Fowler Talk: Vodou, Art, and Resilience
IN PERSON
Lilly Endowment Curator of Art and Religion Patrick A. Polk and Haitian art specialist and oungan (Vodou priest) Jean-Daniel Lafontant consider the Vodou kiosk installation in the Fowler’s Intersections gallery, tracing connections between art, religion, transformation, and resilience in Haitian Vodou traditions.
Jean-Daniel Lafontant is a distinguished oungan (Vodou priest) and a founding member of Temple Na-Ri-VéH in Haiti. He is also the founder of ANAE (1987), a prominent association based in New York City specializing in the cultural promotion of Haitian art influenced by Vodou. Additionally, he is a board member for Le Musée d’Art Haïtien and executive director of the Haitian Cultural Foundation.
Patrick A. Polk’s research interests encompass material religion and visual piety, faith and healing, popular devotion in North and Latin America, and African diasporic sacred arts. He has curated several Fowler exhibitions, including: The House Was Too Small: Yoruba Sacred Arts from Africa and Beyond; Botánica Los Angeles: Latino Popular Religious Art in the City of Angels; Sinful Saints and Saintly Sinners at the Margins of the Americas; and Axé Bahia: The Power of Art in an Afro-Brazilian Metropolis.
