November to be Haitian Culture Month in Medford

We will be celebrating Haitian culture and our new Haitian website on November 15, 2013. We very much hope you can join us that evening (details below).

During the whole month of November the paintings of William Descilien of Medford and Charlot Lucien of Norwood will be exhibited by Sharon Hepburn at Mystic Coffee Roasters, 30 Riverside Ave., Medford. Some of Descilien’s paintings will also be displayed in the windows of the Mystic Art Gallery on 114 Main Street. Many thanks to Mike Oliver who dreamed up this great triple pairing of events with its Haitian focus.

Artist biographies:

William Descilien is a graduate of Massachusetts College of Art where he also earned his Masters degree in Fine Art. He was a founding member of the group “Kalfou Lakay” which for fifteen years was a platform for many artists from different disciplines. Besides supporting the creativity of the artists, this group was vitally involved in the Haitian struggle for freedom from the Duvalier dictatorships. Descilien has exhibited widely, showing his paintings and photographs, and doing installations, especially in New England and New York. He sometimes works as a sculptor and he also uses “found objects.” Another one of his specialties is portraits. There is a deep spirituality running through much of his work.

Charlot Lucien is a Haitian storyteller, poet and visual art artist who resides in Norwood. He is also the founder and director of the Haitian Artists Assembly of Massachusetts. As a storyteller he has released, between 2001 and 2013, four CDs in Haitian Creole and French in the tradition of the great Haitian storytellers Maurice Sixto and Jean Claude Martineau, that have been well
received by critics. The CDs are entitled “Ti Oma”, “Ti Cyprien”, “Grann Dede” and “San bri, san kont”. As a poet, his work has been published in many print and online journals. His recent book of poetry “La tentation de l’autre rive” was just released by Trilingual Press in Cambridge, Mass. in 2013. Charlot Lucien frequently offers readings and conferences on Haiti in universities or cultural venues in New England, Canada, Haiti and France. His creative work and cultural activism have been widely covered in newspapers in Haiti and abroad.

We hope to see you on November 15 at the Hyatt Hotel in Medford Square. All through November you can drop in at Mystic Coffee Roasters and at the Mystic Art Gallery to see the paintings. Visit the website for “Coming to America” stories, folk tales in English and Creole, the singing of Rebecca Zama, Haitian lullabies, poems, paintings, and to find out which town in Haiti has the best avocados and which spawned the most revolutionaries.

http://wickedlocal.com/medford/haitian

We look forward to celebrating with you.

– Submitted by Nekita Lamour