Neo-Conceptual artist Peter Halley came to prominence in New York City's East Village in the early 1980s.  His diagrammatic visual vocabulary including "cells" or "prisons" connected by "conduits" recalls both hard edge and minimalist lineages. Also a prolific essayist and critic, Halley's writings draw on the philosophical theories of French post-structuralist writers such as Michel Foucault, Jean Baudrillard, Roland Barthes and Paul Virilio. Halley has suggested that "if we see the geometric invested with the spiritual, then the geometrization of the space we live in and the geometrization of our lives becomes more acceptable."[1]

Throughout his career, Halley has utilized commercial materials such as fluorescent pigments and a paint additive called Roll-a-Tex, the latter producing a unique texture commonly used in construction, while the use of saturated tones recall the merchandise and styling of New Wave music. In the painting Stacked Prisons (2008), three "prisons" on three connected canvases are each divided by three horizontal lines into four equal sections. Bordered by Roll-a-Tex in silvery paint, the "prisons" are vertically arranged in different color and size formations. Halley's dedication to the grid recalls architectural aspects of urban living, including office towers, parking lots, and institutional imprisonment, as well as emerging technology and the introduction of the personal computer.