» Photograph 60
Color photograph, 2007
» Photograph 1725
Color photograph, 2007
» Photograph 1729
Color photograph, 2007
» Photograph 1719
Color photograph, 2008
» Photograph 2882
Color photograph, 2008
“We Are All In This Together” (2008) was taken on-the-fly out of the car window as my daughter Lane and I made a U-turn at the intersection of Clouet and Dauphine in the Bywater neighborhood of the Ninth Ward in New Orleans. We have taken pictures of the area often since Hurricane Katrina, and we’ve photographed nearly this same scene several years running—sometimes shooting as we drive by, sometimes stopping to frame the shot from a standstill. This photo, used as the Oyster Boy cover, was a drive-by, as you can tell from the sun’s reflection. In 2011, the sign outside the restaurant said, “What kind of society do you want?” and one other time it read, “What did Iraq ever do to you?” We never met the owner(s) or the sign maker, but the signs remind me of Rodney King’s 1992 memorable question during the L.A. riots, “Can we all get along?”
Note
For more information about the X-code shown in these photographs, see Dorothy Moye's "Katrina + 5: An X-Code Exhibition" at Southern Spaces.