Katrina

Katrina as a subject, has been explored by me since 2012. This painting is the last of a series. The first notice I received about Katrina was from the Toronto Star in 2005 while I was traveling in Ontario. The Canadian reportage could not have been more different from how the castrophe was written about in the US news. The foreign news reported women and children drowning in the streets of New Orleans while the white community was evacuated by boat into other white communities. The US newspapers accentuated black riots in the streets as they were escaping the flooding. The painting is a corrective measure to counter the negative narrative and to give a more accurate depiction of what occurred. The colors are taken from a famous Jewish painting of a woman in a dress and the Black Madonna widespread across European religious lore. The background is a famous New Orleans cathedral at the site of Congo Square with fish swimming in the sky. Rather than bringing food in boats, rescuers brought umbrellas to both aid and celebrate while the US President flew over in a plane. My painting style is more European, but departs when it comes to my imagination of fish in the sky.

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