disciplinary hearing to address whether or not Johnson was running a business from his cell, something the prison forbids inmates to do, the Associated Press reported.

Charles Carbone, Johnson’s attorney, told the Associated Press that his client had not broken the rules.

"There’s a very large question mark over the legality and morality of what the department has done to punish an inmate for trying to better himself and better his community," he said.

Johnson recently had a gallery showing July 14 in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. The artist was not in attendance, but his works were viewed by dozens of visitors. The show was prompted by Stephen Kurtz, a resident of San Miguel de Allende, who runs a non-profit called the Pelican Bay Prison Project.

Kurtz began a pen-pal relationship with Johnson and eventually, Johnson sent him some of his paintings.

"We looked at these things and said, ‘These are damn good,’" Kurtz, a psychoanalyst, told the Associated Press. Kurtz helped Johnson get a show at the YAM Gallery in San Miguel. More than 500 people visited the show where Johnson’s postcards were selling for $500 each.

"They are made with these chocolate pigments," said Adolfo Caballero, an owner of the gallery, told the New York Times. "He has really created a new kind of technique, because he doesn’t have access to conventional materials."

Other confections have yielded mixed results.

"It’s the same process with Skittles," he said, "but I end up eating them all.

"Grape Kool-Aid in red M&M color makes a kind of purple. Coffee mixed with yellow makes a light brown. Tropical punch Kool-Aid granules can be made into a syrup and used as a paint wash of sorts. But it’s a bear to work with and it’s super-sticky and it never dries."

Kurtz told the New York Times that Johnson’s artwork is atypical of the art he’s seen other prisoners produce.

"The prison art I’ve seen is very stereotypical: women with breasts out to the next block and beefy guys with them," Mr. Kurtz said. "It reminds me of Pollock in the early-to-mid-1940’s, when he was in Jungian analysis."