MIAMI, FL.- The Patricia & Phillip Frost Art Museum at FIU celebrates Haitian Heritage Month with an exhibition of works by Haitian artist Philippe Dodard, beginning with an opening reception on Wednesday, May 7, 2014, from 6-9 pm. The reception is free and open to the public.

The exhibition, Philippe Dodard: Tradition, runs from May 7 through June 29. Dodard’s work is unique and powerful, expressive and bold, and his use of ink, paint and metal is celebrated throughout Haiti’s artistic community. While his Haitian influences are clearly evident, he has stretched tradition and, in doing so, created a fresh Haitian sophistication that is uniquely his own, the very definition of “independence.”

Dodard is an internationally acclaimed artist who lives and creates from his home in Haiti. As one of the Caribbean’s leading contemporary artists, his success demonstrates the visionary power of Haitian visual art that has continued to command international attention. According to Dr. Carol Damian, Director & Chief Curator of the Frost Art Museum, Dodard’s art is as distinctive as it is engaging. “Too often, the art of Haiti is associated with naïve painters and a tourist market for colorful images of people and places that may belie the reality of their difficult existence. Dodard’s is different, and at the same time quite mainstream in its relationship to international trends of painterly expressionism and abstraction that place him within a contemporary milieu. Through his art, he reveals his ancestral heritage in contemporary terms for a new definition of culture and aesthetics that is intrinsically his own, yet belongs to a global world-view.”

Philippe Dodard: Tradition is curated by Michele Frisch. This exhibition is presented with the support of the Musée du Panthéon National Haïtien, and of the Miami-Dade County Tourist Development Council, the Miami-Dade County Department of Cultural Affairs and the Cultural Affairs Council, the Miami-Dade County Mayor and Board of County Commissioners.