<I>Secret Language</I>
date: label: Date
content: 1999
name: label: Created by
content: Paul Claude Gardère, Haitian American, 1944 - 2011
label: Subject of
content: Jean-Auguste-Dominque Ingres, French, 1780 - 1867
label: Subject of
content: Napoleon Bonaparte, French, 1769 - 1821
notes: label: Caption
content: In Secret Language, Paul Gardére incorporates a decoupaged photo reproduction of Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres’ Bonaparte, First Consul portrait. Ingres painted the Napoleon portrait in 1804, the year Haiti achieved independence and shortly after Napoleon abandoned his plans to reestablish his empire in the Americas. In this piece, Gardére replaces Napoleon’s ornate desk with a Haitian drum. Although the masked figure is pointing at the Haitian constitutional papers on the drum, at the time of their creation, the Haitian people could not read, resulting in the secret language of the founding documents. Gardére also includes various veve imagery through the piece in the long, red curvilinear form that takes the place of the figure’s arm, the plaster relief on the right side of the work, and the short crosses that are scattered throughout the piece. The dominant red color of the male figure may also reference Ogoun or Ogou, the warrior loa commonly tied to the start of the Haitian Revolution.
label: Description
content: A large framed artwork composed of two separate canvases. One canvas depicts a Haitian reinterpretation of the 1804 Napoleon Bonaparte portrait, Bonaparte, First Consul and the other canvas includes an abstract background with raised plaster symbols evocative of Haitian veves.
label: Description
content: The reinterpretation of Jean-Auguste-Dominque Ingres’ Napoleon portrait takes up the entire left-hand portion of the work. The portrait has a pink glittering border around its entirety. The artist has transformed the figure of Napoleon into a black man wearing a red mask that covers his entire face except his eyes and mouth. The man wears the same bright red first consul ensemble as the Ingres portrait. The figure’s left arm becomes a glittering red curvilinear form, spiraling at his feet. This imagery recalls veve drawings and Haitian sacred folk art. He has a long sword attached to the waistband on his left side. With his right hand, the man is pointing to constitutional documents which are sitting on a tall Haitian drum. The view from the window in the background shows crowded houses on a Haitian hillside. A steeple from a church juts up amongst the Haitian homes.
label: Description
content: The canvas on the right side has white plaster symbols adhered to the orange, purple, blue, red and brown painted background. The symbols are both rigid and curving, evocative of Haitian veves, however the symbols themselves are of the artist’s own creation. These symbols are raised off the canvas. A small green frame attached to the lower right quadrant of the canvas and surrounded in blue glitter contains a piece of paper with handwritten imagery and text. The paper includes a red gridded pattern with blue dots in the center. Handwritten script reading [--scriptions / -e earthly / --ath of / --uts , the s] is jotted on top of the red and blue gridded imagery.
label: Description
content: There are four glittering, equal-armed short crosses adhered to various portions of the entire piece. One is in the upper left quadrant, one close to the center, above the Haitian hillside imagery, one below the male figure’s feet, and a partial cross is adhered to the far-right side of the piece. These short crosses resemble veve imagery.
label: Description
content: The verso is signed in the upper right quadrant with: “Secret Language” / Paul C. Gardére / “51 x 66” 00.
place: label: Place depicted
content: Haiti, Caribbean, Latin America, North and Central America
label: Place depicted
content: Liège, France, Europe
topic: label: Topic
content: African American
label: Topic
content: African diaspora
label: Topic
content: Art
label: Topic
content: Colonialism
label: Topic
content: Decolonization
label: Topic
content: French colonialism
label: Topic
content: Law
label: Topic
content: Religion
label: Topic
content: Resistance
label: Topic
content: Self-liberation
label: Topic
content: Spirituality
setName: label: See more items in
content: National Museum of African American History and Culture Collection
label: Classification
content: Visual Arts
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, Gift of Catherine Anne Gardère in memory of Paul Claude Gardère
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of African American History and Culture
identifier: label: Object number
content: 2019.89
objectType: label: Type
content: multimedia works
objectRights: label: Restrictions & Rights
content: © Paul Gardère
label: Restrictions & Rights
content: Permission required for use. Proper usage is the responsibility of the user.
physicalDescription: label: Medium
content: acrylic, glitter, inorganic material and ink on paper on canvas
label: Dimensions
content: H x W x D: 49 9/16 × 67 7/8 × 4 9/16 in. (125.9 × 172.4 × 11.6 cm)