NOTES
The Happiest Day of the Year is Followed by its Saddest
In case you feel like reliving the celebrations.
...I'm exaggerating, of course, but the post-Mardi Gras blues is real.
Only 348 more days until Mardi Gras 2018.
(Photos arranged in sequence of events.)
Email: info@carlosdetres.com
One Year in New Orleans 2016
Another year passes in New Orleans and I documented almost the whole damn thing. Here's a little bit of it.
We celebrated another year in New Orleans on July 20th. I'm a bit late. In 2016 we survived another Carnivale, enjoyed two Halloweens and made new friends. For this version of "One Year in New Orleans," I went for the straight documentation route. I considered including portraits I had made doing throughout the city but then decided that it didn't say much about my overall experience.
As you'll notice, I still have not gotten cemeteries out of my system. While there are less photos of these hallowed locations, I still couldn't help myself. I never can. Rather than creating three sequential posts, I decided to do one with a bunch of photos as an exercise to see what works together and what doesn't. It's for fun.
11 Months to Go Until Mardi Gras 2017
Photos and thoughts of Mardi Gras 2016. We'll sure miss you.
I had a conversation the other night about whether a "New Year's Resolution" in New Orleans should actually begin after Mardi Gras to coincide with Lent. With all of that binge and purging that goes on throughout the months of January and February, it feels appropriate to give or take up that thing you'd normally reserve for that "resolution".
The photos below are a mish-mash of parades and celebrations throughout the city. Some are from Chewbacchus, Krewe du Vieux, Hermes and on and on.
Email for info: info@carlosdetres.com
Super Sunday
I quickly put together a photo essay of the event that highlighted the indians, neighborhoods and music that embody this New Orleans tradition.
Super Sunday at A.L. Davis Park in Central City
Yesterday was my first Super Sunday and I wasn't fully aware of what to expect. I was looking forward to seeing the Mardi Gras indians in their beautifully colored, embroidered suits, which they spend up to nine months planning and creating. Speaking with some of the indians, I learned more of the origin of this tradition, however NewOrleansOnline.com does a better job of explaining than I could:
"To most Americans, "Super Sunday" connotates the Sunday on which the NFL Super Bowl is played. However, in New Orleans, Super Sunday has a different, totally unrelated meaning. It is a day for the city's Mardi Gras Indian tribes to put on their colorful suits and "strut their stuff" while marching in a procession through the streets of their neighborhoods."
The article continues to explain the history HERE.
I quickly put together a photo essay of the event that highlighted the indians, neighborhoods and music that embody this New Orleans tradition.
Chaos and Muses
Parade revelry at its best. (In case you missed the flurry of my Instagram posts...)
Last night I stumbled through the parades on St. Charles. It was a long, eventful, fun walk through a bedlam of mass revelry, debauchery and fun. My opinion of parades has always varied, most of the time, I'm not too crazy about it but then there's New Orleans and no city puts on parades like this one.
If you weren't privy to my burst of Instagram photos last night, here are the highlights.
All photos made with the iPhone 6.
Decadent days ahead -- Mardi Gras is here
"New Orleans -- what a country!"
"New Orleans -- what a country!"
There's a Russian comedian named Yakov Smirnoff who was famous in the 80s and would often say "America -- what a country!" About once a day, I find myself saying the same thing about New Orleans. It really is different -- different in the way that Key West is different. New Orleans is its own republic, separate from the rest of the country, allowed to be it's own weird self, mostly unmolested or uncared for by the rest of the nation, pumping culture with music, food, film, art, etc. And then comes Mardi Gras...etc., etc., etc. What a friggin' country.
The Krewe du Vieux parade, party, after party, after after party, after after after party was amazing, incredible, wonderfully overwhelming and being someone who has DJ'ed a lot of Brooklyn renegade parties back in DUMBO and Williamsburg and throughout Downtown Manhattan that's saying a lot. Anyway, I won't babble on with details. Kinda still piecing it together but if you don't live here and you get a chance to check out Krewe du Vieux, do it. It's for your own good -- maybe health.
I didn't get too many pictures. I tried to just enjoy what was happening but I managed these.
