Every aspect of Haitian life is imbued with vision. From the fabulous voudou rites in remote waterfalls to the horrific killings and ritualistic murders that accompany political change (or perhaps a lack of it) Haitians have an acute visual acuity, not surprising given their history. Riguad Benoit, Hector Hyppolite, Wilson Biguad are some names, if I can mention only a few, painters who made Haiti famous through their visionary painting skills. Some might call it magic.
Haitians may have not the resources to build great cathedrals or temples, although there are some, but they have the talent to create stunning art and ceremonies with minimal tools. This visual sensibility extends unfortunately to death as well. When a victim of political violence is tossed in a trash heap, it should be no surprise that that the imagery created is both symbolic and highly visual, as well as of course, horrific.
For photographers Haiti has been a wrong to try to right, the material for powerful photojournalism that articulates the seeming pathos of Haitian life, as well as creating a symbol for a school of photography that examines, in almost microscopic detail, the suffering of others. This suffering takes place in a void, absent the smiles, and laughter, and yes, even fun, that often exists side by side with tragedy. Its a paradox that photographers love to talk about in war stories, but very rarely is visible in images.
Yes, for Haiti to move forward in history, the skills of the children must be given an opportunity to flourish in a more rewarding atmosphere than a garbage heap and its requisite pig provides.
In Alice Smeets award winning image of 9 year old Landa Joseph in Cite de Soleil, Port au Prince’s notorious slum, there is both poignant beauty, and a feeling of hope as she steps through the muddy water in her clean pink dress.
“I can’t remember the last time I saw a picture that truly burned in my mind for more than a moment, much less a photograph that is able to capture an idea or even a turning point in history. We are starved for these images, even if, as with this image by Smeets, they are right in front of us.”
I can’t remember the last time I saw a picture that truly burned in my mind for more than a moment, much less a photograph that is able to capture an idea or even a turning point in history. We are starved for these images, even if, as with this image by Smeets, they are right in front of us.
This is one of those pictures. Hold it up for awhile, admire it. Better yet, plaster it on a billboard in Times Square. It belongs there, as what we used to call a “Kodak moment.”
Yet as Ms. Smeets notes in her caption, Haitians, no matter how poor, are extremely proud about their appearance. And that pig, which to a westerner may be symbolic of poverty, to a Haitian pig might very well be a symbol of wealth, like the cell-phones that every Haitian these days must have, even those living without electricity!
In this edition of 100Eyes I have intentionally left out much of the violence and misery that we are accustomed to seeing in work coming out of Haiti. This is not to deprecate the problems of the country or to minimize the importance if the reporting, but to suggest that there is another Haiti which greets us after emerging from Mais Gate, and it is not all bad, or violent, or angry.
Just the opposite, we walk through Haitian towns and villages and are amazed that despite the poverty, and the over-population, that Haitians live for the most part civilly, that theft is not tolerated, and that amazingly, Haitians appear happier than those we might run into on the sidewalks of Manhattan, or driving in cars through Southern California. Haitians dream of these places as if they are the promised land, sometimes fleeing the island in small overcrowded boats, tragically often drowning in the process, yet those of us who come in the other direction, from Paris, Miami, and New York, are equally romantic and even nostalgic about Haiti.
When I first visited Port au Prince in 1982, after having grown up in a household filled with Haitian paintings bought from Seldon Rodman in the 60’s, I was struck first by the masses of people–they seemed to occupy every inch of space. This was during the last days of Baby Doc Duvalier, when my fixer (this was before there was an official name for this) had to report to his bosses, who were of course carefully monitoring what an American photographer was doing in Haiti. In those days there were not the fleet of black SUVs in the streets carrying representatives of international aid workers, or the UN soldiers, and the hills that line Port au Prince’s valleys were not choking with cheaply built slum dwellings. In the old Holiday Inn near the Presidential Palace, while waiting to photograph then Priest Aristede, I had a memorable romp in the pool with a blonde Brazilian bombshell.
Sadly in preparing this issue of 100Eyes, it seemed to me that Haiti is not as well documented as it could be. The great changes in photojournalism that have given us the Bangladeshi photographers, who are creating a cottage industry in Dhaka, are not happening in Haiti. The photographers who fly-in are predictable and rightfully attracted to the stories of the struggle–the violence that springs from the elections, the plague of AIDS, and the poverty that is represented by the Cite Soleil, each one capturing what appears to be the same pig?
But there is much more to Haiti, and hopefully we can begin to address that in the future. With this in mind I am holding a photo workshop in Jacmel, Haiti, in February of next year. Besides photographing the Kanaval, and learned new skills in photojournalism, we will surely be talking about the kind of photography that can uplift as well as reveal. And hopefully we will have some young Haitian students to tutor as well, something that groups like Zanmi Lakay and Cine Institute have been doing for years. Many ask why they would fly to Haiti and spend so many dollars for this? To them I will say show up, and find out.
Andy Levin/New Orleans
