“Opening up to the Caribbean is opening up to the world” said Martinican philosopher, poet and author Edouard Glissant (1928-2011).
“France is a Caribbean country. As such, the role of the French Embassy’s Cultural Services in the USA is to contribute to this global mindedness through our French Caribbean culture, through our local presence in Florida. As regional Caribbean hub, Miami was the perfect city to launch the Tout-Monde festival, to shed a new light on the quality and subtlety of Caribbean art, which has been relegated for too long to exotic landscapes”, says Bénédicte de Montlaur, Cultural Counselor of the French Embassy in the United States.
MIAMI, FLORIDA, 02-07-2018 – The Cultural Services of the French Embassy, in close partnership with the France Florida Foundation for the Arts, are launching the first edition of the Tout-Monde Festival, first Caribbean Contemporary Arts Festival, which will take place in Miami from March 1st to March 4th, 2018, at the beginning of Francophonie Month.
Under the patronage of Mrs. Christiane Taubira, Cultural Ambassador of the festival and former Minister of Justice of France, the Tout-Monde Festival will present contemporary artistic, cultural and intellectual practices of the greater insular, continental and diasporic Caribbean context, spanning across all fields: visual and performing arts including music, dance, theatre, film and literature.
Reflecting upon the spirit and philosophy of the "Tout-Monde” – a concept introduced by Édouard Glissant which explores the relation between territories, cultures and individuals with multiples roots in one “whole world” – the festival will aspire to connect artists, academics and institutions in Florida, the United States and the wider Caribbean region, and to reflect upon the meaning of the “Tout-Monde” today.
Under a French Caribbean leadership trio – composed of Vanessa Selk, director and founder of the festival and Cultural Attaché of the French Embassy, and Johanna Auguiac and Claire Tancons, two internationally renowned curators – the first edition of the festival will center on the theme of Hétéronomonde, confronting ideas of heteronomy and autonomy within the Tout-Monde. “Hétéronomonde sets forth and confronts ideas that are specific to the molding of Antillean identity within the wider Caribbean region and in a world where the process of belonging and relating are questioned everyday”, say Auguiac and Tancons.
This launch edition will focus on 17 artists and authors from the French Antilles – Guadeloupe, French Guyana and Martinique – invited to present their performances, their artwork, but also their films or their published works, in dialogue with 7 other Caribbean artists and authors from Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Haïti, Puerto-Rico, Trinidad and Tobago and Venezuela.
Among French artists are Josiane Antourel (Martinique), Lena Blou (Guadeloupe), Jean-François Boclé (Martinique), Yna Boulangé (Martinique), Robert Charlotte (Martinique), Julien Creuzet (Martinique), Ronald Cyrille (Guadeloupe), Kenny Dunkan (Guadeloupe), Black Kalagan (Martinique), Mathieu Kleyebe Abonnenc (French Guiana), Mirtho Linguet (French Guiana), Guillaume Lorin (Guadeloupe), Jacques Martial (Guadeloupe), Shirley Rufin (Martinique), Jacques Schwarz-Bart (Guadeloupe) and Kelly Sinnapah Mary (Guadeloupe). The other Caribbean artists are Loriel Beltran (Venezuela), Adler Guerrier (Haïti), Jilian Mayer (America/Cuba), Shirley Bruno (Haïti).
Their creative productions in each field will be shown over the course of four days in four emblematic cultural venues, representing each a different cultural heritage, community and neighborhood in Miami: the Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM), The Wolfsonian Museum–Florida International University, the Little Haiti Cultural Complex and Mana Contemporary/Wynwood.
Among the events, is the exclusive duo performance between musician/saxophonist Jacques Schwarz-Bart and choreographer/dancer Léna Blou during the opening ceremony at Pérez Art Museum Miami which will take place on Thursday, March 1st, 2018. On the following day, Kenny Dunkan will present a performance and a unique installation of his work within the permanent collection of The Wolfsonian Museum–FIU. On Saturday, March 3rd, 2018, at the Little Haiti Cultural Complex, Jacques Martial will, for the first time in Miami, perform his play on Aimé Césaire’s “Notebook of return to my native land”. On the same day, artist Jean-François Boclé, in residency at Fountainhead, will propose a performance echoing the Caribbean market of the Little Haiti Cultural Complex. On Sunday March 4th, a collective exhibition of contemporary art and photography, as well as a concluding round table with the artists, will offer a larger picture of this Hétéronomonde.
The academic and educational approach of the festival, confronting philosophical concepts with art and literature, represents a key aspect of the event. This facet of the program will be explored in several academic panels with renowned authors and professors such as Edwidge Danticat, Patrick Chamoiseau and Michael Dash during the inaugural conference on Glissant’s “Tout-Monde” at PAMM, and Yarimar Bonilla in conversation with the curators at the Little Haiti Cultural Complex.
In addition, a specific Tout-Monde Teens program with interactive workshops and performances is offered to the younger public and to students. Animation film director Guillaume Lorin will share the secrets behind the production of an upcoming animated Caribbean movie; an urban performance directed by Street Art for Mankind composed with muralist Ronald Cyrille, slammer Black Kalagan and a dancer will invite students to interact; The Wolfsonian library will reveal printed materials from its extensive Caribbean cruise line collections.
In addition, the Tout-Monde Festival will act as a regional platform for Caribbean Business and Tourism with special events and dedicated spaces for partners to meet and help develop economic and touristic exchanges between Florida and the Caribbean, with the aim of increasing Miami's role as a Caribbean hub for contemporary artists, academics, instructions and businesses, and of developing relations between the Caribbean region, Florida and the United States.
A private Closing Ceremony will take place in the presence of Sylvie Glissant, director of the Tout-Monde Institut in Paris and Edouard Glissant’s widow. During the ceremony, an international jury composed of academics, curators, and museum directors, will be chaired by American-Haitian artist Édouard Duval-Carrié, and reward one artist with the Tout-Monde Award, which offers an art residency program for one month at the Fountainhead Residency in Miami.
