Walter Inglis Anderson - After Katrina

After Katrina

Anderson's work (his family's collection) was partially destroyed when Hurricane Katrina struck Ocean Springs in 2005, and the storm surge penetrated the small cinderblock building that had been built to house his works owned by his family safely after Hurricane Camille. There was extensive water damage to the watercolors, drawings, manuscripts, and other objects that were kept there, and much of this work, from the Anderson Family collection, was dried and removed to Mississippi State University. Some has been restored by conservator Margaret Moreland. Works housed on site at the Walter Anderson Museum of Art, Ocean Springs, were undamaged, although part of the offsite collection was (in 2006 the Museum undertook the restoration of Anderson's original linoleum blocks and other works.) The condition of the Community Center mural was worsened by the storm, and it was announced in June 2006 that it would be restored by a team from the Winterthur Conservation Project. Manuscripts of Anderson's writing, much of it unpublished, were kept at Shearwater and were damaged or destroyed. Fortunately, years earlier Anderson's correspondence and much of his other writing had been microfilmed for the Archives of American Art. Still more writing and biographical materials were photocopied before Katrina by Anderson biographer Christopher Maurer and those copies have been donated, together with copies of the archives of Shearwater Pottery, to Archives and Special Collections at the JD Williams Library, University of Mississippi.