a1365: my teckkie son advised me to copy and paste (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

-0500 From: leonie hermantin <lhermantin@hotmail.com> To:

Published Miami Herald: Sunday, December 9, 2001
HELPING ARTISTS FIND SUCCESS FUELS COLLECTOR

BY ELISA TURNER, elisaturn@aol.com

Fresh white roses and fragrant dried rose petals have turned the Bal
Harbourhome of longtime art collector Mireille Chancy-Gonzalez and her
husband Tomás into a garden.
Flowers linger in glass vases and bowls almost everywhere you turn. But
itdoesn't take long for a visitor to see that the white roses pale next to
the lush, hot-house imagery in Chancy-Gonzalez's sequined Vodou flags or
paintings by Haitian artists Edouard Duval Carrié, Jasmin Joseph and André
Pierre.
Along one wall of the living room is a large painting by Joseph, in which
anthropomorphic animals frolic in a verdant, sunny grove. Look closer and
you'll see the animals include a gun-toting pig and pistol-packing green
frog, and that their surroundings are deceptive.

``This was from the time when the military was just taking over after the
departure of Baby Doc Duvalier,'' Chancy-Gonzalez explains. ``It's not
really a political painting, but it's a controversy as to who is wiser.''
In a Duval Carrié painting in the dining room, a mermaid preens among a
Technicolor riot of flowers and foliage where danger and exotic temptations
lurk. It's a scene that nods to the so-called nave tradition of self-taught
painting in Haiti, but also reflects the artist's adaptation of Haitian
Vodou lore to a disquieting contemporary context.
Called The Flight of the Goddess, it plays into a theme Duval Carrié
elaborated on during his solo show last season at the Miami Art Museum. Even
the spirits are leaving, he said then of his richly detailed installation of
painting and sculpture; vignettes of a country in such disarray that its
cultural icons appear to flee along with boatloads of refugees.
Joseph and Duval Carrié are two of several artists that Chancy-Gonzalez, who
owns the World Wide Foto photography supply stores in Miami, has collected
in depth. Their works share pride of place in her home with Yoruba masks and
other examples of West African tribal art - pieces that create both
counterpoints and parallels with the paintings.
The collection includes 300 Haitian Vodou flags of exquisite design and
portraits by artists working in Haiti, geometric steel constructions by
Miami-based artist Jean Claude Rigaud and Duval Carrié's sinuous bronze
sculptures that reinvent the Vodou pantheon.
One of the prime pleasures of collecting, Chancy-Gonzalez says, is following
artists' development and progression, and helping move their career forward
when possible.
``I believe that art is one of the resources left in Haiti right now, and it
should be shown,'' she says. But that's not her only motivation.
``I like the energy it brings me to be surrounded by art. It becomes part of
you,'' she says. ``Whatever I buy I have to have a connection with.''
Chancy-Gonzalez lived in Haiti until she was 10, then moved to France. Her
first husband was a Haitian diplomat, which whom she moved to Miami in 1969.
She soon developed a friendship with Miami sculptor Barbara Neijna, who
encouraged her to learn more about art.

INTEREST REINFORCED

Trips back to Haiti reinforced that interest, and Chancy-Gonzalez visited
studios of self-taught artists such as Joseph and Pierre, who continue to
work on the island. Pierre is particularly admired for his 1950s paintings
on calabash gourds, which feature tiny, jewel-like strokes of color
depicting spirits linked to water and fertility.
Their delicate, intricate lines bring to mind the lacy veve drawings that
Vodou priests trace on the floor of temples with powdery streams of corn
meal. Pierre's distinctive style is vividly executed in the recent painting
of the serpent spirit Danbala Wedo hanging in Chancy-Gonzalez's study, a
work she bought from the artist. Arching over this scene is a luminous
rainbow, a symbol of Danbala Wedo, who is associated with wisdom.

``He lives in a little shack outside of Port-au-Prince, owns all the
property around it and he lets people stay for free,'' she says. Collectors
aren't accorded such beneficent treatment, however.
``You need to pay in advance - $20,000 to $25,000 - and if you don't like
the painting when it's done, he says `well, you're the one who came to see
me.' It's unbelievable.''
Joseph and Pierre ``didn't go to school, but they are gifted,'' she says.
``They have an inner talent. If they have the potential, you need to
encourage them.''
So when Joseph flies to Miami, Chancy-Gonzalez picks him up at the airport
and drives him to Metrozoo, where he spends the day making sketches of
animals for future fantasy landscapes.
With Duval Carrié, Chancy-Gonzalez helped fund the creation of Migrations,
his tour-de-force piece at MAM. It's now a permanent loan and promised gift
to Iowa's Davenport Museum of Art, and will also be included in a traveling
exhibition of large-scale installations by the artist slated to open at the
Davenport or Miami Beach's Bass Museum of Art next year.

``A lot of people buy a painting and then that's it,'' she says. ``I sponsor
this kind of thing [because] I do believe in it.''
Such patronage is not uncommon among veteran collectors, and it has deep
historical roots.

ADMIRABLE SUPPORT
``The kind of support Mireille has provided is very comparable to the
history of art we all studied in our courses on Renaissance Italy, where
progressive individuals provided money for works to be completed,'' says
Steven Bradley, director until this past September at the Davenport, which
owns one of the most comprehensive collections of Haitian art in the United
States. ``Not everyone is willing to do that. This is patronage at its most
basic and admirable level.''

But Chancy-Gonzalez is also curious about the art of Africa and, most
recently, Indonesia and Oceania. Coffee tables and shelves in her living
room are loaded with books on the subject, which she purchased at a favorite
museum book store in Paris.
And though the books will probably stay on the shelves this month, the art
in the living room is about to change, though Chancy-Gonzalez is still
unsure which new work to bring out of storage.

``I always change the art for the holidays,'' she says. ``You feel you're
going through a new house. Since you can't change your furniture, you change
the walls and it brings a different ambience.''

Elisa Turner is The Herald's art critic.

PROFILES IN COLLECTING
*Name: Mireille Chancy Gonzalez.
*Profession: Owner, World Wide Foto.
*Focus: Primarily Haitian and African art.
*First purchase: Painting by Bernard Séjourné in 1971.
*Most recent purchase: New work by Miami-based artists Tomás Esson and
Edouard Duval Carrié.
*Tip: Develop your interests by going to a variety of exhibits and talking
with artists; consider making large purchases with installment payments.
Illustration: color photo: painting by Eduard Duval Carrié (a); photo:
Mireille Chancy-Gonzalez's Bal Harbour home (a)
Caption: Mireille Chancy-Gonzalez collects Haitian art. The painting and the
sculptures are by Eduoard Duval Carrié.

CHUCK FADELY/HERALD STAFF Mireille Chancy-Gonzalez's Bal Harbour home
overflows with Haitian and African art.


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