Floodwall standing strong at Louisiana State Museum

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By Madeline Brown

“The 600 drawers that comprise Floodwall are relics of 600 households, 600 histories and many more human lives,” author of “Breach of Faith” Jed Horne wrote about Jana Napoli and Rondell Crier’s exhibit.

His words about Floodwall are the first thing a visitor sees when they walk into the Floodwall room on the third floor of the Louisiana State Museum. Horne’s beautiful words about Floodwall are worth stopping to absorb before reaching the wall of drawers in the center of the room.

The large wall of drawers collected after Hurricane Katrina is in view ahead, but there’s more to see before walking along the wall.

The next stop in the exhibit is a blown up map of the greater New Orleans area. What’s more fascinating about the Floodwall itself is the extreme care in documenting that went into collecting these drawers in the area. Each drawer has a number and an address, and the map shows where Napoli collected every single drawer.

There are a little less than 600 red marks on the huge map, but 14 of them are yellow. That’s because oral historians have begun to find whom these drawers belong to. They have recorded their stories about the piece of furniture the drawer came from, and their stories about the storm that devastated New Orleans two years ago.

Viewers hear their stories as they walk along the wall, made of drawers from desks, bureaus, and kitchen cabinets.

One woman recalls the drawer the artists put in Floodwall belonged to a desk in her home.

“It’s a very sentimental piece of furniture,” recalls the woman. “It was the place I kept my love letters from my husband.”

“We picked the dresser drawers because it was a symbol of the intimacy of every household,” Napoli told CNN. “At least in this wall, it represents the house and the aspirations of the people that lived in it.”

Floodwall traveled first to New York City earlier this year. Standing in the World Financial Center, Floodwall captured the hearts of the people in New York from January 4-February 9.

The exhibit opened in Baton Rouge on July 13. It will stay here until October 13, so there is plenty of time to make it downtown to view the beautiful memorial and the eclectic mix of drawers Napoli spent months collecting and documenting from Metairie to the Lower 9th Ward. Hear the voices of New Orleans come through the drawers, and learn what has happened to them since Hurricane Katrina.

Napoli told CNN they hope to bring Floodwall to Washington D.C. next. She said she wants to them “to see what it is to have an empty city.” She wants the wall to ask those in Washington what it’s going to take to replace what these families have lost.

Floodwall is on display at the Louisiana State Museum on N. Fourth Street across from the state capital. Admission is $6 for adults and $5 for students.

E-mail the author at Madeline@tigerweekly.com

Originally Published: Issue 578 - September 5, 2007

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