AORTA Projects (formerly ARTinACTION)

NEW WEBSITE

2008-10-23T17:53:00.000-07:00

Please visit www.aortaprojects.blogspot.com, our new website for all things AORTA!

Thanks!

Site #30: Jacqueline Bishop "Field Guide" Milne Boys Home, 5420 Franklin Ave; Gentilly

2008-06-20T14:28:00.000-07:00

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Listen to Open Sound New Orleans' site-specific recording at the Milne Boys Home made during our first day of painting:
#53 "Birds And Insects During The "Field Guide Installation"

Click on photos to enlarge.

ARTIST STATEMENT
"My vision for the Milne Boys Home was to paint the asphalt driveway with approximately 5000 simple black bird silhouettes that were individually cut from original drawings and applied with Industrial Zone and Marking paint directly onto the pavement. Much of my work focuses on the natural environment and its inherent connection to our lives. Considering there are approximately 460 bird species in Louisiana I will be stenciling a variety of these species in an effort to celebrate and raise consciousness about our unique and fragile environment.

The bird silhouettes covering the ground are designed to create a sense of birds in flight above, reminiscent of shadows coming from imaginary birds in flight. In reality these bird species would never interact with each other, but in this project the diversity of bird species migrating together symbolizes the need for human diversity to walk and work together to rebuild our landscape. The graphic nature of the black silhouettes can symbolize the absolutely critical state of our environment – it is a “black and white” issue that cannot be ignored. The eco-system that many of our native and migrant birds depend upon is under attack; as landscape changes or disappears the birds are threatened with extinction; many see this as the beginning of the end of life as we know it. Birds are important pollinators - they plant trees, flowers, fruit, eat biting insects, and deliver messages about our shared environment to those who are intuitive enough to listen. When powerful human leaders dismiss our wounded landscape, it is birds that can help regenerate it. Leading "Field Guides'" migration through the Milne Boys Home driveway are images of hummingbirds - which for the Biloxi Indians represented the symbol of truth. The word Biloxi means “First People”. This native tribe from Mississippi became nearly extinct, but the few survivors ended up in Louisiana.

After experiencing the power of Katrina while sitting in my house, the most immediate, haunting memory after the storm was the deafening silence. There were no birds for days. It seems appropriate that this project can bring attention to birds who in turn bring life to abandoned areas in post-K New Orleans. I hope that "Field Guide" will also support the Milne Foundation in their efforts to renovate this amazing property and reinvigorate the Milne Boys Home as a destination for academic study and community activism."

ARTinACTION would like to thank the Milne Boys Home, Whole Foods Market, and the ARTinACTION volunteers who made "Field Guide" possible. Special thanks goes to Michelle Pontiff, Christian Rapeel, Laura Summers, and David Wray for their tireless devotion and hard work on behalf of "Field Guide".

Ms. Bishop is represented by the Arthur Roger Gallery in New Orleans.

Please also view ARTinACTION Site #26 "Black, White, Blue" which was initiated at the Milne Boys Home in the Spring of 2008.

Site #29: Morgana King "I Miss My Neighbors": 610 Lesseps, Upper Ninth Ward, New Orleans

2008-06-17T08:56:00.000-07:00

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Since Hurricane Katrina, the city of New Orleans population has been cut down to roughly a third of its size, leaving neighborhoods full of abandoned houses. On top of people choosing not to return, the city has still not redeveloped public housing units at all – 2.5 years later. This is a major source of controversy because it is widely believed that the government, through its neglect, is intentionally keeping poor, black and elderly people from returning to their homes. One of these vacant small brick apartment buildings is across the street from my house, where I lived before the storm.

I spent the year after the hurricane away from New Orleans and missed everything about my old life. When I finally did return, I was saddened by how much it had lost - especially the people who were missing. Many slogans have been made into T-shirts and yard signs promoting levee protection, or railing against FEMA, and I was always trying to come-up with my own phrase that would sum up my feelings living in this strange abandoned place. It came to me one day, and I think it sums up my local feelings about the specific people I miss on my street and addresses the city's Housing Authority of New Orleans (HANO) inaction. I feel that this slogan is relevant to everyone in New Orleans. The slogan is: "I Miss My Neighbors".

I created a large handmade banner that stretched above the railing on the second floor balcony of the afore-mentioned abandoned building on my street. On the boarded up windows and doors of the building I painted remembrances of people who used to live there. Like the loud guy who lived in the corner apartment who would always shout "Hey Neighbor!" and "Howdy!" when I was on the street. Or the elderly lady who would sit on a chair on the balcony for hours and hours everyday. I don't intend for this work to be overtly political - I feel this statement is more about sharing a personal feeling.

Initially the first night the banner was up someone tore it down. I don't know who did it, but I was surprised, even pleased, to get such a strong reaction. I re-hung the banner and added two paintings - over the course of the week I added another one every night so that when my neighbors woke up a new portrait would have appeared. This went on until I finished. The work has since been completely torn down (HANO claim to be renovating the building now) (and how surprising is it that they had the energy and time to tear down this art but not to clean the yard/building and get new tenants in???) but I envision this project as on-going. I got a lot of support from my current neighbors telling me how much they appreciated it and agree with my feelings - in this way I feel like we've been reconnecting and rebuilding.

I have plans to reinstall the work and to have a block party celebrating it. Visitors can remember their neighbors who are not here anymore; we can share food and stories and those who want to will be able to create "I Miss My Neighbors" yard signs to take home or put in the yard of a missing friend. This will spread the slogan all over town and hopefully through this process of sharing our personal feelings we can keep some of our missing friends connected to us and New Orleans.

(ArtInAction would like to note that while population figures for the city of New Orleans show an increase and we now regularly read how the city's population is at 70% "pre-Katrina numbers", one must keep in mind that approximately 35% of our current population are new citizens and were not here before the storm.)

Site #28: Kathy Randels "Spaces In Between" 6860 General Diaz, Lakeview

2008-03-31T09:36:00.000-07:00

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"Spaces in Between" is an account of events that took place in Kathy Randels’ birth home during her first 18 years. 6860 General Diaz became the pastorium of Lakeview 'Baptist Church in 1966 when her father James Richard Randels was their pastor. His family lived there until 1993. Subsequently, two other pastors and their families lived in the house. In the days following Hurricane Katrina, the house was submerged in 8’ of water. Two years later, the church has decided to sell the property. This will be the final performance of Spaces in Between.

In this performance Kathy Randels plays a spirit, The Black Lady, who leads the audience through all the rooms of the gutted house, sharing moments when she haunted the family, Kathy in particular. The piece is an extended monologue by The Black Lady, who directly addresses the audience. It is divided into sections based on the room in which she is speaking.

The Black Lady is a shape-shifter who dances in between the realms of the living and the dead. She is named for the color of her costume. (Crna Dama, in Serbian, does not have the same racial implications that “The Black Lady” has in American English.) Kathy inherited the character from Tina Milevojevic of Dah Teatar in Belgrade, Serbia, who created her for Dah’s original performance The Helen Keller Case. Randels took over that role in the fall of 1998/spring of 1999, but the performance came to an abrupt end in March 1999 when, while performing in New Zealand, NATO began bombing Serbia and Kosovo. Randels carried The Black Lady’s costumes and props home to the U.S. and has embodied her in several pieces since, including two performance protests. For Randels, The Black Lady has become an instrument for addressing social or governmental injustices.

"Spaces in Between" was originally created as a part of the first of "HOME, New Orleans? Lakeviews" community art events. "Spaces in Between" was conceived, written and performed by Kathy Randels. The installation was designed and created by Ms. Randels with Takako Uemura. Technical direction, lighting, and sound design were created by Sean LaRocca.

ArtInAction would like to thank Jan Gilbert for her generous support of this project.

Site #27: Rian Kerrane/Frahn Koerner/Anastasia Pelias "The Apostolic Project" 725 Forstall Street, Holy Cross

2008-03-26T19:43:00.000-07:00

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"Searching the Holy Cross neighborhood for our ARTinACTION site location we were drawn to the gutted property at 725 Forstall Street. This 100 year old house with its beautiful live oak tree compelled us to use it as our site and ARTinACTION made this possible. While researching the site's history, a helpful neighbor, Mr. Albert Scott, told us the house had been the parsonage of the Upper Room Apostolic Church where Pastor Curtis Gales lived with his family before Hurricane Katrina. Thus began a process of outreach that deepened our connection to Holy Cross and informed this creative process.

The little white house that so grabbed our attention sits behind the boarded up
Apostolic Church, which until August 29, 2005 was an integral part of its neighborhood. Pastor Gales led the 100+ congregation devoted to community-based civic service, providing basic necessities to countless needy families throughout the years. Now living in San Antonio TX, Pastor Gales and his family remain exiled, like many of the Apostolic Church's congregation since the levee breaks of Hurricane Katrina. The church has not yet been able to re-open.

"The Apostolic Project" is installed in the former parsonage. The interior of the gutted house is filled with thousands of hand folded paper boats - a resonant symbol in a complex historical site. These sculptural boats were made collectively, many in collaboration with people from all over New Orleans - sharing this process added a vital layer of meaning to the work. Also included are representations of pomegranates which have a rich mythology in many cultures, symbolizing birth, death, and rebirth - perfect metaphors for a city struggling to rebuild post-disaster. A hand-made decorative crown is installed on the roof, honoring the church’s purposeful benevolence. This is intended to question the responsibility of a city consumed with catering to a tourist industry's idea of celebration while neglecting its own people, from whom tradition and celebration naturally emanate." - Artist/s Statement

ARTinACTION would like to thank Pastor Curtis Gales, Emmanuel Elam, and Marc Guilbeau whose generous support made this project possible.

Site #26: NOCCA Visual Art Renegades "Black, White, Blue" Milne Boys Home: 5420 Franklin Avenue, Gentilly: Unveiling: Mar 15

2008-03-08T14:42:00.000-08:00

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ARTinACTION is pleased to announce Director Elizabeth Underwood's collaboration with a collective of NOCCA visual art students on the former Milne Boys Home site in Gentilly. In their efforts to address the Milne Boys Home's history of segregation as well as the city's negligence regarding the removal of the blue tarps installed on the Milne rooftops post-Katrina, the artists worked with old and new blue tarps to "segregate" the blue with the surrounding landscape. Creating obviously sculpted mixed-media works amongst the tattered remaining tarps, a narrative is initiated exploring the tension between good intentions and neglect. At what point do the traces of disaster become integrated into the "new" environment? How responsible is "the human hand" in the construction (or deconstruction) of the aesthetics of a post-disaster community? Should a community that is fighting for attention embrace or critique the signs of this lack of attention? By raising a blue tarp on the flagpole, the artists make an ironic and proud statement expressing the power of victims of disaster to not just survive but thrive.

Milne Boys Home began in 1933 as a residential facility for troubled and needy boys. It was originally called the "Asylum for Wayward Orphans" and has gone through many incarnations - all proposing to tend to the needs of delinquent and impoverished young men. Since its inception, it has been under the jurisdiction of the Milne Trust, a private foundation that stipulates that the facility be run for boys. For some time now the City of New Orleans has been leasing the property from the Milne Trust.

ARTinACTION would like to thank Mary Len Costa, John Otis, Monty Burlingame, and the Milne Trust for their generous support of this project.

Site #25: Sean Derry "An Interlude To Stillness" Broad @ Bienville, Mid-City Nov 13 - 17

2007-11-28T18:10:00.000-08:00

Images from Sean Derry's performative/temporary Mid-City installation, "Interlude To Stillness":

(Please visit New Orleans' WWOZ website to listen to Eve Abrams' "Street Talk" profile of this installation/ArtInAction!(click on blue text).)

YouTube video of "An Interlude to Stillness", shot by Courtney Egan.

Please click on photos to enlarge. All photos ©Elizabeth Underwood unless otherwise noted.

Above photo ©Jonathan Traviesa

Above photo ©Jonathan Traviesa

ArtInAction would like to thank John Baus of New Orleans Leasing and Properties, Santos Automotive Center, Fairgrinds Coffee, Whole Foods Market, the New Orleans Arts Council, and the Mid-City neighborhood of this site whose generous support made this project possible.

Site #24: Maxime Demetrio/Naftali Beane Rutter "Brooklyn Portal" 543 Union Street, Brooklyn New York

2007-11-28T09:56:00.000-08:00

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Please click on photos to enlarge.

"As our work came clearer on this wall throughout the day, we were visited by a boy on his way home from school. Alex looked at the wheat-paste photo-mural of the Lower 9th Ward post-Katrina stoop - I asked him if he might know where the photo had been taken. His first guess, “New Orleans.”

Alex got silent for a little while. He asked Max a few questions about his skateboard and then out of the blue, “On September 11th, we could feel the shaking at my school.” Then he told us his story of that day.

More boys from the neighborhood joined us and Max took them under his willing wing for a bit of legal spray-paintery. I took a moment to think about Alex and his thinking.

This young boy had "stepped into" the New Orleans/Brooklyn Portal and shared his story in the safety of strangers on a late November afternoon. For a moment the Portal had worked and the larger purpose of activating the art-making process as a way to deal with pain and connect people had been achieved. For a moment, Alex had sat down on his neighbor’s steps." Naftali Beane Rutter

Please look for the documentary “Your Neighbor’s Steps” chronicling ArtInAction’s sponsorship of “The New Oreans/Brooklyn Portal Project” coming soon to Current TV.

Site #23: [ ] Projects "The Home Repo Project" 1432 Aviators Street, Lakeview

2007-11-19T11:42:00.001-08:00

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[ ] Projects is a collaborative group consisting of four artists: Rachel Jones, JeffRinehart, Natalie Sciortino and Fernando Braxton. "The Home Repo Project" is the groups' first effort as a collective. [ ] Projects joins with ArtInAction in their efforts to cultivate relationships between the creative class of New Orleans, traumatized landscapes, and our community as a whole. [ ] Projects aim to address issues of safety and domesticity with their work at this site.

"The Home Repo Project" occupies an overgrown lot in the blighted Lake Vista community. Working on site for several weeks we began to feel intimately connected to the neighborhood. We grew accustomed to its rhythms and began to feel as if we were contributing to the surrounding reconstruction efforts. Parallel to this experience of being part of a community we very often found ourselves alone in the landscape. This acted as a sobering reminder of how far this specific neighborhood has to go in its efforts of recovery and how isolated one can feel living in a post-K environment.

In response to this experience of connectivity we set out to build something that would act as a symbol of life and, in our own way, ‘rebuilding’. The simple gestures of our work became an important ritual given the context of this particular space.

"The Home Repo Project" is an interactive installation. The work cannot be fully experienced without the viewer navigating throughout the piece, stepping over yarn, considering where and how to move next. In doing so the participant is judging space, making active decisions, and internalizing the amount of time and effort these actions will take. What seems like a simple act of walking across the polished slab becomes complex and delicate. Many participants of "The Home Repo Project" speak of parallels in their own everyday post-K lives: moments of frustration or confusion mixed with small flashes of relief followed by a sense of accomplishment.”

Many thanks to David Sullivan and his family for allowing the use of their property and for their wholehearted support of our efforts.

Site #22: Jessica Bizer "Multi-Function Device" Jean Lafitte Pky @ Jean Lafitte Court, St. Bernard Parish

2007-08-08T20:41:00.000-07:00

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"I was interested in using a dramatic, but possibly overlooked, element of the storm-damaged landscape as a jumping-off point for this installation. During my search for a site, this massive broken sign post caught my attention...it looked so absurd and out-of-place. It seemed to capture the upended, broken feeling of the surrounding landscape.

This piece is intended to continue the feeling of surprise that I felt when I first encountered the overturned sign. My idea was to create a small, positive, diversion in an otherwise bleak landscape. It is made mainly of pipes, plastic (which I have warped and melted), ducts and streamers. I connected, painted and decorated these disparate objects to suggest that they were related, or part of a system. However, I want the work's functional traits to be balanced a sense by ambiguity and mystery while the disparate elements of the piece appear organized, their overall purpose is not clear. Also, it was important that I use decorative, appealing colors and materials. These characteristics of the piece add a fanciful element to the work and contribute to its purpose as an appealing, mysterious diversion." Jessica Bizer (Please visit www.jessicabizer.com.)

We would like to thank Guy Trentecosta, the property owner, for his generous support and enthusiasm for this project.

Site #21: Butch Merigoni "Sunrise" 9001 Pritchard Place, New Orleans

2007-08-01T12:44:00.000-07:00

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Please click on photos to enlarge. All images ©Courtney Egan

"'Sunrise' is a boxing match in which I will be the only contender. The bout will begin at 6 p.m. on Monday August 6th and end the next day as the sun fully rises (appx. 6 a.m). The consecutive rounds will be 3 minutes in length, divided by 1 minute breaks. Other breaks might be taken out of necessity. This performance will take place on a makeshift boxing ring built in front of Gregory White's home in New Orleans. His neighborhood, a community that is a quarter of what it was before Katrina, is one of many still struggling to rebuild.

The challenges of darkness (literal and metaphorical) truly exist in our lives, no matter how conscious we are of them. Though I will be standing in the middle of what can be the fearful night and repeatedly surrendering, I trust that I will come out whole into the clarity of the next day. In this regard, 'Sunrise' is symbolic of the devotion and risk that life in post-K New Orleans demands of its citizens.

Visitors are welcome to visit the performance at any time but I invite those who make the trek to stay for as long as possible. Given that 'Sunrise' is essentially about allowing quiet space to grow out of surrender, and falling into that space once it has opened, this process will take time. By investing in the performance of 'Sunrise' (the audience is as much a part of the work as anything else) you will participate in the performance and make it your own - it is as much for me as it is for everyone struggling to "let go" and recover their lives. That said, 'Sunrise' is especially dedicated to Gregory's family for many reasons, the least being that their contribution to this performance is priceless.

- Butch Merigoni

Site #20 "Today" Maxime Demetrio/Naftali Rutter: Charbonnet b'w Burgundy and Dauphine, Holy Cross

2007-06-28T12:56:00.000-07:00

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"The intention of the "Today" Project, which will consist of two installations in New York and New Orleans, is to express love and hope, and forge a bond between the people who call each city home. Both installations are designed to create a visual portal where two communities can metaphorically gaze into each other's worlds.

"Today" in New Orleans is a mixed media mural comprised of a wheat-paste print of two doors and stoops of NYC brownstones. This acts as a symbol of life in Brooklyn. The word "enter" is spray painted around and on the wheat-paste mural. This piece was installed in the Holy Cross area of the Lower 9th Ward. Visiting the city (we live in New York) and connecting with the people who live there has been unforgettable and influential. The process of being sensitive to the site, gaining permission, and including folks in the process took the graffitti, which is generally considered "art vandalism", to a deeper level.

The Brooklyn sister piece will be a similar wheat-paste and graffitti mural of a Lower 9th Ward stoop leading to an absent house - a symbol of the continuing struggle in New Orleans." Maxime Demetrio

Site #19 "Bright Light Satellite" Citizen Action: Caffin at Galvez, Lower 9th Ward

2007-05-10T16:22:00.000-07:00

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This installation, located around the corner from the "original" "Bright Light Fence", spontaneously appeared, an aesthetic hybrid, an outgrowth, like bamboo it spreads rhizomatically. Given that part of the intention of the "Bright Light Fence", using simple materials in an accessible fashion, was to positively inspire an, "I can do that!" reaction, the appearance of this satellite fence brings the AiA agenda full-circle.

The bottles are filled with dyed water and manually typed messages wrapped in wax paper. There is no mark of "authorship" and the land-owners are completely supportive. The original "Bright Light Fence" was recently demo'd, along with the house of its owner's, after almost 2 years of exhausting work on their part to move on to rebuilding. Both the destruction of the "original" and the sprouting up of this satellite reinforces many of the philosophies underlying the AiA manifesto.

Site #18: "Deep Water Dates" Courtney Egan: Broad at Banks, Mid City

2007-04-27T15:21:00.000-07:00

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"The history of flooding in New Orleans reveals some fascinating, comforting and unsettling stories. How come I've never heard these stories before? On a visit to the Historic New Orleans Collection, I met with the encyclopedic John Magill, who told me a memorable tale about the Bonnet Carre river crevasse of 1871. A giant break in the levee upriver pushed so much water into the lake that the Hagan Avenue levee broke and flooded areas of the city that were populated then, such as Mid-City, for MONTHS. People resigned themselves to living in their flooded homes, on the 2nd stories or on top of furniture. Food and staples were delivered to them by boat. Like Katrina, this flood was also a media sensation, with reporters from all over the nation arriving in droves to chronicle the event.

An informative paper about the history of drainage can be found here.

An interesting detail: a group of women in 1899 lead a successful battle to pass a tax, heavily opposed by many property owners initially, to fund the creation of the Sewerage and Water Board. The new S&WB's implementations - the pumping system, for one - so improved the sanitation of the city that yellow fever abated, life expectancy instantly increased, and commercial growth boomed. The population of the city almost doubled within the next 25 years.

The other effect of the S&WB and the population boom was that people began settling in some of the lowest areas in the city, where land had become "habitable" because of the new drainage technology. Where did the memory of horrible past flooding go? Some floods happen slower than others, allowing more evacuation time and less loss of life supposedly in the 1871 flood, the waters rose about 1 foot every 36 hours.

How will we remember Katrina in 30-40 years? How will it affect where we continue to live and how we live?

The idea for this piece initially came from wanting to make permanent in some way the Katrina water marks that are slowly disappearing around the city. Shawn Hall put the history bug in the project, waterlines through time. I still may try to make more Katrina markers, and only do the "through time" parts in a few neighborhoods, like in Broadmoor, which became a 9-foot deep lake during Sauve's river crevasse of 1849, and in the lower 9th ward, which suffered uniquely from Hurricane Betsy in 1965 and from other flood events due to its geography and the intrusion of large man-made canals in the area.

During the May rainstorm flood of 1995 I lived near this installation, between Tulane and Banks on N. Rendon. My car flooded over the engine. I called work to let them know I wouldn't be in, and no one knew there had been a flood! They all lived in higher areas. The water during Katrina, only 10 years later, was 7 -8 feet deep around this corner, maybe more. This neighborhood is always impacted by floods, yet the people and the businesses return. Broad St. is a busy thoroughfare, with cops passing constantly on their way to the courts and the jail, which made installation nerve-racking, until we realized that the cops didn¹t care about two white girls with a drill working on a phone pole in the rain. A local guy, "Sergeant Joe," stopped and talked to us about his Katrina experience and other flood experiences, on his way home to celebrate his birthday. I hope the colors in the piece attract attention and get more people interested and aware of the long history of flood events in the neighborhood." Courtney Egan

Site 17: "O No!" Jonathan Traviesa; Jefferson Davis Parkway Neutral Ground, Mid-City

2007-04-20T13:17:00.000-07:00

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This is the re-installation of Jonathan's "O Water!" piece found below (Site #3)

"Some time in mid-March, I discovered the glass pitcher for "O Water!" broken. A shard was still (grimly) hanging from the orange rope with many more scattered pieces on the grass below. Near the sand map of Louisiana (which at this point had now overgrown with unexpected healthy-looking grass) a fist-sized scrap of concrete lay - probably the weapon used by ?____curious kids? For a split second, I felt the sting of losing something. Then I almost immediately felt very fortunate that a simple art installation out in the general public / raw environment had lasted as long as this one had. I removed all the glass shards for safety reasons and went home.

A few days later I thought about glueing the pieces together and reinstalling it because it had originally intrigued and amused many people who encountered it. I couldn't quite resolve the idea to reinstall the pitcher and fill it up with bayou/lake water again because it seemed too repetative an action after the form had been violently altered and crudely repaired. Only when I LOOSELY connected the silly act of destruction to the pitcher with the senseless violence circulating the streets of New Orleans did I feel justified in reinstalling the pitcher and the sand map. This time however, instead of water being tentatively suspended above our land in the smooth rounded form of the original unbroken pitcher, the scrap of concrete rests inside the mangled/mended pitcher - a symbol of fragility and violence hanging in the air." Jonathan Traviesa

(Thanks to the Florida group with Monica and Marco who assisted with the reinstallation of "O No!" as part of their ArtInAction tour.)

Site #16: "Emerge" Beth Dary: City Park, Mid-City

2007-04-12T08:10:00.000-07:00

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"This work is an environmental installation of a variety of cast paper “pods” into the landscape of a low-lying “wet” spot on the grounds of New Orleans’ City Park. “Emerge” is my attempt to seed something of potential growth for a landscape that was flooded and badly damaged during Hurricane Katrina. I have also chosen the park site as it holds some of my first memories of times spent exploring this city’s undeniable beauty with my family when we moved to New Orleans.

These pods, many of them unfinished fragments, are part of an earlier body of work that was interrupted by the storm. The use of elements of a partially completed work connotes an interruption and cutting off of a work in progress, much the way so many lives were caught in a particular moment at the time of the storm and dropped elsewhere out of their usual and intended context. It is likely that, for a casual passerby, the distinction between “artistic” and “natural” phenomenon will blur -- the sculptural elements of the piece, made of cast plant fibers and inspired by objects found in nature like a gourd or seed pod, are placed in a way that could be a part of the life cycle of the plants in the area.

The decision to place them back into the environment was both a way to complete a work in a different way than originally intended and a metaphor for “letting go.” It is also hoped that this work, all composed of organic materials, will be transformed in the process, whether it is appropriated by birds or insects for nesting materials, absorbed back into the earth with the ebb and flow of the watery area where they have been placed, or perhaps even collected as a curiosity by a visitor to the park." Beth Dary

Site #15: "Picture This" Elizabeth Underwood/Naftali Rutter: Deslonde between Miro & Tonti: Lower 9th Ward

2007-03-26T13:06:00.000-07:00

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New Orleans has always been a target, as it were, for photographers. Post-Katrina this phenomena has intensifed and taken on some conflicting elements. The impulse and need to record the damage and/or absence of what used to be is elemental in spreading the message of the situation to the rest of the world. At the same time, photography can perpetuate a disconnect between the "artist" and "spectator" (one's camera is between one's self and the world) and issues of ownership and privacy are inherently raised.

In a city so visually fetishized, pre and post Katrina, a visitor might assume that taking photographs of something you aren't intimately familiar with is acceptable. Despite photography's power to connect people, articulating the needs of its subjects, questions regarding its parasitic component are always valid. In a landscape that now symbolizes the horrific destructivness of marginialization/"other-ing" (for the sake of time/space, this over-simplification of the how's and why's of the levee breaks will have to suffice) how does one who genuinely wishes to connect with the landscape/story via photography do so with respect and dignity?

Another angle: for months after the storm the loss (and attempts at recovery) of family photographs became a shared experience for survivors; a common refrain of survivors is how losing their family photos is what hurts them to this day. The power that a photograph has to function on an comforting medicinal level becomes clear. At the same time, strangers walking the streets could happen upon private family photos in varying stages of ruin and feel no qualms about taking them as souveniers (with no obvious "owner" in site, weren't the artifacts fair game? Finders keepers? Or: if I don't pick up and save that smeared photo of a kid in front of the Christmas tree who will?). How does this process connect people, how does it further object/abject-ify people? These questions linger.

In some respects, this tree filled with Polaroids of birds in varying stages (ceramics, needlework, live and in flight, etc) is nothing more than a gesture toward giving something back to this landscape that has been so relentlessly exploited. By leaving photographs versus "taking" them, the process is reversed and a measure of balance can be returned, even if only symbolically. The quiet simplicity of this gesture aims to function as a poetic remedy to the noise of the murderous waters rushing in, the tragedy, and grief. As the baler's twine disintigrates in the hard winds, the photographs are falling from the tree, a strange fruit reminiscent of photos found after flood waters receed. The surfaces of the Polaroids are altered by the weather and take on qualities that can not be anticipated. Someone might stand underneath this tree and think about what they are surrounded by (vast empty space/unmarked graves) and consider their role in the story. Someone else may not even look twice. Both reactions are valid. The photographs and the tree and the memories remain.

All are invited to contribute photographs to this tree. The only requirement is that they be of joyous, singing, and/or celebratory images.

Site #14: "Positive Thoughts" Terrence Sanders: Canal at Carondelet

2007-03-07T09:39:00.000-08:00

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"I created this installation for the displaced and disenfranchised citizens of New Orleans. I believe that positive thoughts can create positive results and so have made this wall of positive statements. They can serve as a catalyst for evoking potential greatness in everyone. I offer this installation as a gift in hopes that when people encounter it they will take at least one statement with them on their life's journey."

Terrence Sanders

"Making Contact" Radioproject.org Profile on ArtInAction!

2007-02-12T16:09:00.000-08:00

Please listen to the "Making Contact" public radio profile done on ArtInAction in February 2007.

This broadcast was dedicated to the memory of Mrs. Giselle Rooney.

Site #13: "Neighborhoods: 1508 Crescent Street" One Night Only! Saturday Jan 13th 4-8 p.m.

2007-01-10T13:20:00.000-08:00

On Saturday,January 13, 2007, 4:00-8:00 pm, for one night only, the second installment of the “Neighborhoods” art installation project will be held at 1508 Crescent Street, Gentilly.

“NEIGHBORHOODS: 1508 CRESCENT STREET” is a site-specific, multidisciplinary installation that will take place in the gutted home of Belinda Tanno, an artist who is currently rebuilding her house and studio in Gentilly. Through the use of interviews with neighbors, soundscapes, live music, drawing, photography, and sculpture, this event will confront the range of issues the community is experiencing as they revitalize this neighborhood.

Visual artists include Scott Saltzman, David Sullivan, Jonathan Traviesa, Robert Vicknair, and Monica Zeringue; sound by Anton Gussoni, and SpartieTucker, and music by the Panorama Jazz Band.

This program is supported by a grant from the Louisiana Division of the Arts, Office of Cultural Development,Department of Culture, Recreation and Tourism, in cooperation with the Louisiana State Arts Council as administered by the Arts Council of New Orleans.

Site #12 "Pink Tree Pink!" Elizabeth Underwood: Peoples Avenue @ Mendez/Gentilly

2006-12-04T16:49:00.000-08:00

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Google Map

All I want to do is create beautiful surprises in this landscape & for this community who have (and continue to) suffer/ed their share of surreal visual surprises/abuses for the past year & a half. Just a reason to go, "What the heck?!" for something other than seeing a car on top of a house or a house upside down in the middle of a road or an empty field where your favorite grocery store used to be.

On a more personal level, I realize that many elements of this installation are honoring my sister Milissa who died a year ago December 16th. Also working so close to the house where I was living at the time of Katrina, I am confronting my own “flood lines” (I lost everything), literally and metaphorically. As I climb into the recesses of this dead tree, tenderly painting away, giggling and cold, trains passing, crows overhead, I am painting my way out of a grief that is both private and collective. One passerby said, “You’re brightening things up!” and this has become my mantra for the Pink Tree Pink.

It is in process now and will continue to evolve.

Be sure to say hi to Mr. Joseph Rooney (he lives right across the street from it) when you visit Pink Tree Pink (he planted this tree and the others around it - this stretch of land used to be his garden and he's just waiting for the city to come and clean it up so he can get to it again).

Site/s #11: Generic Art Solutions: Bywater & Lower 9th Ward

2006-12-04T15:11:00.000-08:00

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Generic Art Solutions, (please visit the GAS website), is the collaborative efforts of multimedia artists Matt Vis and Tony Campbell. Campbell and Vis were educated on either side of the pond; Campbell-London, Vis-New Orleans. This Art Team was conceptualized in New York, and their artistic union was galvanized when both artists moved to New Orleans.

G.A.S. creates their own corporate entity by using the advertising/marketing vocabulary, and as in the advertising world, the creative process is often a team activity. G.A.S is not limited in style, media or message. Their ideas lead their aesthetics, and they strive to make art appropriate for modern living.

G.A.S. uses performance as a tool, but not in the traditional sense. There is no stage/audience separation. It is an on-the-fly, unscripted intercourse. This forum questions where art begins and real life ends.

G.A.S. makes concept driven artwork, often with humor and/or mischief at its core. G.A.S uses humor as a deconstruction tool, establishing the familiar, the stereotypical scenario, but ultimately turns our expectations on their head. G.A.S demands their audience to look beyond the punch line. In reference to Generic Art Solutions the famous New Orleans art critic Doug McCash coined the term "Comic Conceptualists", which is neither rejected by nor embraced by Generic Art Solutions.

Katrina Trees:
Since the hurricane the New Orleans landscape has change in many significant ways, one of which was the sudden explosion of contractor ads in the cities neutral grounds and telegraph poles. G.A.S welcome this phenomenon as a new forum for art. Katrina Trees is a conceptual attempt to freshen up our city as well as advertise Generic Art Solutions as artists.

Hurricane Free Zone Signs:
Generic Art Solutions (G.A.S) have installed in New Orleans street signs declaring various areas a "Hurricane Free Zone". This street sign was inspired by the Drug Free Zone signs found in many Neighbourhood across the country. This sign is a direct response to the inaction of government to protect New Orleans from Hurricanes (levee failure). G.A.S feel that people who are confronted with situations which are out of their control are forced to lean purely on hope, faith, collective positivity,
superstition and a little luck.
The signs read :
"Hurricane Free Zone
Hope can make a difference
Positive thoughts brought to you by Generic Art Solutions"

This is an on-going project and more zones will follow soon.

Site #10: "Bird/Puddle" Christy Speakman: Lake Ponchatrain Tennis Courts

2006-12-02T10:33:00.001-08:00

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Please visit ChristySpeakman.com

"During my evacuation after Hurricane Katrina, I spent much time looking at aerial photographs of the city, watching in
disbelief as entire neighborhoods began to resemble street puddles. It was through these images that many people were able to locate and measure the flood levels of their home. Aspects of perspective, control, and surveillance are evident in this exchange.

Arriving in New York two months after the storm, I began making Polaroid photographs of puddles in the street. Using the Polaroid as a template, aluminum, resin and vinyl were used to build a floodwall around each puddle. The puddle form becomes a bowl with walls acting as a levee, while the bottom is flat to the ground, mimicking and emphasizing its photographic representation. The puddles are about transformation, both in time and geographical space, yet the form remains a justified abstraction. The shift from macro to micro is measured by using the length of my body as the measured distance of view. This human scale is not meant to alienate the viewer into the sublime, but rather to validate an embodied view of an ephemeral site.

Filling the puddles with birdseed is another metaphorical action, as the idea of flight in the threat of disaster may be seen as both fantastic and absurd. Here on the Lakefront, the puddles will be subject to the elements of rain, wind, sun, and migratory bird life. I am interested in the act of the birdfeeder puddle in that it may subvert the idea of the aerial (birds-eye) view as a powerful, god-like, and unobtainable measure of escape and longing.

This work is meant to function as a narrative disruption of the imagery we have been inundated with since the storm, using a hopeful rhetoric to create a dialogue that engages the survival process. It has done that already for me. The process of installing the work on the Lakefront was a powerful experience- even walking along the shore I became acutely aware of Elizabeth Underwood and I's footsteps in the sand, each and every persistent irregularity in the ground. Itching from the mosquitoes, we didn't say a word as I dug the puddles into the weeds and dirt. It was a strong itch and a long calmness.

Please walk through the tear in the fence, along the shores of Lake Ponchatrain, past the trash and debris into that hidden cove. Please step over the puddles and please feed the birds."
- Christy Speakman

(Bird/Puddle as of Dec 5th:

Site#9: "A Fish Tale" Podesta/Underwood: Corner of Magnolia and Washington/Central City

2006-12-02T10:15:00.000-08:00

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Google Map

Assignment: One person tries to draw and the other person tries to stop them by drawing over and around them.
Tools: Anything to draw with and anything to draw on. We used stickers.

"At first we thought this assignment was kindof loud but then it got quiet and we did have some laughs. You have to be 100 percent about it or it is just a waste of your morning. A story got told which was a surprise. We think the fish is still swimming. We put the stickers up here because we think that during the hurricane there were fish swimming here and we wonder where they are now, like the people that used to be everywhere on this street. We hope you like our story if you go to read it remember that pictures were words first. Thanks!"
- The Sunshine Kids

Site #8: "Croatoan" Stephen Collier: Tennessee Street/Lower 9th Ward

2006-12-02T10:08:00.000-08:00

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Google Map

"The word “croatoan” was painted on to all the dead trees that are lined along Tennessee Street in the Lower Ninth Ward. Tennessee Street was chosen because the only things that remain on the street are dead oak trees and the occasional cinder block. All of the homes have been removed. There are no signs of life on this once lively street. This desertedness echo’s the mysterious word “croatoan” first discovered by Governor John White in 1590. White found the word “croatoan” carved in a tree in Roanoke Island. This word was the only trace of the first English colony left there a few years before. The colony was never found. They are now known as the “lost colony”. The word “croatoan” has mysterious and unpleasant connotations. It is the same feeling one gets while walking down Tennessee Street in the Lower Ninth Ward."
- Stephen Collier

Site #6 "Bright Light Fence" Elizabeth Underwood 5723 Galvez

2006-11-29T17:37:00.001-08:00

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Google Map

This particular stretch of fence is compelling to me mostly because of its sheer existence. That it’s still standing while so much in the surrounding area is gone seems like a miracle to me, one I wanted to acknowledge with an equivalent gesture of surprise.

There’s a real sweetness to the house, too, poignant and endearing. It used to be canary yellow, you can see that much. And I can imagine some wonderful stuff happening on that front porch. Newspapers, gossip, sweet tea.

I wanted to create something here that reflected the simple charm and magic that I can still feel emanating from this property. The mini-water bottles, brightly dyed water, and the messages that are in some of the bottles are my unaffected choices in keeping with the easy feeling I get from the energy of this house.

Every time I visit this location to add to the piece or just check in on it the wind is howling around and I am surrounded by ghosts. The spirit of this lost community, the lost lives, and lost dreams whistle and whip through the yellow caution tape, the high dry weeds. And the colorful bottles in this small gate wink and sparkle like small stars I wish all the people who used to live here could see.

Site #5: "Seed Church" Speakman/Underwood: Mt. Carmel Church, corner of Galvez and Forstall/Lower 9th Ward

2006-11-29T17:26:00.000-08:00

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I’ve been in the Lower 9 so much since Katrina: volunteering to gut houses, feeding animals who remain homeless, and to witness and digest the tragedy. I’ve always held a respectful reserve in terms of going into the properties uninvited and poking around and I never took a single photograph here until I started working for Art In Action. It felt exploitative until I actually built up a relationship with the place, as it is now, and had a reason to document the environment other than to have a photograph of the inconceivable (a car on a house!).

Over time and while exploring for locations, I have begun to feel a current and intimate connection with the landscape, the people, the place as it is now. And while contributing artist Christy Speakman (Bird/Puddle) was in town she and I spent a lot of time driving around looking for locations for work. We got out of the car a lot to just listen, walk around, breathe. And we found this church, Mt. Carmel, gutted and singing a very strange magnetic song. How eerie and metaphorical to find this shell of a church with empty plates and bowls stacked up out front with the “Invitation To Dine (with Jesus Christ)” plaque propped up behind them. It seemed appropriate to fill the dinnerware with bird seed.

For ages I’ve not seen one bird down here - only recently have I seen a few hawks and crows, so I had my doubts as to whether we’d be feeding anything but rats and mice. But last week while refilling the bowls hereI heard sparrows in the branches of the dead oaks out front. Their singing was delicate and bright and a clear reminder of the profound resiliency of life.

Site #4: "Innovators Barber Shop Mural" Claiborne @ Amelie (near Louisiana)/Central City

2006-11-29T16:37:00.000-08:00

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Site #3 "O Water!" Jonathan Traviesa: Jefferson Davis Neutral Ground

2006-11-28T09:37:00.000-08:00

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"Installing this piece was the utmost thrill. Just knowing that it has the potential to engage random people who come across it - that it may inspire them to think about its existence. That they may like the simplicity and weirdness of throwing together a few different things in a public space. Also it was a little frightening to climb a ladder of that height - but that was really special - being high up in those trees. Also it felt great to work with friends and have them help me."
- Jonathan Traviesa

(This piece was found & written about on this blog: b.rox. ArtInAction works!)

Site #2 "Green Is The New Black" Catherine Burke 2701 Decateur/Fauborg Marigny

2006-11-27T14:49:00.000-08:00

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"When hurricanes are bearing down people put plywood up to protect their houses and in typical New Orleanian fashion it's often decorated with wise-ass slogans or art. To me this kind of work is in step with the celebratory, partying nature of New Orleans, which has not changed, which did not blow away in the storm, and I like it. A lot." Anonymous

Site #1 "T'n'T Murals" Anonymous: Corner of Caffin & Galvez/Lower 9th Ward

2006-11-27T13:31:00.000-08:00

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"In this post-apocalypse town, what it's about now is not just what recovery means, how it's defined and how it manifests, but what survival means. We're non-stop being confronted with what is absent and missing and at the same time everyday there's the chance to be blown away that something still exists. That's what I think when I look at these paintings."
- Anonymous