Project brief: Created between October and December 2005, Richard Misrach’s Destroy This Memory—a haunting series of images—is an affecting reminder of the physical and psychological impact of Hurricane Katrina Approach: Rather than simply surveying the damage, Misrach—who has photographed the region regularly since the 1970s, most notably in his ongoing “Cancer Alley” project—found himself drawn to the hurricane-inspired graffiti: messages scrawled in spray paint, crayons, chalk or whatever materials happened to be on hand. At turns threatening, desperate, clinical and even darkly humorous, the phrases he captured—the only text that appears in the book—offer unique and revealing human perspectives on the devastation and shock left in the wake of this disaster.

Destroy This Memory presents previously unpublished and starkly compelling material, all of which Misrach shot with his four-megapixel pocket camera.

Effectiveness: With no essay, titles or even page numbers in the way, the words on these homes, cars and trees offer a searing testament that continues to speak volumes, five years since their original inscription. The artist’s royalties for this project are being donated to the Make It Right Foundation, which is currently rebuilding the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans.

Misrach also conceived an exhibition of these photographs to be presented at five major museums across the country: the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC; the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; and the New Orleans Museum of Art.

The text is in the photos. The fact that this has no text is the most compelling part.