Vestiges of Grandeur

Vestiges of Grandeur:
The Plantations of Lousiana's River Road

San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 1999
Written and Photographed by Richard Sexton
With aerial photographs by Alex S. MacLean
Introduction by Dr. Eugene Cizek, FAIA
Book design by Charles Routhier, Storehouse Co.
256 pages; 230 color photographs
ISBN: 0-8118-1817-9
Hardcover, $40 retail

A gallery edition of Vestiges of Grandeur is available directly from the author and through select booksellers. The gallery edition includes a belgian linen slipcase and an original Iris print. Each print and book are signed and numbered. The gallery edition is limited to 100 books. $275 retail

Synopsis
Published in 1999, Vestiges of Grandeur is perhaps best described as a companion volume to New Orleans: Elegance and Decadence. This project focuses on the historic plantation architecture of the River Road between New Orleans and Baton Rouge. In many ways, Vestiges of Grandeur is a refinement of the photo-essay approach that proved so successful in Elegance and Decadence. The subject matter, though, is more somber. Whereas Elegance and Decadence was a celebration, Vestiges of Grandeur is more of a lament. Also, Vestiges is more journalistically ambitious and seeks to present a more definitive picture of its subject.

Richard Sexton's text and photographs are supplemented by the aerial photographs of Alex S. MacLean, which are a vital component of the photo-essay. Preservation architect Eugene Cizek contributed an historical introduction.

Reviews
...beautifully photographed with images so vivid you can almost feel the damp heat and smell the decay.
- Jayne Clark, USA Today, December 10, 1999

Richard Sexton chronicles the landmarks, both vibrant and decaying, that line the banks of our most storied river, from Baton Rouge to New Orleans. His atmospheric photographs limn a landscape at once melancholy, contradictory, overripe, haunting, and scary.
- Allen Freeman, Preservation, Nov/Dec 1999

Vestiges of Grandeur...is a landmark book, a moment frozen in time. Eloquent, passionate, and heartfelt...this work belongs on every Louisiana bookshelf.
- Susan Larson, Times-Picayune, Nov. 5, 1999

With his gorgeous bookVestiges of Grandeur, Sexton does what no photographer really has done since Clarence John Laughlin shot the derelict plantation homes half a century ago. . . Though he has numerous books to his credit, Sexton's Louisiana photography is exceptionally organic. He writes about the "swampy infinity" of the River Road as if he grew up here, and nobody packs such a wallop with a shot of cracked ceiling plaster.