Culture of Haiti
Celebrations
- January 1st: independence of Haiti (January 1st 1804, bank holiday);
- January 2nd: Day of Aieux (bank holiday).
- May 1st: Day of Agriculture and Work (bank holiday)
- May 18th: Creation of the Haitian Flag in Arcahaie by Dessalines, the liberator of Haiti which tore off the white of the French flag and to make recoudre the blue brought closer to the red by Cathérine Flon, a name retained in the history of Haiti. It is also the day of the University. May 1083, (bank holiday)
- October 17th Commemoration of died of the Emperor Jean-Jacques Dessalines the Large one assassinated with the Bridge-Red (Northern of Port-au-Prince) by its soldiers (Gabar and Guerin) under the dictation of the Generals Henry Christophe and Alexandre Pétion, the most quoted. Mutilated, its remainders were collected by a woman known under the name Défilée that the history taxed with insane to bring them in a bag to the cemetery Saint Anne of Port-au-Prince. October 1806, (bank holiday)
Haitian literature
The majority of the Haitian Littérature are written in French language. More and more of authors do not write any more in creole language . Among the writers of the Haitian diaspora also authors of English language (like Edwige Danticat) and of Spanish language are.
The Haitian authors of international reputation include/understand the names of Jean Price-March, Rumanian Jacques, Jacques Stephen Alexis Rene Depestre, Jean Métellus and the man-total (painter, playwright, writer), Frankétienne. Like Dany Laferrière (novelist, scenario writer) which left Haiti for Montreal in 1976 ( How to make love with a negro without tiring , 1985) and Emile Olivier.
Haitian painting
Painting was always a form of traditional expression in Haiti as mural decorations and the illustrations testify some to religious inspiration of which some go back to the 18th century. Whereas the rich families of settlers imported tables of Europe or made come from the Western painters on the spot, others sent their Esclave S free in France there to learn painting and to exploit their talent. It is in particular the case of the portraitist of Léogâne, Luc.The first Academy of Haitian painting east creates with the Cape-Haitian by the king Christophe shortly after independence (1804). In 1816, Pétion opens a school of Art to Port-au-Prince where come to teach French painters. Between 1830 and 1860, historical subjects related to slavery, and monks, in particular around the worship Voodoo, then constitute the main themes of the artists, whose production is still masked by the activity of the copyists.
Naive Haitians
After the Second world war, the painter and American professor Peters Dewitt create in 1944 a school of art and painting with Port-au-Prince. Its teaching initially remains academic and influenced by the Western or American currents. Impressed by the naive syle of the painters of the streets, Dewitt decides to accommodate, in complement of its traditional students, of the autodidacts to whom it provides the material which will enable them to express their talent. A first wave of these artists starts to know a certain notoriety, like Hector Hyppolite, Rigaud Benoit, Castera Bazile, Wilson Bigaud or Holy Brice. It is the beginning of the movement of the “naive Haitians”.
At the time of its voyages in Haiti, in 1943 then in 1945, André Breton is caught admiration for these works, which it associates with its surrealist step. It then publishes a text devoted to Hyppolite, which draws the attention of the French intellectuals to Haitian painting. Other intellectuals, like Jean-Paul Sartre, visiting the island in 1949, or Andre Malraux, amplify the movement. “People of artist live Haiti” then written Malraux, stressing that on the island, all is prone to pictorial transcription: the market, the marriage, fishing and the religion, syncretic as with Cuba and the Brazil.
In the Years 1950, Haitian painting evolves/moves and diversifies, opening with various forms of expression, but always privileging the colors and the feature. Several workshops are born in various parts of the territory. The Haitian na5ive art is spread then in the world: the Museum off Modern Art of New York becomes purchaser of fabrics of the artists more in vogue while Time Magazine reproduces frescos Haitian in its editions.
The term of “naive” describes a figurative style then where dominate the colors in Aplat and popular subjects (scenes of street, markets brisk, combat of animals, etc). It applies less to technique of artists which completely controls their Article In the Années 1960, purchasers tear off works of naive Haitians which becomes articles sought on the market of Article This brutal commercial interest, which causes the emergence of a true craft industry of naive paintings, will lead artists like the community of Saint Sun to return to the sources while placing the culture voodoo in the middle of their step.
Painting voodoo
The worship Vaudou appears very early in Haitian painting. The two most outstanding figures and more the symbolic systems are Hector Hippolyte and Saint Brice, whose artistic step was greeted by André Breton for the first, and by André Malraux for the second.With the beginning of the year 1970, Maud Robard and Jean-Claude Garoute (who will be known as painter under the name of Tiga) create a center of art intended to accommodate the artists around the topic of the mystery voodoo. They initially install it in the district of Chicks, with Pétionville, in the suburbs of Port-au-Prince. The experiment is not conclusive, but the two intellectuals cling to their project. They move in 1973 in Soisson it Montagne, to about fifty kilometers of Port-au-Prince. They on the spot meet masons, cookers, gardeners and peasants to which they lend a room, brushes and fabrics. The painting of these “residents” will be directed towards the topic of the voodoo. Their group will be regarded as a school, baptized “Holy Sun”. In 1975, Malraux visits this community and one gives him will have mystical in its test Timeless the . In 1978, the community Saint Sun separates but the most implied painters and most talented want to continue to paint: Louisiana Fleurant Saint, Denis Smith, Dieuseul Paul, Levoy Exile and Prospère Pierre Louis, the “histories of Saint Sun” create an abstract group which takes the name of the “Five suns”. These artists go essaimer and much from painters will recognize themselves in their their step: thus artists as Payas or Stevenson Magloire (the son of Louisiana Saint Fleurant, which will die assassinated) are made known until in Europe and with the the United States.
A long time, one found fabrics of these artists in the most improbable stores including the shops for tourists, in whom they côtoyaient naive painting. Today, a market was organized around painting voodoo, and the fabrics as of its representatives are sold, often very expensive, in the American and French galleries.
Haitian music
The music constitutes an important part of the life of the Haitians. The forms of musical rates are varied. The Kompa, the Music messenger, the Twoubadou and the Rythme root form the basic quartet of the clean culture in the island. These musics know evolutions to be combined harmoniously at intervals of rumba, jazz or of rock'n'roll.Concurrently to these forms, the musicians are influenced by the rates/rhythms of the adjoining countries: the Merengue, but also the Hip-hop, the Ragga or the Reggae. So certain musicians remain on the island, others export their art in the world, like Ti Jack.
Haitian cinema
Appearance of the cinema
Haitian historiography on the cinema is very limited. One knows only one double number of the review of the Institute French of Haiti “Conjunction”, left in 1983, devoted to the cinema, a book of Arnold Antonin, published during the same year in Caracas (Venezuela), entitled “Material for a prehistory of the Haitian cinema” and an article of the same author in the book of Guy Hennebel and Alfonso Gumucio Dagrón, published in 1981 pennies the title of “Cinema of the Latin America”. Moreover, a considerable amount of information published in “Conjunction” come from this article. The authors revealed us thereafter that they had not taken the risk to quote Arnold Antonin in their bibliography because of the dictatorship of the Duvalier.
Almost at the same time as in all the other countries of the world, the cinematograph makes its appearance in Haiti. December 14th, 1899, a representative of the Lumière cinematograph carries out the first public projection with the small Seminar. The following day, this same representative, Joseph Filippi, of passage in Haiti, films a fire in Port-au-Prince.
One still lays out, in the American files of Library off Congress of the United States of America, of many images moving of the period of the occupation of 1915-1934, representing the actions of the navy and the official ceremonies.
One can still find images moving turned to Haiti on the health care, the agriculture or of the scenes of the social life, whose carnival is the privileged moment, in the files of Library off Congress also or in Pathé-Movies.
The first continuous projections, after the passage of the representative of the brothers Light, take place as from 1907 with the Large Hotel of Pétion-City, then in Parisiana, located at the Champ de Mars, as from 1914. Parisiana was the first big room of cinema and theater (approximately 500 places) who existed in the country.
In 1933, the Movies Eden open its doors with the Cape-Haitian. The following year, it is the turn of Paramount in Port-au-Prince and in 1935 that of Rex Théâtre.
Ricardo Widmaïer, pioneer of the radio was it also for the cinema. It is him which ensures the beginning of the year 1950 the realization and projection with the Paramount Movies of the filmed current events. It has its own laboratory in Port-au-Prince where it develops, in black and white and colors, its films made in 16 Misters It produces with Edouard Guilbaud: " me, I am belle". Jean Dominique, author of the comment, also speaks on behalf of the narration. The sound is ensured by Herby Widmaïer which does not have whereas 15 years.
Although there are no searchs systematic and thus for accurate informations and documented on this subject, it had reports filmed on subjects varied (movies-varieties) until the seizure of power by François Duvalier in 1957. Emmanuel and Edouard Guilbaud carry out many reports on the political and sporting events considered to be most important, under the direction of Ricardo Widmaïer very often.
The cinema which the Haitians see
If the local film production is practically non-existent, the Haitians however go to the cinema. In the years 1960, the spectators still had the choice between films produced by Italian and French realizers. But progressively, in spite of the spaces offered sporadically by the French Institute, the cinema Hollywood, and not best, invaded the screens. During all the Duvalier mode, a strict monitoring is exerted on projected films for fear they do not convey subversive ideas. For example, the “Fever goes up in El CAM”, of Shine Bunuel, was quickly removed rooms. Extremely often the Westerns and the films inspired of Chinese martial arts represented the only choices offered to the public.
In the years 1980, the group Maxence Elisee appears on the Haitian market of the cinema. This West-Indian corporation allowed the Haitian public to have access to successful films carried out in France and the French versions of American films.
Today, this group, become group “Leisures S.A.”, dominates the distribution and the exploitation of the cinema in Haiti and has the majority of the theaters of the country, in particular three larger, the Imperial one (5 rooms), Capitol (4 rooms), Rex Théâtre and Paramount. It is thanks to him that one can currently see on the big screen the productions Haitian, fictions and documentary too.
The fate of the Haitians who want to see cinema on the small screen is not amusing. Although the country still lives per hour of the radio (194 stations through the country), much of new television channels (18 on the whole) made their appearance, that is to say 7 with the Capital and 11 in province. The local production being non-existent, these “televisions” do nothing but relay, that is to say directly or remote, of the collected programs, starting from parabolic aerials, of the American or Canadian chains, which extremely often pour in English all kinds of images coming from the first world. As for the television of State it nowhere does not have the similar one elsewhere for its style and the kind of propaganda but it diffuses.
The cinema which the Haitians make
The cinema of the interior.
During the dictatorship of Duvalier, the production of images moving was of one extreme poverty inside the country. Considering the technological and financial constraints of the film production, it is not astonishing only in one country where all the socio-economic indicators work to wrong way, which the scenario writers, with rare exceptions, did not manage to carry out films.Thus occur, in all and for all, during the 28 years of the dictatorship of Duvalier, only three films: A medium-length film: “Map blade Net” (1976), version Creole of the part of Jean Cocteau, “the beautiful indifferent one” carried out by Raphaël Stines; “Olivia” feature-length film (1977) rea1ized by Bob Lemoine. This one tries the realization of another film but which is never exhibé. Rassoul Labuchin carries out “Anita” (1980), who was a great success at the time, thanks to the diffusion that in the Film club - Sight made not created at the same time which, unfortunately, did not last a long time. Olivia was turned in 35 mm and the two others in 16.m.
Unfortunately after the fall of Duvalier, the production was not more abundant, far from there. Not only one film was not carried out inside the country since then, unless one abolishes the distinction between film on support strips (acetate) and video. In this field, there were several achievements which we will reconsider.
The cinema militant and of the diaspora
It is in the diaspora that with strength a cinema of denunciation and fight against the dictatorship appears. Initially with documentary films of Arnold Antonin in particular: “Duvalier on the dock” (1973, 25 mm, black and white). “Haiti the way of freedom” (1974, feature-length film of 120 mm, black and white). The film, sponsored by the famous review the Books of the Cinema, launches the Haitian cinema to the international level and is presented still today like a film worship. (Festival of the Haitian cinema, Paris 2001.). “Duvalier condemned” (1975, medium-length film, 40mn, 16mm, black and white). “Na5ive art and repression in Haiti” (1975, medium-length film, colors). “Can an uncle macoute be a poet? ” (1980, medium-length film, 16mm, 40mn, colors) “Right to the word” (1981, medium-length film, 20 mm, 16mm. colors).
The documentary heading also should be announced: “Bitter Cane” (1983, feature-length film carried out by Paul Arcelin, 1975,16mm, colors).
These films gain many prices and are projected in many international festivals. It is with the fall of Duvalier that a new militant cinema appears. This one is not done any more exclusively the documentary ones but of film of fiction also: it is that of Raoul Peck which realizes, inter alia: “Haitian Corner” (1989, 109 minutes, 16mm, colors, fiction). “Lumumba or the death of the prophet” “The man on the quays” selected officially with the Cannes festival of 1993. (1992, 105 mm, 35mm, colors, fiction). “Desounen” (1994, 52 minutes, 16mm, colors). And recently fiction: “Lumumba” which is a great success in Africa and in the United States.
Other films also deserve to be mentioned: “Ayisyen raised kanpe” (1982, short film carried out by Haiti film. Colors, documentary). “Nou all refijye” (1983. short film carried out by Willy Exumé.) “Kò is put” (1990, short film, 16mm, colors, realized by Patricia Benoit).
An Haitian scenario writer, Roland Paret, residing then at Canada, carried out 1ui also many short films on various subjects. It is necessary to quote Michele Lemoine and Elsie Hass in Paris also. The majority of films are carried out by authors of extraction or Haitian nationality but are often turned with foreign teams and financings
Video and cinema.
The creation and the production of images under the social conditions and economic of Haiti seem to be able to find an exit in the light media and in particular in the video. Indeed, of many independent producers, beside the television, which continues to produce very little, turnings realize, in video, films of fiction or the documentary ones in a number which exceeds the film production itself clearly.
Arnold Antonin itself, since its return in 1986, during a first time, carried out only institutional or educational vidéos, except a short film on Port-au-Prince entitled: “The third world war already took place” (1996). As from 1999, it launches out with the team of the Center Pétion-Bolivar, of which Oldy Auguste (camera and assembly) and Mathieu Painvier, assistant of production, in the realization of a series of documentary, portraits of workers of the popular layers of the country and small personal museums of emblematic figures of Haitian art like Tiga, Cédor, Albert Mangonès, André Pierre, Patrick Vilaire, Marithou. Starting from a text of Gary Victor, it puts out of film the satirical part: Piwouli and the zenglendo in 2001.
Many a vidéastes works on the ground either as producers, or as cameramen, or as assemblers. Some ones also work like realizers. It would be necessary to quote among them names like; Mario Delatour, Jean Fabius, Claude Mancuso, Jean-Pierre Grasset, Richard Sénécal, Rachel Magloire, Patrick Barthelemy, Karl Lafontant, Laurence Magloire. etc
Raynald Delerme and Jean Gardy Bien-Aimé produced and carried out several feature-length films of video fiction which were projected in the cinemas of Port-au-Prince and the principal chief towns of province with an astonishing success. Just like more recently: Réginald Lubin and Richard Sénécal.
Among the film-videos carried out by Raynald Delerme one can quote: “Founérailles” (1988, carried out according to a scenario of Theodore Beaubrun and with Theodore Beaubrun (Languichatte). Video PVS/Polycarpe Studio). “Shérico S.A. No 1” (1989) “People of good” (1995, realized according to a scenario of Beloved Jean-Gardy) “Languichatte at the XXe century”, television serial with Theodore Beaubrun
Of Beloved Jean-Gardy, one can quote: “The Cape with the one” (1993. Video rainbow Production). “Scars” (1997. Video rainbow production). “Millionaire by error” (2003)
Of Surprised Frederic: “People from here” “Cherished, I love you” (1998)
One can also quote a video film carried out by Raphaël Stines “Kraze lanfè”, with an actor of the joke populaire" “Jessifra”. This actor is an enormous success near the public for his imitation of the accent considered to be picturesque of the inhabitants of the North of the country. The vidéos of its theatrical works, filmed without any effort of turning or assembly, especially have an incomparable success in the diaspora.
Raphaël Stines was also the realizer of a television serial entitled “EP Toma” and recently of “Bouqui nan paradi”, starting from the part of Fouché.
De Réginald Lubin: Fear of liking
Of Richard Sénécal: Barricades
Business success or artistic success
The Haitian, poor cinema from the technical and artistic point of view, is far from competitive vis-a-vis the foreign productions. Gravities of any kind are drawn up on the way of a production of quality. Audio-visual creation in Haiti is not obviously with the height of the reputation of plastic creation. Moreover one can even put the following question: Isn't Haiti, a country of orality? What then comes there to seek the cinema? However the Haitian, avid public of its own images, seems to answer this interrogation clearly.
With the premium access one wants to especially underline the lack of quality of the serials and the vidéos carried out and to oppose them to a cinema art and of test which would be the documentary cinema or of political fiction and militant of certain Haitian creators. And if the Haitian cinema were however basically these fictions turned in video in the vein of the popular joke or the light comedy with all their technical and esthetic gaps? And if this primitive, ingenuous cinema and kitch, often inspired by stereotypes and mawkish stories were not the typical turnip but the condition for the blossoming of a popular cinema of mass?
Today, the hybridization of technologies and the multimediatisation of the products facilitate the production and prevent a clear distinction between cinema and video. Indeed, the kind of productions to which we referred before became most abundant if not only what exists since the fall of the house of Duvalier and it is that which attracts crowd. Only the spectacular “Titanic” (1998) collected more video entries than it entitled “Scars” produced locally by Jean Gardy Bien-Aimé and projected in the various cinemas of the country. It would be necessary to avoid the dilemma educational and cultural cinema on the one hand and cinema of mass of the other, to put the question: which are the productions really representative of the work of the makers of images in this country? Is it possible today to benefit from Haitian specificities vis-a-vis the transnationalized identities and to arrive while drawing from the imaginary collective, while benefitting from immense “No man' S Land” which links reality and the fiction in our country, in order to make a cinema of quality where the Haitian spectator, even cultivated, is really found there and with joy?
Isn't it Julio Garcia Espinoza which dreamed of an imperfect cinema which would make its own technical limitations the force and the reason of its creativity? In fact, in Haiti, we run the risk to make material gravities of severe limits to the creativity and esthetic research.
Characteristics of the film production in Haiti
There is a weak technical and artistic preparation in the mediums of the production and the realization. The majority of the technicians and the artists, including the actors, are trained on the job. They are obliged to be delayed to solve engineering problems, for lack of formation, instead of dealing with the problems of creation. Professionalism is thus almost absent. There does not exist preparation in the economic organization of the production in Haiti. There does not exist yet of legislation on the cinema in the country. The State does not express until now any interest for the film production. There is no cineclub nor of school of cinema. No subsidy is envisaged on any level in order to support the production of images. On the other hand the realizers are obliged on television to pay spaces for the diffusion of their works; a television besides which, until now, just like the State, seems to be more worried to organize the lapse of memory of the memory. Finally, the cinephilic criticism and practices are practically non-existent; only criticism is summarized with publicity, with short articles financed in the newspapers at the launch of the products or some rare very descriptive articles always.
Foreign films on Haiti
The list would be quite long if one were to also mention foreign films, documentary and of fiction, inspired by Haitian reality on support strips or videos carried out by scenario writers, vidéastes or television channels on Haiti. Deserve perhaps to be retained, inter alia: The traditional one: “The divine horsemen, the living room gods off Haiti” (1963), of Maya Deyren. “Actors” (1965) by Peter Glenville (British production), according to the novel of Graham Greene. Fiction which proceeds in dark Haiti of Duvalier. Films of the Cuban Institute of Art and Cinema industry (ICAIC): “Coumbite” (1964) carried out by the Cuban Divided into volumes Gutiérrez Alea, according to the novel of Rumanian Jacques, “Governors of the Dew”. French, Maurice Failevic, will make an adaptation of it also. “Simparele” (1974) of Humberto Solas with the Haitian singer Martha Jean-Claude. “Between el cielo will tierra it there” (1979) of Handbook Octavio Gómez, always with Martha Jean-Claude
The documentary ones of the French Jean-Marie Drot and Charles Najmann, those of the Americans Jonathan Demme and Rudy Stern, Kareen Kramer, of the Dane Jurgen Leth, the Canadians Jean Daniel Laffond, Yves Langlois and Gerard Lechêne. All the foreign scenario writers who, as producer or realizer, felt the need for reconsidering once more Haitian reality.