The land and water between New Orleans and Houston, commonly referred to as the Energy Coast, literally seems to float as a kind of terra infirma that is liquid and fluidly unstable; a watery mirage drawn by human intervention and land use that persists long after the storm. The land and water uniquely mirror each other, both in human folly as well as human achievement. It has been equally devastated by hurricanes, flooding, loss of wetlands and rise of the oceans, and the ever-present reality of disastrous oil spills that devastates animals, ecosystems and humanity equally.

Commemorating the 10th anniversary of both Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Rita in the Gulf Coasts of Louisiana and Texas, Judy Natal’s Another Storm is Coming is a commission by the Center for Energy & Environmental Research in the Human Sciences (CENHS) at Rice University, in collaboration FotoFest International Biennial in Houston, Texas. A site-specific outdoor installation consists of large-scale photographs, and two solar powered, recycled shipping containers housing a film screening room for two new videos Breathed on the Waters - a heartfelt suite of performances of singing, praying and chanting, entreating the gods for safe passage from hurricanes - and Storm Redux comprised of oral history interviews of survivors of the repeated succession of devastating hurricanes on the Gulf Coast. The Library invites viewers to engage with Natal’s research library, artifact collection from her travels that inspired her work, sketchbooks and journals, creating intersections between oil, energy, land use and land loss, sea level rise, repeated cycles of storm and flood, climate change and faith.

Natal stumbled upon a piece of graffiti that included the phrase “another storm is coming” in the abandoned amusement park that was blown to shreds by Katrina on the edge of Lake Pontchartrain in New Orleans at the start of her project. Instantly recognizing the prophecy, the poetry and the truth the phrase held, Natal used this as a fitting title for her project. With each cycle of hurricane that hits the Gulf Coast, Natal relives the stories she recorded of repetitive cycles of loss and devastation, and is haunted by the stories of the people she met whose lives are drastically redrawn again and again to this day. The Gulf Coast waters continue to warm due to climate crisis. There will be another storm.