BRITE IDEAS

Springlake Subdivision Sunset, Baton Rouge LA 10/2006 from Baton Rouge Blues

All reproduction rights reserved Wm. Greiner 2007

“If a place takes you in and you take it into yourself, you don’t desert it just because it can kill you. There are some things more valuable than life.”

Poppy Z. Brite , New Orleans novelist
Excerpt from The New York Times , Fed-Up New Orleans Residents Are Giving Up
By SHAILA DEWAN Published: February 16, 2007

AND THE BAND PLAYED ON.........

Big Horn, Jazzfest New Orleans 2006 from the series 8 Days in Spring

All reproduction rights reserved Wm. Greiner 2007

AND THE BAND PLAYED ON…….

I had intended to do a regular blog entry, titled Not So Silent Heroes, which was to feature someone who had done something for New Orleans and it’s battered community. It has taken me awhile for my second entry , but here is a great one.

Dinerral Shavers wanted to save New Orleans with the sound of music. Dinerral was the snare drummer for the Hot 8 Brass Band. After Katrina, having fled to a Baton Rouge shelter , it is reported that Dinerral played many gigs trying to spread a positive vibe about New Orleans.* However for Dinerral Shavers that was not enough.

He decided to start a full marching band for L.E. Rabouin High School on Carondelet Street in New Orleans. There was no football team at Rabouin , but Dinerral thought this new band could debut at Mardi Gras 2007. He was almost obsessed with his plan and goal.

Unfortunately, Dinerral Shavers was shot and killed on Dec 28th , by a bullet intended for someone else! If that weren’t tragic enough, Dinerral’s wife and two young children were with him when it happened.

In a fitting sort of memorial, the band has been formed. And the band will march and play at Mardi Gras!

You can see and hear them -

Today 7:45 pm Morpheus
Saturday 12:30pm Tucks
Sunday 5:30 pm Bacchus
Monday 5:15 pm Proteus

And when you do - think of Dinerral Shavers. I know I will.

*from A DREAM MARCHES ON by Marla Montoya , Staff Writer, The Times-Picayune.

BON VOYAGE

Tulips in Porthole , 12/2005 from the series CRUISE.

All reproduction rights reserved Wm. Greiner 2007.

BON VOYAGE

It was reported in The Advocate* today that Carnival Cruises is delaying bring a second cruise ship through New Orleans , citing a lack of advanced bookings by potential travels.

Apparently, there is a reluctance of some tourists to venture into the city after the storm? Well, I would like to say to all those people , please come visit! You may like it and in any event , you wouldn’t be there for long!

* Carnival Corp. delays second ship for N.O. by Alan Sayre - Associated business writer

Thought for Food

Tatter Tot Sign, Baton Rouge 2/2006 from Baton Rouge Blues

all reproduction rights reserved Wm. Greiner

Mandina’s restaurant on Canal Street is an institution. Its one of those neighborhood places where you can just drink , eat or do both. Mandina’s flooded after Katrina and it was announced that they are re-opening today! Better late than never?

“misdemeanor murder” *

Boarded Central City Funeral Home, New Orleans 1/2007

all reproduction rights reserved Wm. Greiner

* “misdemeanor murder” is a term coined by New Orleans inner city residents, to describe the murders who are only held in jail for 60 days or so and then released due to the Police Departments’ inability to process or preserve crime scene evidence.

There were 161 homicides in this city last year, and there have been 18 so far this year, making New Orleans by most measures the nation’s per capita murder capital, given its sharply reduced population.

( In New Orleans, Dysfunction Fuels Cycle of Killing By ADAM NOSSITER and CHRISTOPHER DREW Published: February 5, 2007 , The New York Times).

UAB Exhibition

I will be giving a gallery talk , before the opening on Friday Feb 9th at 5pm.