Backwater Blues depicts a woman in a sheer slip standing inside her door, ankle-deep in water, futilely attempting to sweep out the rising brackish floodwater. In this piece, Alison Saar responded to the voyeuristic nature of the media coverage of Hurricane Katrina, where the victims were often shown in various stages of distress and undress without regard for their dignity or privacy and without efforts to assist them. Shortly before creating this image in 2013, Saar spent some time in New Orleans and was appalled to learn that there were tours to the Ninth Ward and other neighborhoods to see the devastating destruction of the storm and the multitude of homes still boarded up years after Hurricane Katrina.