Lagniappe

There are places that shape us long after we've left them. For me, that place is New Orleans. In the city's vernacular, lagniappe means a little something extra, an unexpected gift, freely offered. During my twenties and thirties, New Orleans gave me that gift. It slipped quietly into my life through its color, its music, its people, and its unmistakable sense of home. Decades later, those impressions continue to find their way into my work. This collection is less about the city itself than the memories it left behind. Inspired by the weathered shotgun houses and Acadian cottages tucked into its neighborhoods, these paintings borrow from walls faded by the Southern sun, Caribbean colors softened by time, and layers of paint that speak of generations who passed through the same front door. Within those modest homes lived extraordinary lives. They witnessed family dinners that overflowed into every room, backyard fish fries where neighbors became family, the sounds of jazz, rhythm and blues drifting through open windows, celebrations, grief, resilience, and quiet moments that rarely make history but shape us nonetheless. Built through layers of paint, paper, wax, and texture, each piece carries fragments of those memories, not as literal places, but as emotional landscapes. They are impressions of warmth, belonging, and the invisible stories that remain long after the people have gone. Lagniappe is my offering back to a city that gave me far more than I ever expected. It is a collection born from gratitude, celebrating the beauty found in humble places and the extraordinary gift of finding a place that, for a time, became home.