Haiti Insight Volume 7, No. 6

Enock Placide: Expression Over Tradition

Although Enock Placide has not lived in Haiti since 1968, he easily visualizes the lush landscapes and rich spirituality of his native country whenever he picks up a brush or a pencil in his painter's studio here in western Long Island.

A featured artist in two group shows in New York City last year, Placide, 50, was inspired as a student by the masters of "primitive" Haitian art like Hector Hyppolite and Philome Obin, but he is also a firm believer that contemporary Haitian painters must not be limited by the influences of the "naive" style made famous by the Centre d'Art, a Port-au-Prince gallery and art school founded by Dewitt Peters in the 1940s that is widely credited with establishing an international appreciation for Haitian art.

"Centre d'Art presented itself as the true representation of Haitian art and it produced a stereotyping of Haitian art," explained Placide. "When you limit the scope of an artist, you are denying the right of expression."

Placide's work has great range, including a recent painting of six connecting pieces that tell the story of Amistad, an uprising on board a slave ship in 1839 that was depicted in a motion picture released by director Steven Spielberg last year. The painting was part of a group show held at the New World Art Center in New York City's Soho district that coincided with the opening of the Spielberg film. A majority of the more than 20 painters who contributed work to the show are of Haitian descent, including painter Rob Duverger of New York City.

"I wanted my work to be an expression of resistance, of rebellion. I started work on the painting in June 1997, and it depicts life, death, birth continuity and resistance," Placide said, noting that each piece of the painting tells a particular episode of the Amistad story. "The discreet pieces come together to tell a story. It's a series of individual images laid on top of the other to create a composite image."

Holy Trinity School

Placide was born in Gonaives and at age four he contracted polio, an ailment that disabled his legs but has not impeded his work as an artist, his "other" career as a medical technologist or as a husband and proud father of two boys, Marvin, 10, and Dimitri, 6.

His mother was Episcopalian, and enrolled him at a Port-au-Prince school that was run by the Episcopal Church, St. Vincent's. For nearly 50 years, St. Vincent's was directed by a nun from the United States, Sister Joan, and this remarkable educator turned St. Vincent's into a rehabilitation center that has provided generations of children with a chance of leading full and promising lives. Placide went next to Holy Trinity School, next door to the Episcopal cathedral in Port-au-Prince, Sainté Trinit.

In the 1940s, Monsignor Charles Alfred Voegeli, Bishop of the Episcopal Church of Haiti, commissioned Centre d'Art to decorate the interior of the cathedral with religious murals. Four painters -- Philome Obin, Castera Bazile, Rigaud Benoit and Gabriel Leveque -- each were assigned a different section of the apse, and under the guidance of art collector Selden Rodman, work on the murals began in 1950. The main murals were completed in April 1951.

"When I was 12-years-old, I started painting after I witnessed an artist paint the organ doors at Sainté Trinit," said Placide. The long time principal of Holy Trinity, Sister Anne Marie Bickerstaff -- who encouraged countless of Haitian children to follow their creative talents and become artists and musicians -- noticed Placide's talent, and made sure he always had paint, paper and brushes.

He next studied for a year at the Haitian Fine Art Academy of Port-au-Prince, which at the time was lead by Professor Montagutelli of Italy. "We studied a classical education at the Haitian Fine Art Academy. We worked on sculpture and we sketched using live models. All of us at that time in 1967 believed in the Gallery Brochette school, which was founded in the 1950s and nurtured a parallel movement away from Centre d'Art. Painters like Luckner Lazar and Raphael Denis founded Gallery Brochette because they wanted a place to show Haitian art that was not primitive."

Diaspora

In 1968, Placide won a scholarship to attend Corning Community College in New York and studied physics and science. He went on to New Paltz State University and earned a degree in Abstract Mathematics that led to a career as medical technologist. He now works at Methodist Hospital in Brooklyn.

"I've always painted," Placide said. "I worked long hours at the hospital, but I always came home and painted. Now I can work less at Methodist Hospital, and I feel free to promote my work. It was important for me to establish myself as an artist, and not depend on a gallery or marketplace to give me direction or ideas for my work. I wanted to create it myself."

Placide's work has been featured at the Brooklyn Museum, the Bedford Stuyvesant Restoration Cultural Center, Gallery 1199 in Manhattan and Medgar Evers College, among others.

His next goal is to open an artist's studio in Aquin, near Haiti's southern coast.

"I am a creating a studio where you can visit peacefully. Our presence there cannot be painful to the people. It has to help the environment," said Placide. "I can't have my kids eating well and see others go hungry.

"It will break from a style of leadership in Haiti that too often is based on how much pain you can inflict on the people who disagree with you. That's a part of Haiti that I hope one day will change."