The Anthology Film Archives presents an exciting series—STRUGGLE OF MEMORY: FORGETTING HAITI, REMEMBERING AYITI—from February 9 to February 29, 2024, with films by Arnold Antonin, Jac Avila & Vanyoska Gee, Miryam Charles, [the late] Maya Deren, Guetty Felin, Rassoul Labuchin, Raoul Peck, Michelange Quay, Michèle Stephenson, and more. The series includes the Arnold Antonin Program on February 11, see below. [The Anthology Film Archives are located at 32 Second Avenue, New York, New York.]
Arnold Antonin Program
NAIVE ART AND REPRESSION IN HAITI / ART NAÏF ET RÉPRESSION EN HAÏTI—1976, 45 min, 16mm-to-digital. In French and Haitian Creole with English subtitles.
Antonin’s fourth documentary historicizes and condemns the triple exploitation – commercial, political, and ideological – of what is known as “l’art naif” or “naïve art.” The style was identified and coveted by the American art market (with C.I.A. approval) to support a primitivized image of Haiti and Haitians. In addition to feeding a lucrative and exploitative artistic commerce at the mercy of American interests, “l’art naïf” was also weaponized by the Duvalier dictatorship for its own ends. Naïve Art and Repression in Haiti includes numerous interviews with artists. A comment by one of them is a chilling testimony: “I can’t make anything I want to. I’m a slave to an American capitalist who wants to satisfy his escape fantasies. If I made another type of painting, I wouldn’t be able to sell it.” Antonin’s documentary functions to both expose the collusions of art and power, while ultimately calling for a renewed and autonomous Haitian artistic and cultural production.
RADIO HAÏTI-INTER: LE DROIT À LA PAROLE—1981, 14 min, 16mm-to-digital. In French and Haitian Creole with English subtitles.
This film is a tribute to the collective struggle of journalists and writers against the censorship of the Duvalier regime. Made while many of them had to leave the island and Antonin himself was in exile in Venezuela, Radio Haïti-Inter recreates one of their typical independent radio broadcasts at a time when these were banned. The mixture of fact and fiction makes this something of a “docu-fiction”, with appearances by Lilianne Pierre-Paul, Compère Philo, Harold Isaac, Jackson Pierre-Paul, Vivianne Nicolas, Henry Alphonse, and Raymond Davius. Even at the heights of repression, this speculative experiment created an imaginary opening for subversive voices which the government never succeeded in fully silencing.
Total running time: ca. 65 min.
For more info about Arnold Antonin, visit www.arnoldantoninfilms.com and www.youtube.com/@arnoldantoninhaitifilms2554
For more information on the series & schedule, see http://anthologyfilmarchives.org/film_screenings/calendar?view=list&month=02&year=2024#showing-57171
The Anthology Film Archives presents an exciting series—STRUGGLE OF MEMORY: FORGETTING HAITI, REMEMBERING AYITI—from February 9 to February 29, 2024, with films by Arnold Antonin, Jac Avila & Vanyoska Gee, Miryam Charles, [the late] Maya Deren, Guetty Felin, Rassoul Labuchin, Raoul Peck, Michelange Quay, Michèle Stephenson, and more. The series includes the Arnold Antonin Program
