08/29/2005
At approx. 10:00 AM the levees protecting the lower 9th ward broke up into multiple sections and flooded the area. Storm waters surged and destroyed thousands of acres and flooded not only homes, but also destroyed the foundations that they once were built on. Nowhere in the city was the devastation greater than in the Lower 9th Ward.
“The last area in New Orleans to have power, the last area to have water restored & the last to be pumped dry”
“I remember”
As an adult i think back and remember where i was when Katrina hit. I remember in the month and a few weeks leading up to the storm, we were getting new students from New Orleans. I remember they were coming and they said that them and their families were avoiding a storm coming to where they were from. I remember being in the 7th grade in Dallas,TX getting home from school on a cloudy day. Turning on the TV, flicking through the channels looking for cartoons but being interrupted by my father telling me to turn it onto the news. I remember seeing the weather man on TV saying that a huge storm was brewing and coming and could be catastrophic to the state of Louisiana especially the city of New Orleans. Being young and in Texas I had no idea that the events that were about to take place would have an affect on my life in the years to come. I didn’t have much context to the effect of what was truely happening because it didn’t directly effect me. Watching the news and seeing the reports in the coming days gathering more and more information my heart ached for the city of New Orleans. Seeing more and more people pouring into my city from Louisiana it started to resonate that a lot of people left and may never return. In 2007 i had the opportunity to go with my church to provide clean up relief in the Lower 9th Ward. I remember the smell, the thickness of the air, the gloom of the sky, the sadness. I remember thinking and wondering “what if this was me and my family?” Standing in what looked like a war zone I just prayed and asked God to watch over the families that once lived in The Lower 9th Ward, i prayed for the lives lost & those that simply wanted to come home.
“December of 2020 i had the opportunity to return back to The Lower 9th as an adult. Seeing the neighborhood almost in the same shape as it was in 2007. The area broke my heart all over again. I wanted to share what i saw & hopefully through my lens you felt what i felt.”
— Tortellini
“Foundation”
The rich traditions and culture of the city of New Orleans run deep, deeper than i could ever know. In the Lower 9th i photographed as much as i could with the little film that i had. One thing that caught my eye were the foundations that remained behind. The foundations that once were attached to homes that are no longer there. Steps, porches & bricks lay in rubble. Through the storm, this is what remained.
