Smug faces, military uniforms, a strange sign, an open window, and a shopping cart full of ill-gotten goods; these are the objects that can be seen in Banksy Street art found on a damaged building in New Orleans, Louisiana. On August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina, a Category 3 storm, made landfall on the Gulf Coast. In its wake, Katrina left a trail of destruction that killed over 1,800 people and cost an estimated $108 billion in damages, making it the most destructive natural disaster in U.S. history. Right in the path of the most powerful part of the storm was the city of New Orleans. (Hurricane Katrina) In the aftermath of the storm's destruction, the ridiculously negative response from state and national authorities, and the large-scale crime wave that followed the outbreak of anarchy, New Orleans was a gold mine for political comments. Three years later, Banksy, a world-famous English street artist, enters. Banksy became famous ironically due to his use of anonymity as an artist. Banksy will choose a city somewhere in the world and will usually embark on a month-long anonymous crusade in which he “tags” different buildings with culturally and politically motivated works of “street art”. When Banksy descended on New Orleans, he painted 14 works of street art in total, but the painting that stood out as the most blatantly political was the painting titled “Looters.” (Story by Banksy) In Looters, two white males dressed in green National Guard uniforms can be seen painted on a white wall of a damaged building next to an open window. One of the soldiers can be seen half leaning out of a painted window as he passes a medium-sized TV to another soldier. Behind the soldiers is a shopping cart with a large stereo system inside... middle of paper... doesn't alienate his follower base, but he's edgy enough to gain publicity, and through that, money. So, in the end, everyone has to give their own interpretation of this work of art. If the goal of art is to elicit a strong emotional response from the viewer, Banksy's painting “Looters” was ultimately successful. However, the memory of the actions taken by National Guard soldiers after Hurricane Katrina will continue to live in the hearts and minds of Katrina victims, not because of a painting of some Europeans removing all the valuables they could find , but for the small paintings of x that the soldiers left on all the houses where they eliminated all the survivors they could find. Works Cited “Hurricane Katrina.” History.com. A&E and Web Television Networks. March 25, 2014. "The Story Behind Banksy." Smithsonian. Np, nd Web. March 25. 2014.