ALL ON A MARDI GRAS DAY

Behind the drawn shades of a run-down home on the outskirts of New Orleans, Demond Melancon is creating a masterpiece: an extravagant suit made of pleated velvet, yellow ostrich feathers, and beaded patches so detailed they look like oil paintings. When it’s done, it’ll weigh 100 pounds, contain nearly 1 million individually
sewn beads, and make him 10 feet tall. He’ll wear it one time, then start the whole process again.All on a Mardi Gras Day is an intimate portrait of one man’s obsessive
journey through the secret 200-year culture known as Mardi Gras Indians: African-American men who spend all year making feathered suits to honor their runaway slave
ancestors and the Native American tribes who housed them during their escape. Every morning, Demond wakes at 5:30 and sews until midnight. His relentless sewing costs him his job each year, but he still finds the $8,000 in materials to complete his suit. His tribe -the Young Seminole Hunters - represents the Lower Ninth Ward, the most famous casualty of Hurricane Katrina. Ironically, its time under the mediaspotlight only accelerated gentrification, and Demond’s been pushed to the suburbs. What is so important about the Indian culture that he is willing to make these sacrifices?