At the time of his death in February 2002, Matt Lyon was UC Berkeley's Assistant Vice Chancellor for Public Affairs. His wife, Katie Hafner, comments on his talents and his passion for photography, which inspired his family to endow the Matthew M. Lyon Prize in Photography:

When someone dies at an early age, as Matt did, he leaves many things unfinished. When he died, at age 45, Matt was still in the middle of shaping the future of the university's Office of Public Affairs. He was drawing. He was writing a book. And one joint project — the project in which he took the greatest pleasure — was the raising of our daughter, Zoe.

Photography was something he had loved since childhood. As a teenager, he carried his camera with him everywhere. He developed his own film and made his own prints. Everyone and everything was a potential subject. He was as adept at portraits — especially self portraits — as he was at landscapes. He loved to experiment. And he had an eye for unlikely subjects — doorknobs, cornices, puddles. For a period in his 30s, he photographed nothing but freeway underpasses and overpasses. Unlike many people who outgrow their childhood hobbies, Matt stuck with his. When he became a father, he turned his lens to documenting Zoe's life. Every photo he took of her was, in its way, a piece of art.

Of all the ways in which Matt's memory could be honored, a prize for aspiring young photographers is by far the most appropriate. Matt fostered talent wherever he spotted it. He was the driving force in reviving UC Berkeley's Dorothea Lange Fellowship in documentary photography, and he was proud of the graduate students it recognized. He would take delight in knowing that a lifelong passion of his is inspiring new generations of photographers. And he would be honored to have this prize for undergraduates named for him.

Katie Hafner