Louisiane st Fleurant
Biography
Louisiane Saint Fleurant was born on 11 September 1924, in Petit-Trou-de-Nippes, Haiti. She was not formally trained in art and began painting only in her late 40s.
In her fifties, Louisiane Saint Fleurant took a job as a cook for the Saint Soleil Group when she came to Soissons La Montagne. Here, she was discovered painting small pictures in her room by her employer, Maude Robbart. Along with Prospere Pierre-Louis, Dieuseul Paul, Denis Smith, and Levoy Exil, she formed the renowned Cinq Soleil (Five Suns) art movement. The Five Suns group formed out of the Saint Soleil movement, of which Saint Fleurant was the oldest and only female artist. In 1974, she joined Poisson Soleil, initiated by Tiga and Maude Guerdes Robart, in an inaugural exhibition at the Museum of Haitian Art. Saint Fleurant was originally introduced to the Saint Soleil art community as a peasant cook and after receiving some direction from Jean-Claude Garoute, she started her practice in painting and sculpture.
In 1965 she moved to Petion-Ville where she had a tiny shop of her own selling also her two sons, Ramphis and the Stivenson Magloire.