30399: (news) Chamberlain: Haitian Heritage Museum (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

   By JENNIFER KAY

   MIAMI, May 12 (AP) -- The Haitian Heritage Museum is, for now, boxed in
antioxidant cardboard in a climate-controlled storage locker.
   It includes 20 vibrant paintings and pieces of hand-carved folk art that
will one day hang in a 25,000-square-foot building scheduled to break
ground in Miami's Little Haiti neighborhood later this year.
   Eveline Pierre and Serge Rodrigue, the museum's founders and only
full-time staff, hope to build a permanent collection of about 1,000 items
chronicling the Haitian Diaspora, especially in the United States, and the
traditions they brought to new homes.
   The two are of Haitian descent, having lived most of their lives in
south Florida. Pierre is in arts and entertainment management and Rodrigue
is in construction management. They worked together in 2003 on plans to
commemorate Haiti's Bicentennial in the Miami area the following year, and
both felt something was missing from the celebration.
   "There was no monumental symbol of Haitian history and culture, no
readily accessible public record or storehouse of the contributions of
Haitian people to society," Rodrigue said.
   The museum project developed from there.
   The two have largely sought new acquisitions through word of mouth, and
at speaking engagements and fundraisers. To date, they have raised about
$180,000 for the museum and haven't specified an ultimate fundraising goal.
   They estimate the value of the artwork they have already collected at
$25,000 to $30,000, they said. As they seek more artifacts, they find that
some issues get lost in migration -- efforts at proper preservation and
documentation proving authenticity among them.
   "A lot of the history of the country really lives with the inhabitants
of this country. They take it with them," Rodrigue said. "These things go
down through the generations. Grandmothers put it in a paper bag and,
because they know the value of these things, pass it down to their kids."
   The museum's nascent collection includes a wooden bust of a woman in
African dress with wire earrings; bright, Voodoo-themed paintings by Andre
Pierre, considered one of Haiti's greatest painters; a painted wooden
screen that was commissioned for a Miami department store window display in
the 1970s; and artwork painted on boards used in home construction that
Haitian artists work with when they couldn't afford canvases, Pierre said.
   Also promised, Pierre said, are pieces of a wooden freighter that ran
aground on Key Biscayne in 2002 with more than 200 Haitians aboard. The
museum also seeks books, film footage, stamps and military memorabilia.
   Briefly unpacking the artwork on a recent afternoon, Pierre and Rodrigue
recalled some of the items they wish they had -- letters written by Haitian
soldiers overthrowing their French colonial masters, and documents signed
by Toussaint L'Ouverture, one of the leaders of the slave rebellion that
led to Haiti's independence in 1804. The would-be donor broke contact when
asked to prove their authenticity.
   "I'm pretty sure they were authentic with my personal eye, with the
training I've gotten. They were truly deteriorating, but had the actual
signature that appeared to match other signatures on record," Pierre said.
   "In Haiti, there's been a lot of coups d'etat, a lot of buildings
ransacked and valuables stolen," she said. "We don't want to run into a
Spielberg situation. We want to make sure we start off on the right foot.
If you can't tell us or prove the authenticity of the item, we'd rather not
deal with that."
   The FBI recently disclosed that filmmaker Steven Spielberg had a stolen
Norman Rockwell painting in his collection. Spielberg had bought it from a
legitimate art dealer in 1989 without knowing it had been taken from a
gallery more than a decade earlier.
   By weeding out artifacts looted or traded on the black market during
Haiti's many changes of government, the Haitian Heritage Museum hopes to
avoid having to return items once their true histories become known.
   Some acquisitions will have to wait until the Haitian Heritage Museum
opens a secure building with more space. A historian has offered his
collection of Haitian coins for exhibit the founders plan to call "The
Riches of Haiti" in contrast to Haiti's image as the poorest nation in the
Western Hemisphere. Until then, "he's in Haiti. So's the stuff, because
it's very valuable," Rodrigue said.
   Marcia Zerivitz, chief curator and founding executive director of the
Jewish Museum of Florida in Miami Beach, said prospective artifacts should
not necessarily be rejected for lack of historical documentation.
   "I would take it anyway. History starts somewhere," she said. "The Jews
have had to move, after having been slaughtered and persecuted everywhere.
Whoever owns the item, the history starts with them."'
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   On the Net:
   Haitian Heritage Museum: http://www.haitianheritagemuseum.org