EXTRAORDINARY BEADED TAPESTRIES by HAITIAN ARTIST CONSTANT MYRLANDE: Fowler Museum, Los Angeles, CA

Art of Myrlande Constant (detail), Fowler Museum, Los Angeles, CA

Myrlande Constant is a Haitian textile artist whose works reflect the vibrancy of life in Haiti--from family celebrations to religious traditions. As you enter the gallery at the Fowler Museum atUCLA in Los Angeles where her works are currently exhibited, you are struck by the explosion of color. The tapestries literally shimmer on the walls. 

Myrlande Constant: The Work of Radiance, gallery at the Fowler Museum

Created with thousands of tiny beads that capture and reflect the light, it is almost impossible to convey their beauty and complexity in a still photo. Even a short video barely does them justice.

  

The exhibit, on view from March 26, 2023 to August 27, 2023, is a retrospective, showcasing examples of Myrlande Constant’s work from the time she was a young woman working in the factories of Haiti, to today when her work is collected in museums around the world. Early works are smaller with simpler designs, but her recent creations are complex scenes with dozens of images woven together on large pieces of fabric, resembling, at times, the scale of medieval tapestries.

"Elaborate narratives and compositions characterize her work and distinguish it from that of earlier drapo artists who focused more on pieces used in Vodou ceremonies. … In her drapo, Constant illustrates stories of healing, justice and celebration. She depicts her reality, in which everyday life coexists with the sacred and transcendent, and the intimate and monumental mingle fluidly."

Constant's textile designs originate in the Haitian tradition of beaded flags, or drapo, and include images from Haitian daily life and from Constant’s ancestral religion, Vodou. But the beading technique introduced by Constant allows for greater detail and scale than traditional drapo Vodou, which typically use sequins. Constant's tiny beads, sewed on one by one, create a rich three-dimensional surface..

Detail from Grande Alouba. Grande Alouba is a revered female elder Iwa, regal and accompanied by her attendants. The Iwa are deities who are deeply enmeshed in the lives of individuals and families--in their dreams, struggles, fate, temperament, as well as their power to heal and defend themselves.

The fighting cock is a symbol of Ogou, the warrior Iwa.

In all Constant's works, her name becomes part of the design--with the "n's" sometimes inverted.  Many are "framed" with elaborate borders.

Erzulie Dantor, 1995-2020. 

Constant spent 25 years working on her portrait of Erzulie Dantor. Erzulie Dantor is credited with launching the Haitian Revolution, which overthrew colonialism and abolished slavery, creating the first independent Black republic. She is revered as a symbol of Black working class motherhood.

Detail of Haiti, Tuesday, January 12, 2010.

Political and current events are also the subject of some of Constant's pieces. In the year after the catastrophic 2010 earthquake, Constant created this tapestry, filled with scenes she had witnessed in her own community.

The above photos are just samples of the dozens of works on display in the Fowler Museum exhibit. In addition to the textiles on the walls, a video interview of Constant Myrlande in her studio plays in an adjacent room, providing insight on her method and purpose. The exhibit at the Fowler ends August 27, 2023. If you cannot see it in person, you can read about it in the book Myrlande Constant: The Work of Radiance, Katherine Smith and Jerry Philogene, editors (Fowler Museum UCLA, 2023). She is a remarkable woman. This is the first U.S. museum exhibition devoted to the work of a Haitian femaile contemporary artist. 

Baron Vulgaire, Baron Ravage.