29689: Hermantin(News)Innovative Haitian painter Garoute (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: leonie hermantin <lhermantin@hotmail.com>

Innovative Haitian painter Garoute

By Candice Russell
Special to the Sun-Sentinel

December 17, 2006

Haitian-born artist and educator Jean Claude Garoute, known to the art world as 
"Tiga," died Thursday of liver cancer in a Fort Lauderdale hospice.

Before his death at age 71, four days after his birthday, Tiga hosted a steady 
stream of visitors to his bedside, including artists such as Patrick Gerald 
Wah, who traveled from New York to see him. A televised tribute aired on New 
York television last weekend and was seen by the ailing Tiga, friends said.

Another visitor was Levoy Exil, a painter in the Saint Soleil movement, known 
as the avant-garde of Haitian popular art. This movement was started by Tiga in 
1972 in Soisson la Montagne with five core artists: Exil, Prospere Pierre 
Louis, Louisiane Saint Fleurant, Dieuseul Paul and Denis Smith. Only Exil and 
Smith are still alive.

Saint Soleil paintings are characterized by explosive color, semi-abstract 
figures, doves as symbols of peace, and women as the source of creation. 
Connected to the dominant Haitian religion of Vodou, or Voodoo, as it often is 
spelled, Saint Soleil also connects to a larger sense of sacredness, according 
to the writing of Tiga, who based it on four key words -- dream, possession, 
creation and madness.

In visiting from his Thomasaint, Haiti, home, Exil expressed gratefulness to 
Tiga for giving him the freedom and education that changed his life.

"My relationship with Tiga is very spiritual," Exil said after visiting him in 
the hospice. "He gave me three brushes and told me to do anything I felt like 
doing. President (Rene) Preval has great regard for Tiga and inquired after his 
health. He sees him as an icon or master of Haitian art."

Carnival in Haiti next February will be dedicated to Tiga and the Saint Soleil 
movement. Exil and Smith are working on the floats for the parades in 
Port-au-Prince and Jacmel, as well as their costumes. Tiga's daughter Pascal 
Garoute will lead the parade.

French writer Andre Malraux became impressed with Saint Soleil during a 1976 
visit to Haiti and wrote in the book L'Intemporel about the movement as "the 
most striking and only controllable experiment in the magic world of painting 
in our century."

Haitian art collector Reynolds Rolles of Plantation said, "His Saint Soleil 
movement put Haitian art on the map internationally and made art lovers see 
differently things they never saw before."

Tiga's art was featured in a benefit for the ACTION Foundation, a Broward-based 
nonprofit organization promoting Creole art and culture, several years ago.

"The contribution of Tiga is immense not only at the level of visual art but at 
the level of culture," said Eric Boucicaut, the foundation's president. "He had 
a theory of artistic rotation, which entailed the use of many different media 
almost simultaneously. It worked with adults as well as young children and the 
mentally challenged who were his students."

Susan Karten, an American clothing designer and Boca Raton resident, studied 
art with Tiga years ago when she lived in Haiti.

"He was very intense in a quiet way," she said. "He only let us use three 
colors -- red, yellow and blue -- because he said from those you can make 
anything."

Funeral arrangements for Tiga are pending in Haiti.

Copyright © 2006, South Florida Sun-Sentinel

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