The Katrina Decade: Images of an Altered City

Published on the occasion of the 10-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina

'The great photographer David Spielman captured the essence of hope and despair in his powerful pictures of Katrina s devastation. But he never put his Leica down, because he knows that after ten years the recovery of his beloved city is both amazing and incomplete. The result is this poignant portrait of rebirth and blight, perfect for an artist who s a master of black and white.' - Walter Isaacson, president and CEO of the Aspen Institute and best-selling author

'As strangely beautiful as the encroaching vines that still enshroud whole rows of houses ten years after Katrina, David Spielman s astonishing photographs speak with a quiet but forceful eloquence of devastation and abandonment,of perseverance and renewal.' -John Berendt, author of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil

In August 2005, Hurricane Katrina and the subsequent levee breaches ravaged New Orleans. Dramatic images abounded, but they told only the beginning of the story. In the 10 years since, David G. Spielman embraced the traditions of photographers from the Works Progress Administration and Farm Security Administration and documented subtle changes throughout his beloved city.'New Orleans has a melancholy beauty that defies logic and transcends time,'says Spielman. Vines creep up the side of a home that could be vacant or occupied. Graffiti mars or beautifies? the walls of an abandoned building. Readers must draw their own conclusions from his haunting black-and-white images.