Collection: The Unending Stream: Chapter II

The Unending Stream is a two-part exhibition that showcases the thriving community of photographers living and working in New Orleans. The title of the exhibition pays homage to a Clarence John Laughlin photograph of the same title, which is a part of the permanent collection at Ogden Museum of Southern Art. Considered “the Father of American Surrealism,” Laughlin was perhaps the most important Southern photographer of the mid-twentieth century. His seminal work, created between the 1935 and 1965, is an important chapter in the long-storied relationship between New Orleans and photography.

Following in Laughlin’s visionary footsteps, this exhibition focuses on contemporary photographers who are visually defining the Crescent City in the twenty-first century. The Unending Stream celebrates the city of New Orleans’ continuing role as one of America’s most important cultural capitals while also highlighting the role the arts have played in revitalizing the region over the past twenty years since Hurricane Katrina.

The Unending Stream highlights the  work of six photographers who investigate themes similar to Laughlin’s of memory, place, time and identity while capturing the mysterious beauty of America’s most unique city. Each photographer brings a contemporary twist to the exhibition, creating work that provokes thought and conjures emotion. The Unending Stream: Chapter II  features photographers (Casey Joiner, Eric Waters, Virginia Hanusik, Giancarlo D’Agostaro, Steve Pyke and Clint Maedgen) who work in both analogue and digital photography.

Casey Joiner uses the camera to explore themes of family and grief; Eric Waters documents the complex culture of New Orleans’ Black masking traditions; Virginia Hanusik captures Louisiana’s disappearing coastline in a time of climate change; Giancarlo D’Agostaro makes moody nocturnal photographs of Mardi Gras parades; Steve Pyke records the lush urban forest contained within City Park; and Clint Maedgen fuses multiple images and self-portraiture to create scroll-like collages informed by his musical background.

New Orleans has been both muse and home to some of the most important and celebrated photographers of the ninetieth and twentieth century. The Unending Stream sheds light on the current trajectory of photography being created in New Orleans today.