‘Without golf art, I’d be in jail’: the remarkable story of Valentino Dixon

A mere five-minute stroll from Augusta National lives a man with a more extraordinary backstory than anybody who will tee off in the upcoming Masters. Golf was largely responsible for restoring Valentino Dixon’s freedom, which in itself is poetic given his upbringing in the streets of East Side Buffalo.

“I had never set foot on a golf course before I went to prison,” Dixon explains. “I have played about 20 times now.

“Golf meant absolutely nothing to me. I grew up in a tough, inner‑city neighbourhood where it was just football and basketball. Golf was for white privileged people; at least I thought it was. It had nothing to do with a poor black kid, growing up in a drug-infested neighbourhood. I was never in a gang or anything like that but a lot of my friends got killed when I was younger.”

Dixon has rubbed shoulders with Tiger Woods and Jack Nicklaus. He has sold artwork to Michelle Obama. Yet for 27 years – he received a life sentence – Dixon was imprisoned for a shooting he was not responsible for. The delivery of justice arrived only after Dixon’s astonishing knack for reproducing golf holes on canvas received widespread publicity. He walked free in 2018, after the confession of another man – made two days after the 1991 shooting – was so belatedly accepted.

For the first seven years of his internment and despite earlier being such a promising art student Dixon did not draw a thing. His passion was refuelled by a delivery of supplies from an uncle. “He told me if I could reclaim my talent, I could reclaim my life,” says Dixon. “I started to draw again. My uncle said I may have to draw myself out of prison. That made me say to myself: ‘If I become one of the greatest artists who has ever lived, that has to get me