The Republic of Haiti will be for the first time at the 54th Venice Biennale, one of the most relevant international art event in the world. The exhibition DEATH AND FERTILITY will present the works of three artists from Port-au-Prince, who are a part of Atis-Rezistans, the artistic collective from the Grand Rue neighbourhood. The group, started in the mid-nineties, is based in a popular neighbourhood in the Haitian capital. The Haitian pavilion will be dedicated to Gede, the family of spirits, which in the Vodou religion, embody both death and fertility.

The focus on Gede was a curatorial choice which intends to highlight the artists' meditation on the extremes of life and the elements in their work which allude to death and sexuality, reflecting the complexity of Vodou. The intersections, analogies, and the use of mirroring and double correspondences in the exhibition structure, will allow for a complex, yet engaging approach to understanding Gede.