LEVOY EXIL

(1944- )

This master of the Saint Soleil school has favorite subjects to portray - the sun, doves as symbols of peace, and women as the source of creation. Levoy Exil was said by Haitian art authority Selden Rodman to have kept “Haitian art from succumbing to the popular realism so greatly in demand since the triumphs of Rigaud Benoit and Wilson Bigaud in the forties.” His paintings seem to abhor even a centimeter of blank space. Sometimes using a pointillist technique of tiny dots, perhaps to suggest a galaxy of planets, Exil is personally apolitical and unconcerned with who’s the head of the government. He is content to live with his family in Soissons la Montagne, in the misty mountains far above Port-au-Prince, sing to his cherished voodoo gods and paint his visions beloved by the outside world. Among the numerous exhibitions to feature Exil’s work was “Haiti: Art Naif, Art Vaudou” at the Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais in Paris in 1988.