Life's About Change - Tale of New Orleans Artist

Sometimes you flee a place in search of change; other times you choose to stay and be the change. Wade Griffin, one of New Orleans’s most eclectic artists, has planted himself in Central City, a neighborhood facing a dual threat to maintain its identity: crime and gentrification. It’s here the son of a carpenter grew up and here he and his wife are raising their daughter despite the departure of so many friends and family.

Hurricane Katrina destroyed their home but not their desire to rebuild it…or their life there as they knew it. Wade, a contractor and woodworker at the time, took it apart piece by piece, and then rebuilt it from the baseboards up. But you never saw a mound of scrap in front of his house; he kept it, seeing beauty and purpose in the discarded debris.

In the meantime, to lift his spirits and lower his stress, he returned to the musical roots he hadn’t nurtured in years. He turned his den into a sound studio and started writing and recording songs. He bought instruments and equipment and earned a growing reputation in the neighborhood. Sadly, however, his good fortune turned into misfortune when greedy thieves ransacked his studio stealing his equipment and the future he banked on before he could insure it.

Wade could’ve given up and moved out, but the contractor-turned-musician didn’t miss a beat. Instead, he picked up a paintbrush and from notes to strokes, created new art. The canvas gave voice to the song in his heart. Each image is bright, bold and captures the grit of both the subject and the artist. And each is showcased in the framework of fortitude. Remember the scraps he saved after rebuilding his home, the storm debris? That’s what he wraps around his artwork. It’s all part of the beauty that is change.

Life’s about change…make it real.

~Delta

P.S. To check out more of Wade's work: https://m.facebook.com/wlgriffinart/?ref=bookmarks