September 20, 2009

While the art market languishes along with the global economy, even the giants in the field are suffering. Recently the auction house Sotheby’s reported a shocking drop in revenues internationally, from $50 billion to $25 billion — a fifty per cent drop in one year. That includes everything from French Impressionist paintings to rock’n’roll memorabilia and Chinese jade.

In a creative way to get people’s attention, Aderson Exume is selling off a portion of his private collection of Haitian art in order to benefit six Haitian non-profit organizations (unspecified in his email to me). The event takes place on Saturday, September 26th from 1 to 4 p.m. at the Washington, D.C. home of author Dr. Michael Eric Dyson, often seen as a political commentator on television, and his wife Marcia Dyson. The entrance fee for this afternoon of Haitian art, cuisine and music is a pricey $250 per person, so the casual or unmonied art lover can’t even get in the door.

This is a high rollers’ art sale. Included among the artists are such impeccable names as Hector Hyppolite and Philome Obin, reportedly represented by two masterpieces each, Rigaud Benoit, Castera Bazile, and Wilson Bigaurd. The list of names to make a true collector salivate continues with Gerard Valcin, Marcel Wah, Georges Liautaud, Gabriel Leveque, Louverture Poisson, Alexander Gregoire, Pierre-Joseph Valcin, Gerard Paul (rare to find), La Fortune Felix and Jacques Richard Chery. There is even one work by Jean-Claude Legagneur, whose enormous canvases and modernist style are popular with wealthy Haitian expatriates.

I wish everyone at the event all the best and sincerely hope that truckloads of money are raised because Haiti needs help. For more information about the art to be sold at the show, please email Mr. Exume at exumefineart@aol.com.

–Candice Russell