The Backstreet Cultural Museum
Foster Care
The Backstreet Cultural Museum
The History
The Backstreet Cultural Museum officially opened its doors in 1999. However, its origins can be traced back three decades to when Sylvester Francis paraded with the Gentlemen of Leisure Social Aid & Pleasure Club. A man photographing the parade wanted Francis to pay $35.00 for his own photograph. To avoid such costs in the future, Francis bought both a Super 8mm camera and a still camera and began documenting Carnival celebrations, second-line parades, and jazz funerals throughout New Orleans.
Our Mission
The mission of the Backstreet Cultural Museum is to preserve and perpetuate the unique cultural traditions of New Orleans’ African American society through collections, exhibitions and publications, public programs, and performances. These cultural traditions include Mardi Gras Indians, Skull and Bone gangs, Baby Dolls, jazz funerals, social aid and pleasure clubs, and other related activities, rituals and celebrations.
The vision of the Backstreet Cultural Museum is to foster the appreciation of New Orleans’ African American processional traditions as important to American history and contemporary visual culture. The Backstreet Cultural Museum is a gathering place of memory, celebration, and communion that uses art and culture to enrich and sustain its community.
Our institutional goals: The Backstreet Cultural Museum will be an accredited institution. The objects and artifacts in its possession will be presented and preserved in stable, climate-controlled facilities. The Backstreet Cultural Museum will have sufficient human and financial resources to carry out its mission. The museum will produce public programs that attract high visibility and substantial audiences. In addition, the museum will support and host important community cultural celebrations and rituals.