Impression: Mark Sindler

Mark J. Sindler (A&S ‘76) arrived at Tulane in 1972 with his sights set on an archaeology career. But everything changed when he turned in his photography as part of an anthropology class assignment. Discovering a new mode of storytelling, he traded the study of the past for a chance to document Louisiana’s living cultural legacy — a legacy he has continued to help maintain.

In his early years at Tulane, Sindler interviewed and photographed New Orleans residents he befriended on walks to the French Quarter. He used this work for a class assignment, which earned him a Kenneth J. Opat Fund award from Tulane’s Department of Anthropology in the School of Liberal Arts. The fund supports exceptional undergraduate research conducted across the world.

His roommate, a writer for The Tulane Hullabaloo, showed the project to the student-run paper’s editor. A week later, Sindler picked up the latest edition and was surprised to find his images as its main photographic spread.

“I decided to change my plans of becoming an archaeologist and pursue a career in photojournalism instead,” Sindler said, noting that the work he did for the Hullabaloo, as well as Tulane’s yearbook “The Jambalaya,” trained him well for the immersive personal documentary projects that followed. He graduated with highest honors in journalism and was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. A couple of years after graduating, Sindler made a decision that would alter his life.

In New Orleans East, 1,000 or so Vietnamese immigrants had settled in the Versailles Arms Apartments after the fall of Saigon. Inspired by an article in the Vieux Carre Courier describing this burgeoning community, Sindler moved into the complex in 1978.

He was determined to capture the transition as the group adapted to life in the United States. Grants from the Louisiana Division of the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts supported his efforts, and local residents raised funds to match the contributions.

“I wanted to record for posterity the aspects of their traditional culture that might be lost,” he said. Over nearly a decade, Sindler worked on the only known documentation of the state’s Southeast Asian residents and their cultures.

Nearly 50 years after Sindler moved into the Versailles Arms Apartments, the Historic New Orleans Collection (HNOC) mounted “Making it Home: From Vietnam to New Orleans,” an exhibition that included more than 70 of his photographs and related ephemera. While the HNOC exhibition ended in October, select photos are available for viewing on the HNOC website.

Notably, the exhibit included another important photo: President Gerald Ford in Tulane’s gymnasium on April 23, 1975, announcing the end of American involvement in the Vietnam War. Sindler photographed the event while he was still a student, back when his experiences at Tulane were setting the stage for his career.

Sindler devoted his life’s work to documenting his adopted home. In 2003, the Office of Tourism in the Louisiana Department of Culture, Recreation and Tourism (LDCRT) recruited him to be their only full-time photographer. He then went to work in the Office of the State Museum in early 2005. When hurricanes Katrina and Rita struck later that year, he traversed nearly 400 miles of coastal wreckage to capture their aftermath. His work from that period has been on display since 2010 in the Presbytère’s permanent exhibit, “Living with Hurricanes: Katrina and Beyond.”

Sindler’s photographs have formed the foundation for numerous exhibits and collections honoring Louisiana’s culture, from the early days of Jazz Fest to the 100th anniversary of the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club. After retiring from the LDCRT in 2017, he settled in Lafayette, Louisiana. But Tulane and the city he fell in love with call him back regularly. “I return to the city to experience its splendid historic, artistic and culinary treasures.”