"We put up tables," McCardell says. "This is where we worked because we had nowhere else. Lori had nothing, you know, was living in a tent."

Gordon was surprised to see her Katrina pieces sell quickly. Many of the buyers were volunteers who came from all over the country to help after the disaster.

'Angel of St Rose,' made mostly of debris from Hurricane Katrina, by artist Lori Gordon

Local residents also bought Gordon’s art, often recognizing pieces of their lives in the collages.

In the process, she began to see her work in a new way.

“I was able to take bits and pieces of all that negative stuff, and put them together and transform them not only into something I found beautiful and life-affirming," Gordon says. "But that made me some money, which was very significant at that point in time.”

Margaret Woodward, who is still repairing damage to her home in nearby Long Beach, owns several pieces of the Katrina Collection.

“Lori made the impossible seem possible and not only possible but beautiful again, there was very little that was pretty after the storm," says Woodward. "It was just tragic.”

Gordon, who now shows her work across the country, still works at the artists’ co-op two days a week.

“You don’t have to have experienced a Katrina to understand what loss is," she says. "Whether it’s the loss of your community, whether it’s much more singular and personal, like a divorce, we all have to do the same things. We have to pick up the broken pieces and put them back together in a way that makes sense, and in a way that will bring happiness and joy back to our lives.”