With Ryan Groendyk, Chery Jerry Reginald, Hughens Féquière, Joel Pierre and Laforèt Roselord. Photos by Lazaros. Installed on December 12th of 2013 at the Grand Rue, Port-au-Prince, as part of the 3rd Guetto Biennale of Haiti.
From Port-au-Prince, we traveled by bus to the city of Saint Mark, two hours north. There is a large farmer's market there, where we purchased two sacks - around 100 kilograms - of Haitian grown rice.
We transported it back to Port-au-Prince in a public bus. We then packaged the rice in smaller bags weighing around 1 kilogram each. Pink and blue echo the colors of the Haitian flag, bleached. At the courtyard of the E. Pluribus Unum Musée d’Art, we stacked the bags in a vertical pile.
After the 1994 coup d'état that ousted president Jean-Bertrand Aristide, Haiti drastically reduced its food import tariffs, undermining local agriculture. Soon cheap imports flooded the markets and local farmers turned to exports, creating a state of alienation and permanent food crisis. Haiti became dependent on imported goods from the Dominican Republic, the US and others. I saw that when visiting Haiti. Restaurants in Port-au-Prince offered two types of chicken on the menu: poul blan, or white chicken, which is imported from the US; and poul peyi, or country chicken, raised locally. Poul peyi was almost 2 times more expensive in every restaurant I went to. I then learned that the same happens with several staples of Haitian agriculture, such as mangoes, coffee, sugarcane and plantain.