BRUCE WEBER: HAITI / LITTLE HAITI
2010-11-22In 2003, The Miami Herald published a magazine supplement of Bruce Weber’s photographs of Miami’s Haitian community. The photographs were Weber’s response to an unjust U.S. immigration system in which Haitian men, women and children were detained indefinitely unlike refugees from other countries who were typically released to family or friends while awaiting asylum hearings.The documentary film, The Agronomist, by Jonathan Demme, had been Weber’s call to arms. In it, Demme chronicled the life of Haiti’s most famous journalist, Jean Dominique, the founder of Radio Haiti Internationale, and his murder by unknown assailants in 2000. Incensed by the violence, political strife, and poverty depicted in the film, Weber asked Demme what he could do, and Demme suggested turning his attention to what was happening to Haitians in Miami, where Weber had a home. Compelled to tell the story of the struggle of Haitian immigrants, Weber immersed himself in the Haitian community, which he has continued to chronicle through the present.
Weber chose primarily to work in black-and-white for the project, but switched to color film when photographing Haitian Flag Day celebrations. Over the years he has built up a large archive of photographs of Haitian celebrations, church congregations, Little Haiti stores and boulevards, as well as portraits of individuals, groups, and families.
Opposite – Keren Love Francois, Miami, FL, 2010, Bruce Weber
Exhibition runs through to Februrary 13th, 2011
Museum of Contemporary Art, North Miami
Joan Lehman Building
770 NE 125th Street
North Miami
Florida
33161
