Haitian Artists Say Increased Tourism Will Boost Sales

Artists in Haiti say they are struggling to sell their work, which makes supporting their families difficult. Local artists are asking the government to invest in tourism so they can expand the market for their work, as Lynda Michel writes for The Global Press Institute. Here are some excerpts from her article. Follow the link below for the original report.

Louis Jean Gounod is a poet and artist living in Jérémie, a town in southwestern Haiti. He says he is struggling to make a living in the visual arts, an art form he has long had a passion for.

“Ever since I was 6 years old, I used to draw,” he says. “I used to take money from my mother to buy colored pencils.”

“We need tourists because it is the tourists who will buy our paintings.”

Louis Jean Gounod, artist

But his family couldn’t afford to provide him…