In NOLA.com Guest Column, HNOC Historian Discusses “Captive State” As Public History Project
Curator Eric Seiferth explains how HNOC’s 2025 exhibition and companion book serve as an important public telling of privately known truths.
Eric Seiferth, HNOC curator and historian
Captive State: Louisiana and the Making of Mass Incarceration
softcover • 9" × 11" • 106 pp.
57 color images
ISBN 9780917860942
$19.95
“Captive State” Book: Upcoming Local and Regional Literary Events
Related Exhibitions
Captive State: Louisiana and the Making of Mass Incarceration
Learn how the institutions of slavery and mass incarceration are historically linked, and how these connections have made Louisiana the world leader in incarceration today.
Related Stories
A Long Arc of Injustice
Once the hub of the domestic slave trade, Louisiana now leads the world in incarceration, with Black people disproportionately affected. HNOC’s exhibition Captive State traces the roots of this inequity all the way back to the founding of the state.
Processing Hope and Loss in the Prison Portraits of “One Big Self”
Deborah Luster’s portrait series, taken inside prisons across Louisiana, confronts viewers with the human lives at stake in the incarceration capital of the world.
Related Collection Highlights
“Vernon C. Bain” Christening Ceremony Video
When New York City’s war on drugs sent incarceration rates soaring, officials commissioned a floating jail built and christened downriver from New Orleans.
The Mysterious Axman’s Jazz
At the turn of the 20th century, a music-loving serial killer proclaimed that only jazz lovers would be safe from his reign of terror.
Death Notice for John Ward Gurley
One hot-headed young upstart in early 19th-century Louisiana found his way onto the dueling field, where the odds were not in his favor.
Related News
Innocence Project New Orleans to Honor HNOC with John Thompson Award for Courage & Justice
Forbes: HNOC Explores Human Tragedy of Mass Incarceration in Louisiana
“Captive State” Book: Upcoming Local and Regional Literary Events
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