Kanaval

‘Before Carnival, you never sleep, always dreaming of bringing pleasure, innovation and creation. ’– Fanel Saint-Helere & Frantz Denoujou (Flanbo Mardi Gras troupe)Leagues away from the sequinned, sanitised, corporate-sponsored carnivals found elsewhere in the Americas, the Madigra troupes of the Haitian port town of Jacmel enact and subvert myth, legends and the nation’s own histories, their improvisational costumes and surreal narratives a Vodou-charged blend of folk memory, political satire and personal revelation. Here the Zèl Maturin, satin-clad devils in papier-mâché masks, hinged wooden wings clapping on their backs, do battle against Sen Michèl Arkanj and his army of pastors; further on the Chaloska in their cows’-tooth-adorned masks transform the feared early twentieth-century police chief Charles Oscar Étienne into a metaphor for the corrupting nature of absolute power. At the crossroads the horned Lanse Kòd, their skin shining blacker than black with a mixture of cane syrup