Serenity Peace Birds

Clarence Dalcour (center, in hat), Big Chief of the Creole Osceolas, releases white doves for “Public Practice,” one of the opening events for Prospect.3, a New Orleans art triennial. The street performance was designed to showcase the ceremonial culture of New Orleans and, according to the organizers, “counter common representations of crime-ridden neighborhoods.”

Dalcour operates Serenity Peace Birds, a professional service that releases white doves for memorials, weddings, and other events. He is part of a network dedicated to ethical and humane ceremonial releases using trained and banded homing pigeons. Dalcour began raising pigeons and rock doves as a young man. He shared this interest with other Big Chiefs, the late Thomas Sparks of the Yellow Jackets and the late Eugene Thomas of the White Eagles, who also built lofts for their pigeons.