A Day at Poverty Point: Revisited

Day At Poverty Point: Revisited showcases select works of six Louisiana-based photographers who, on September 10, 1993, set out in the early morning to document a day in the life of East Carroll, West Carroll, and Richland Parishes until sundown. Guided by local officials, clergy, and community volunteers, the photographers recorded what they encountered in both images and field notes: accounts of hardship and neglect, but also of faith, labor, and community.

Background and Purpose

This project was originally intended to support a $40-million Empowerment Grant. The photographs were created to highlight the dire conditions of the region, where most residents lived without indoor plumbing, reliable kitchens, or even doors to their homes. Although the parishes did not receive the Empowerment Grant, the photographers, working in collaboration with Dr. Michael Luster (former executive director of the Louisiana Folklife Festival) and the 2003 staff of the Masur Museum, chose to document the day for exhibition purposes.

Exhibition Goals

Two decades later, the rates of poverty and unemployment in these parishes are still among the highest in the nation. We revisit this exhibition not to solicit sympathy, but to insist on attention, and to ask what action follows from looking. The Masur Museum is committed to connecting this history with the present. As the exhibition travels, we are developing ways for it to serve as a fundraiser, with proceeds directed to programs addressing urgent needs in the very parishes it depicts. Whether through food security, housing, education, or cultural resources, our aim is that this project not only documents conditions of poverty, but also contributes to their alleviation.

Supporting the Cause

Visitors are encouraged to support East Carroll directly by donating to Together for Hope Louisiana with the QR code below. Together for Hope seeks to contribute to poverty alleviation through community engagement and resource allocation.

This project underscores the museum’s commitment to using art as a catalyst for social change, encouraging viewers to not only witness but also act upon the issues depicted.

Photographers

Camille Jungman

A self-taught photographer, mixed-media artist, and retired art instructor who recently relocated from Monroe. Her travel photography was acquired to Masur’s permanent collection in 2001. Her work has been featured in more than 30 state, regional, and juried competitions since 1980.

Chandra McCormick

New Orleans-based photographer known for collaborative work with her husband, Keith Calhoun. Together, they specialize in documenting African-American communities in New Orleans. In 1980, they began the long-term series Slavery: The Prison Industrial Complex, a photographic testimony to the exploitation of inmates under the 1865 13th-Amendment loophole, which continues today.

Deborah Luster

Photographer from Northwestern Arkansas whose work is held in major collections, including the Whitney Museum of American Art and SF MOMA. Her 1998 collaboration with poet C.D. Wright, One Big Self: Prisoners of Louisiana, combines image and text to document prison-made objects, tools, and portraits of incarcerated people across Louisiana.

Jeannie Frey Rhodes

Baton Rouge–based portrait and black-and-white documentary photographer. She is best known for A Sense of Green: A City’s Changing Texture, an interpretive photography book and exhibition on the history of Baton Rouge’s urban forest.

Kevin Kennedy

Shreveport-based photographer and educator. He taught photography at Louisiana Tech University (1994–2012), served as a Visiting Lecturer at Centenary College of Louisiana (2016–2019), and was a Visual Art Instructor for the Caddo Parish School Board until 2020.

Lee Estes

Monroe-based photographer (b. 1927), best known for his precise black-and-white documentation of architecture. His published works include Fading Textures (2000), a project begun in 1957 featuring imagery of Northeast Louisiana, and Fading Warriors (2005), which profiles interviews and photographs of 47 World War II veterans.