| THE HOUSE OF DANCE & FEATHERS lower 9th ward |
home about registryhouse of dance and feathers deutsches haus joytown square liuzza's by the track maple leaf bar mimi's in the marigny rock bottom lounge roman by terry sound cafe sportsman's corner st james AMEdomino sound montana house mother-in-law lounge lafitte housing complex jefferson variety community book store wheatley elementary nominate book contact us
|
 |
||
From Tupelo Street in the Lower Ninth Ward, you can see the tin roof of the House of Dance & Feathers. It’s tucked behind a newly painted white house that belongs to Ronald W. Lewis and his wife, Charlotte. Ronald started the museum, dedicated to the culture of Mardi Gras Indians, social and pleasure clubs, and musicians of the neighborhood, before Hurricane Katrina. Its early beginnings were in a shed in his backyard; its function was a place where young people could come to learn about the culture of their community. Since Katrina, the Lower Nine has become a symbol for the city’s devastation and the media has turned the neighborhood into a symbol of poverty and neglect, a misrepresentation that Lower Nine residents resist. One of the first people to return to the Lower Nine, Ronald has become a spokesman for the neighborhood, challenging stereotypes, educating people about his culture, and bridging divides between black and white, resident and visitor, volunteer and survivor. In the summer of 2006, Project Locus, a nonprofit design/build architecture organization, rebuilt Ronald’s home and museum. Students from Kansas State University and others from around the country came to New Orleans to help. In the process, they became close not just with Ronald’s family, but with the other neighbors who had returned home. Since its completion, Ronald continues to keep the doors of the museum open and the people of the Lower Nine continue the slow rebuild.
|
Address: 1317 Tupelo Street Additional Information: www.houseofdanceandfeathers.com |
||
      |
 |
  |
|
"But this is me—the collection of artifacts and various conversation pieces that make the House of Dance and Feathers what it is. From the section about the students leaving some of their personal items here to the Mardi Gras Indian beadwork that I done that evacuated with me to an umbrella that was part of the 2006 parade of the Big Nine Social and Pleasure Club to the banner of the original Double Nine Social and Pleasure Club that rose up out the ashes of Sonny’s Bar, this building is a building of many stories." "The idea was to do something small— simple— that didn’t take away from what was going on around it. But we had to elevate it out of the private realm. We had to make it a public building in some way. We used the roof to express that idea. The roof is the only thing that you really look at. It’s got this big rolling curve and it’s flowing above the building. We wanted to relate it to the idea of water and what the water did." |
|||