Chandra McCormick and her husband Keith Calhoun were both born in the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans. For over forty years, McCormick and Calhoun have taken photographs together and separately in order to document life in New Orleans. After Hurricane Katrina flooded their studio in 2005, McCormick and Calhoun salvaged their waterlogged photographs and did not begin printing them until years later. The resulting prints were fascinating, and this encouraged them to explore abstraction in their work. Pink Pride, shot in 1998, captures the Tambourine and Fan Club’s annual parade and features jazz musician Troy ‘Trombone Shorty’ Andrews. The damage from the flooding is extremely noticeable, and there is a unique, warped texture throughout the image. The vibrant colors of the KodaChrome film have also shifted. The figures appear as if they are inside a bubble, yet there is still a great amount of detail visible within the figures. 

Amanda Rose ’21