Like many other Haitian artists, Henry Dubreuil was trained at the Centre D’Art (Art Center) and the Foyer des Arts Plastiques (Center for Plastic Arts.) Both are critical to understand the development and history of Haitian Art. The Art Center was organized under the initiative of American painter Dewitt C. Peters. He had come to Haiti to teach English to Haitians, but was struck by the lack of art and art schools in the country. The idea of the Art Center was born and its first exhibit was in May 1944. The Center for Plastics Arts was created a few years later by a group of dissenting artists. They felt that the Art Center was too close to the USA and was pandering to the primitive art movement. They wanted to give those who had natural abilities the means to cultivate them through formal training. Henry Dubreuil was born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti in 1948 and began to paint at 17. His work was exhibited locally starting in 1968. As displayed in “Shoe Shine,” Henry Dubreuil is a realist who likes to paint people in their natural environment. We recognize the setting with vivid details such as the woman with the headscarf and we feel the melancholy through the postures and the doleful eyes.
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