"This body of work comes out of a need to create works that are narrative, accessible, and emotionally connected in a direct way to the people they portray. As an artist who is committed to cultural history, I think these works act as visual commentaries that reconstruct our perception of race and class in America. In 1994, I moved from New York back to New Orleans, where I was born and raised. In late 1997, I began to create a series of portraits of people in my neighborhood in order to offset the many derogatory images on display in the New Orleans French Quarter. Stores offered degrading posters, figurines and cards; and street performers used buffoonery to present stereotypical characters. As I developed my ideas for this new body of work, I was struck by the vast differences between the two New Orleans that I know."