In Extremis: Death and Life in 21st Century Haitian Art Exhibition

In Extremis: Death and Life in 21^st Century Haitian Art Exhibition

I went to the “The Extremis: Death and Life in 21^st Century Haitian Art” gallery. I looked closely at Pierrot Barra’s art work and design on “Cross with fork and spoon, 1995”. This artwork consist of many materials all clumped up together. The description writes that it is made up of wood, fabric, metal and plastic. It has a very wild and abstract background. What mainly struck out to me was the cross, fork and spoon. The cross represents God and because it looks as though the cross is holding onto the fork one end and the spoon on another, it looks like or represents a person getting ready for dinner. When I thought about relating the cross with a human, the concept of anthropomorphism came into mind. This is the “tendency to…see likenesses to living beings in inanimate things…” (Lecture 1). When I looked at these cross, I immediately thought about a person sitting at the dinner table, holding a fork and a spoon and ready to dig into their meal. I think Barra thought the same way on anthropomorphizing because the description writes “But he’s always there, waiting to dig into you with his fork” (Cross with fork and spoon, 1995).  Barra names the cross as a “he,” thus meaning that he is relating the cross a human like creature.

This work also reminds me of bricolages, which are “compositions designed by combing pre- existing designs. They express their creator’s identity and worldview” (Lecture 1). I think that the cross is famous for representing God, the very powerful being, the fork and spoon are eating utensils which can mean that they are tools for inflicting pain because humans use it to eat meat which kills animals. The arms and body parts on the artwork represent the dead because in general, if a body is not whole, it is either in pain or the person is dead. These objects are very familiar to everyone, and they are put together to send a message. This message is that if a person has sinned in their life, God will inflict pain on you when the sinner is dead by picking at him. Thus, these objects are combined to form a bricolage and it displays how Barra views sinners and the things that will happen to them in the afterlife.