Illustrating Carnival

Illustrating Carnival

The Public Domain Review has published "Illustrating Carnival: Remembering the Overlooked Artists Behind Early Mardi Gras," by Allison C. Meier, which features two dozen of LaRC's Carnival float and costume designs.

"For more than 150 years the city of New Orleans has been known for the theatricality and extravagance of its Mardi Gras celebrations.  Meier looks at the wonderfully ornate float and costume designs from Carnival’s “Golden Age” and the group of New Orleans artists who created them."

“The greatest publicly accessible resource of their art is the Carnival Collection, part of the Louisiana Research Collection (LaRC) at Tulane University and supported by a bequest from the late journalist Charles L. “Pie” Dufour. In 2012, Tulane marked the completion of a two-year digitization project that put over 5,500 float and costume designs in the Carnival Collection online.”

As the article notes, scanning and placing online LaRC's Carnival float and costume designs was made possible by a private gift. LaRC depends on private funding for such special projects. If you would like to help us in that way, please contact Leon Miller, 504-314-7833, lmiller@tulane.edu.

Founded in 2011, The Public Domain Review is an online journal and not-for-profit project dedicated to the exploration of curious and compelling works from the history of art, literature, and ideas.