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On quiet nights in college in the late 1990s, New Orleans photographer Frank Relle went out with a friend at Tulane University and strolled through the neighborhoods of his hometown. The two would concoct stories about the imagined residents of the city's unique homes, both the ornate mansions and decrepit houses (colloquially referred to as "shotgun shacks"). When Relle returned in 2004, after 3 years away from the the city, he began looking for a way to tell the the story of New Orleans through his camera. He soon realized his excursions in college had the answer; he decided to document his hometown through its unusual houses. New Orleans has long been a city of haves and have-nots. As recently as 2011, the U.S. census bureau reported that New Orleans had the 6th-highest income inequality in the United States. At no time was this more apparent than in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005 when poor low-lying neighborhoods were devastated while mansions built on high ground suffered little to no damage. When the storm hit, Relle had already been photographing houses for nearly a year. Discouraged and forced to moved to New York, he thought the project was over. Then he realized the project had just begun and returned to photograph the homes in the aftermath of Katrina. Relle shared some of the photos from New Orleans Nights here, but you can see the rest at his website, where he sells prints of the work.
