MORE IMAGES FROM NEW ORLEANS

Continuing my foray into photoblogging. Click here for part one, and here for part two.

A statue somewhere downtown that I shot while we drove by.



A shot looking down my favorite street in the French Quarter, Decatur.



The cool, old 19th century buildings in the French Quarter are perfect for photography: there's all this great, linear and angular stuff with stark patches of color contrast. Really, everywhere you look there's something aesthetically pleasing.



Looking inside a mask-making shop in the French Quarter at night.



In New Orleans, masks like these are worn for Mardi Gras, but I suppose tourists buy them year round. Actually, the whole mask thing is kind of interesting. From a Wikipedia article about Mardi Gras:

Costumes and masks are seldom publicly worn by non-Krewe members on the days before Fat Tuesday (other than at parties), but are frequently worn on Mardi Gras Day. Laws against concealing one's identity with a mask are suspended for the day. Banks are closed; some places with security concerns have signs for people to remove their masks before entering.

These anti-mask laws gave my acting class some cause for concern when we were doing an assignment for our masked character studies. It is illegal in Louisiana for people to walk around with their faces concealed; apparently, this goes back some decades, an attempt to combat the KKK. One of the more important exercises for that mask work, however, is an outing in character, wearing our masks. A few years ago, the campus police were very disturbed by another class making such an outing. Our movement teacher was, of course, also very disturbed, and checked out the law: there are some very specific exceptions, one, as noted above, for Mardi Gras celebrations, another for educational purposes. So he was off the hook from this weird Southern law--on the other hand, he now has to notify the LSU PD in writing whenever one of his classes wanders around campus in masks. Kind of a hassle.

A cellist in tux and tails running down Bourbon Street.



Who is he? Why is he running? Is he late for a gig? I guess I'll never know.

An unkown band playing in a bar on Decatur at night.



You know, for such a small city, New Orleans has a really kickass music scene, the likes of which I haven't encountered since I was living in Austin. I guess it's just the city's history, but why the hell are local bands in Houston so vanilla?

More New Orleans photoblogging to come.

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