Secret Language

Source catalog description

This description refers to material held by Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. Visual details below describe the original material.

A large framed artwork composed of two separate canvases. One canvas depicts a Haitian reinterpretation of the 1804 Napoleon Bonaparte portrait, Bonaparte, First Consul and the other canvas includes an abstract background with raised plaster symbols evocative of Haitian veves. The reinterpretation of Jean-Auguste-Dominque Ingres’ Napoleon portrait takes up the entire left-hand portion of the work. The portrait has a pink glittering border around its entirety. The artist has transformed the figure of Napoleon into a black man wearing a red mask that covers his entire face except his eyes and mouth. The man wears the same bright red first consul ensemble as the Ingres portrait. The figure’s left arm becomes a glittering red curvilinear form, spiraling at his feet. This imagery recalls veve drawings and Haitian sacred folk art. He has a long sword attached to the waistband on his left side.

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