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Photography Exhibit Showcases Vanishing Landscapes
Matthew White Shares Visual Story of the Lower Mississippi River Delta
Photography Exhibit Showcases Vanishing Landscapes
Matthew White Shares Visual Story of the Lower Mississippi River Delta
Published 12-07-09
Submitted by Big Vision Media
The fusion of art and the environment takes place at the Port of New Orleans from December 1 - 16, 2009 with Matthew D. White's exhibit, The End of the Great River. The showing of White's work features fine art images of the vanishing landscapes of the lower Mississippi River Delta, from Port Sulphur in Plaquemines Parish south to the end of the three passes that drain the river into the Gulf of Mexico. This delta, full of history, culture, and industry, is sparsely populated and rarely seen in detail by outsiders, but is a landscape of vast beauty.
Decimated by Hurricane Katrina and rapidly disappearing at a rate of one football field every forty five minutes, this hauntingly beautiful and fragile region consisting of 3 million acres of coastal wetlands and 40% of the salt marsh in the contiguous United States supports the economy of New Orleans with significant shipping traffic, supplies approximately 18% of the United States oil supply and 16 % of the US's fisheries harvest, has had quite a long history fighting coastal erosion. What's at risk here "is a significant national asset", said Stan Mathes, Director of Plaquemines Parish Economic Development.
The goal of this photo collection is to raise awareness for the unique beauty of this locale through the photographer’s lens and to encourage the creation and preservation of images of the Mississippi River Delta and its disappearing habitat for future generations. "I have captured a rare glimpse of some of the most remote locations on the Louisiana coast", said White. "The way of life that is so simple and peaceful down there on the Delta is just hanging by a thread. I feel that I can do my part for its preservation by showing what is still beautiful about it; that it is, and always has been, one of the most unique and spellbinding landscapes in the nation. I try to convey 'sense of place' in my photos; if the viewer can for one second sense the peace, solitude, and wonder I feel standing in these landscapes, then there would be no question about whether or not the Delta should be preserved."
Hosted by the Port of New Orleans and sponsored in part by Plaquemines Parish Economic Development, the exhibition is a part of PhotoNOLA, (www.photonola.org) an annual celebration of photography in the Crescent City, coordinated by the New Orleans Photo Alliance in partnership with museums, galleries and alternative venues citywide. Following its debut at the Port of New Orleans, the exhibit will travel nationally before concluding its tour in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana where it is expected to remain on permanent exhibit there.
For more information go to: www.endofthegreatriver.com.
About Matthew White
Matthew White (www.matthewwhitestudio.com) is a native New Yorker who fell in love with photography at an early age. He has lived and worked as a freelance photographer and musician, after receiving a Bachelor's Degree in music from Berklee College of Music in Boston, and a Master's Degree in jazz studies from the University of New Orleans, a summa cum laude graduate. Winner in the Print Center 2008 International Competition, his work has been featured locally in the Grand Isle Juried Art Exhibit, The New Orleans Photo Alliance Elemental/Environmental Space Exhibit, and as part of a permanent museum exhibit for Parks Canada in New Brunswick. He was invited by the U.S. State Department to present his images during the second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina and he most recently partnered with Lighthawk and the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana on a series of aerial flyovers to take photographs of the endangered Louisiana coast. White is represented by Big Vision Media, (www.bigvisionmedia.com).
Big Vision Media
Big Vision Media
Margaret Saizan is a social entrepreneur and currently the owner and founder of Big Vision Media, a company focused on transformational media, most recognized for her award winning online publication, Beyond Katrina: The Voice of Hurricane Disaster and Recovery, www.hurricane-katrina.org. In addition to her business background, she has extensive training in the field of personal development. She received her training as an ontological coach through Newfield Network, www.newfieldnetwork.com. Towards this end, she has innovated and remains engaged in a number of projects with both a local and global focus to impact large scale change. Beyond Katrina: The Voice of Hurricane Disaster and Recovery, www.hurricane-katrina.org, is one of the most visible of these projects, winning the Society for New Communications Research Award in 2006. (www.sncr.org) This new media publication has reached over a million people in over three hundred countries worldwide since its inception. It has been syndicated to such publications as: Reuters, The Chicago Sun Times, The Houston Chronicle and other traditional news sources. Through this endeavor she was invited by the U.S. State Department to coordinate a foreign media tour of New Orleans in conjunction with the second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. She also assisted with a number of other Katrina recovery projects with such notable institutions as The Appleseed Foundations’ First Anniversary Katrina Report, The Katrina Deceased Project sponsored by The Earth Institute at Columbia University, and other initiatives. She has been interviewed as an expert resource on Gulf Coast recovery issues and the use of new communications strategies in disaster management and recovery by CNN, The Discovery Channel, John Hopkins University, the University of Munich and others. Beyond Katrina is currently in relaunch as Gulf Coast Rising, an online portal featuring news and information about innovations happening on the Gulf Coast. Currently, Margaret managers, represents and collaborates with New Orleans based photographer Matthew White on various coastal projects, such as "The End of the Great River", a landscape photo-documentary of the vanishing communities and historic landmarks of the lower Mississippi River Delta. She is also producing "Purgatory", a dark comedy about an ill-fated love affair set in New Orleans in 2005, the year of Hurricane Katrina. This original play by Christy McBrayer is set to open in New Orleans during the summer of 2010. Margaret is also collaborating with Los Angeles based photographer Helen K. Garber and jazz musician John Beasley to bring Urban Noir, a photography exhibit set to music to the Big Easy in 2010. As an avid patron of the Arts Margaret is also the exhibitions coordinator for PhotoNOLA, an annual celebration of photography in New Orleans, coordinated by the New Orleans Photo Alliance in partnership with museums, galleries and alternative venues citywide. (www.photonola.org). She has sponsored and/or co-produced exhibits for several Louisiana artists, such as: A Labyrinth Journey, by Theresa Herrera, a 3-D interactive art installation and traveling exhibit that included a 36’ canvas labyrinth as a walk-able painting. She is the co-founder of the Baton Rouge Labyrinth Project (www.batonrouge labyrinthproject.org), an effort to work with public agencies and organizations to build labyrinths as tools for community engagement and change. This has been hugely successful in East Baton Rouge Parish. Margaret and her collaborators succeeded at getting The Baton Rouge Recreation & Park Commission to appropriate the funds to commission a labyrinth installation at City Park. Margaret believes that the issues inherent to Gulf Coast rebuilding are microcosms for many of the complex challenges that confront the planet as a whole. She brings a think global, act local perspective to her life and work.
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