Casey Kaplan
Kevin Beasley | The New York Times
In the Lower Ninth Ward, an Artist Renews His Purpose
Kevin Beasley was invited to create an installation in New Orleans for a few months. Instead he bought land, and met his neighbors.
By Siddhartha Mitter | Jan. 6, 2022
NEW ORLEANS — The cookout in the new garden, guests agreed, upheld the cultural and convivial traditions of the Lower Ninth Ward.
Herlin Riley, a celebrated jazz drummer from the neighborhood, was grooving with his quintet beneath the canopy. Old-timers, friends since high school, held forth at a long table near the stage. The photographers Keith Calhoun and Chandra McCormick, important local documentarians, were present.
Tending chicken thighs and beef ribs from the trailer grill hitched to his truck, Errol Houston conferred the seal of Lower Ninth legitimacy. “What you see here is like a normal family picnic with neighbors,” he said. “There’s people here who know my aunts and uncles.”
The artist Kevin Beasley, host of the cookout, was chatting with all comers, wearing a black T-shirt adorned with drawings of 38 plant species he intended to grow in the garden. The party was an opening of sorts — the neighborhood reveal for an unfolding creative project that
had begun at the invitation of the Prospect New Orleans art triennial but had taken on a life of its own.
Beasley was invited to create an artwork in New Orleans for a few months. Instead he bought this land, cleared it and began to plant a garden.
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