Haitian Collection

In 1944, Castera Bazile was working as a servant for DeWitt Peters, the founder of the Centre d'Art. Taken with what he saw, Bazile began to paint in 1945. He was one of the few artists to paint murals in the Saint Trinité Episcopal Cathedral in Port-au-Prince in 1950-51. Bazile won both acclaim and international awards for his works. He stopped painting in 1962 and died three years later from tuberculosis. Although Bazile was known as a devout Catholic, he was also familiar with vodou, and often addressed both in his religious paintings. Here the artist conflates the Christian devil and hell with Ogou, the god of war and metal, one of the vodou lwa (spirits). Ogou is a deity of fire and his sacred color is red. He is associated with St. Michael and St. George. These saints are shown slaying a winged demon or dragon in popular Catholic chromolithographs found throughout Haiti. In Bazile's painting, men and women are led down a winding path where they will be plunged into a pit of fire, also filled with such winged demons and dragons. The devil watches from above. Surrounding him are pots filled with offerings, Ogou's sword, painted drums, and an ason (sacred rattle), all associated with vodou. Triptychs (literally three folds) have been used for altarpieces since medieval times. This painting may have been part of a triptych, which would account for its unusual shape. Bazile commonly created color contrasts, such as with the bright orange, red fire against the muted blues and browns of the background in this work.

Castera Bazile came into contact with the Centre d'Art through his work as a domestic servant for DeWitt Peters, the center's founder. Bazile quickly became a professional artist and had a distinguished, albeit short, career. In 1955 he won First Prize in ALCOA's Caribbean International Art Competition, and won the $1,000 First Prize in the 1957 Holiday Magazine competition. In 1962, at the age of 39, Bazile contracted tuberculosis and died a few years later. In vodou, the lwa (spirits) are closely related to nature and are believed to reside in springs, rivers, and trees. Sometimes vodou followers make pilgrimages and offerings to these types of sites to show their devotion to the spirits. Worship for Loco, the spirit of vegetation, is often associated with the worship of trees, especially the mapou or silk-cotton tree, sometimes called the ceiba. The towering mapou, one of the tallest types of trees in Haiti, is considered sacred. In this painting, a man climbs a mapou while other individuals watch. Offerings have been placed in the straw bag he carries, which he will then hang from the tree. The man in the foreground holds an ason (sacred rattle) that is used to summon the spirits. Other offerings have been placed at the bottom of the tree, including coins and a candle under a bila (tent). The man's makout (straw bag) and the miniature straw hats on the ground also associate this offering with Azaka, the spirit of agriculture. As in many other vodou ceremonies, drapo (ritual flags), and food (indicated by the two cocks that will be sacrificed) play an important role.

The blighted tree is one of the most frequently used motifs of Haitian artists. It is a powerful symbol of the crises brought about by slavery in past centuries and the excesses and repression of the Duvalier regimes in the twentieth. The ecological devastation wrought by François Duvalier and his son and successor Jean-Claude have rendered Haiti a wasteland in many areas. Benoit represents this devastation by painting a forest of amputated trees surrounding a manbo (vodou priestess). However, Benoit provides an image of hope despite the suffering. The trees sprout new growth while life, symbolized by the birds, returns to the forest. Benoit's friend, artist Yves Michel, has stated that this painting is based upon a popular song, "Choucoune" ("Yellow Bird") sung by Haitian singer Martha Jean-Claude.

Benoit's painting accurately depicts one of the most important ceremonies in vodou, the Desounen, a religious service connecting the sacred cyclical components of life, death and renewal. To those who practice vodou, the act of death has two phases, physical and spiritual. After physical death, the spirit's departure from the body takes place in stages and is not complete until the community gathers to insure the proper release of the two remaining parts of the soul (the first part of the soul having departed upon physical death). The ceremony also insures the continuance and flow of sacred ancestral knowledge from one generation of vodou practitioners to the next. Benoit's extensive use of purple and black refer to lwa Gede, the vodou deity of death. A deep purple sheet covers the dead woman, and the initiates wear purple and black. They are divided into four distinct groups, each acting out the predetermined roles that must occur for the Desounen to be successful: drummers, the ounsi (female initiates) dressed in their ritual color of white, laplas wearing yellow shirts (assistants to the oungan, or vodou priest), and the oungan. With the successful departure of the last part of her soul the deceased can now rest in peace. The community is also at peace knowing that they have successfully transferred the three components of her soul to their appropriate resting places: the ti bon anj (little good angel) to heaven, the gros bon anj (big good angel) to Ginen, the watery world under the earth where all things African go, and the mèt tèt (master of the head) into the head of a living family member.