Axelle Liautaud's Haitian Accessories and Home Product - Profile
Introduction by Gail Bruce
Axelle Liautaud is a dear friend and artistic associate for over 30 years. She has been a strong advocate for Haitian artists and almost single-handedly help save Haiti’s historical art collection when their museum was destroyed in the earthquake of 2010, the fifth deadliest natural disaster in history with a death toll of over 316,000 people. Axelle helps local artists and craftspeople expose their incredible art to the world. HipSilver is honored to show some of the astonishing beadwork that she commissions artisans to create to help with their economic development.
Axelle is a designer of furniture, jewelry, fashion accessories, and ornaments for the home, working with artists and artisans to create unique items. She began visiting le Centre d’art and art galleries from a very young age, thereby gaining an introduction to art. For 30 years, she worked to promote Haitian art and crafts in Europe and the United States, founding a gallery in Paris and Montreal. She spent time at Andy Warhol’s 'Factory’ and became friends with Jeffrey Lew, one of the driving forces of the New York art world during the 1980s and 90s.
Together with Virgil Young, she took part in organizing a collection of sequin pictures, in collaboration with great American artists such as Keith Harring, Alison Saar, etc.… She has collaborated with many museums in preparing exhibitions of Haitian art, in particular, the Fowler Museum in Los Angeles for The Sacred Art Of Vodou and the Fross Museum in Miami for Lespri Endepandan. She has been the curator of exhibitions at the Museum of Naive Art in Paris (Halles St Pierre), for the Organization of American States (OAS) in Washington and the Bass Museum in Miami for the Allegories of Haïtian Art exhibition, where the film-maker Jonathan Demme’s collection was put on display.
Axelle Liautaud has been a member of Le Centre d’art’s Board of Directors since 1997 and became Acting President following the 2010 earthquake, the death of Francine Murat, and the collapse of the Center’s building. She has been the President of the new Board since 2015