Takashi Horisaki to do project in New Orleans

Takashi Horisaki is an artist who spent 3 years in New Orleans, graduated from Loyola, and he now lives in NYC. Upon a post -Katrina visit he was inspired to do work about the state of things here. He wrote the following:

"Last June, I revisited New Orleans and shocked the situation. Since then, as an artist, I have been concerned about all level of political social and cultural issues over there. Several good exhibitions about New Orleans happened in NYC, but felt missing such a physical reality that I got there. So, I started thinking about how possibly under my situation, I were able to contribute to these issues that supposed to be nation level.

I completed my proposal late December and that is "Social Dress New Orleans - 730 days after." One of my recent sculpture works is Social Dress series. I use pure liquid latex to apply onto object mainly buildings, let it dry, carefully peel it off with all surface substances and exhibit in a different space. I thought finding entire toppled shotgun house in New Orleans, painting latex, peeling it off, bringing it to NYC and recreate the house here will be good piece to physically present and speaking up about those issues still happening over there.

Fortunately, one of institutions well accepted this project proposal and will be solo exhibition coming Summer. At Socrates Sculpture Park in Long Island City, New York between 7/29 and 10/28, this sculpture will be exhibited coming with documentary film screening and publishing a book of this project."


Please take a look at his blog and his remarkable work. He will keep us here posted about his project.

People of New Orleans

During my family’s evacuation from Hurricane Katrina I was shocked at how the press handled the catastrophe. Like the government the press was not prepared for such an event. On top of that they did not have an idea of what New Orleans was really like before the storm. It takes people living in New Orleans to talk about New Orleans. Simon Dorfman took on the challenge of documenting the event from the perspective of the people who lived it. His project is appropriately called “People of New Orleans”.

“People of New Orleans” is a collection of video interviews of people from all over the New Orleans area. Simon began his project with these parameters: the interviews would be five minutes in length with very little questions and posted to his website unedited. The interview would be lead by the interviewee with only a few questions at the beginning to get the ball rolling. These parameters evolved as the project went on and the interviews became longer. However, Simon stayed true to the other rules and did not edit or manipulate the interviews. In addition, visitors to the website can make comments about their reactions to the videos and the Katrina event as a whole. The comments add an interesting aspect that reveals the perspective of those outside of New Orleans within the affected areas and from other parts of the country.

I came away from Simon’s website refreshed to hear the thoughts of New Orleanians about their evacuation, their return home, and their rebuilding efforts. Since the storm passed the state and local governments have not been able to bring the resources together to bring the city as a whole into a rebuilding mode. As this process occurs or does not occur, the people of New Orleans are left to rebuilding the city themselves. Like so many things in New Orleans, rebuilding is a grass roots effort. Simon’s work to reveal this to the rest of the world is indeed needed.

You can find Simon’s website at http://www.peopleofneworleans.com, browse the many videos and feel free to leave your comments. You can also subscribe to the RSS feeds available on the site as well.

Don't forget to leave a comment in the "Blog Name Suggestions" entry giving your ideas on a good name for this blog!

-Tim Best