After a night in Oxford, I spent a day exploring the Mississippi Delta and the birthplace of the blues. The weather was dark and gloomy, and so are the photographs.
Following along…
One of my reasons for heading south earlier this year was to experience a place I know only from photographs that are incredibly familiar and important to me - Hale County, Alabama. This is where Walker Evans and William Christenberry worked, documenting the landscape, the people, and structures for more than sixty years collectively.
I purposefully avoided looking at their Hale County work before departing on my trip, choosing to just go and see what I could find rather than hunting down the location of specific images. The only name I will always remember is Sprott, so I made sure not to miss it - little more than an abandoned crossroads with one of the churches that William Christenberry’s documented for decades not too far away.
William Christenberry - Sprott, Alabama
This experience - and this whole Southern trip in general - really made me realize how attached and inspired I am by every aspect of the Great Plains and the West. The South is not my home. I felt like I was just passing through, gawking at the landscape rather than documenting it in my usual way.
I am very glad to have visited Alabama, even as a tourist.
Louisiana and Mississippi
Photographs on the road from Baton Rouge to Natchez to Gulfport, captured in late February of this year.
East Texas Blues
Photographs of Beaumont and Port Arthur, Texas and the Gulf Coast…
