Haiti has fielded two athletes for the Milan-Cortina Winter Games who would proudly wear Haitian symbols — although one less than intended after intervention by the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
The skiers will compete in uniforms designed by Italian-Haitian designer Stella Jean that originally featured an image of Toussaint Louverture, the former slave who led a revolution that created the world’s first black republic in 1804. The IOC ruled that the image violated Olympic rules barring political symbolism, requiring Jean to come up with a creative solution: painting over the nation’s founding father.
Even so, competing on the elite global stage for winter sports is a powerful message of resilience from a tropical nation that has weathered so much tragedy. Since the assassination of Haitian president Jovenel Moise in 2021, gangs have grown in power. They now control 90 percent of the capital, Port-au-Prince, and there has been a surge in rapes, killings and the recruitment of children by armed gangs.
Photo: AP
“Haiti’s presence at Winter Olympics is a symbol, is a statement, not a coincidence,” Haitian Ambassador to Italy Gandy Thomas said. “We may not be a winter country, but we are a nation that refuses to be confined by expectation... Absence is the most dangerous form of erasing.”
Jean took inspiration from a painting of Louverture astride a red horse by Haitian artist Edouard Duval-Carrie.
To resolve the IOC complaint, Jean engaged Italian artisans to paint out the imposing figure, leaving a nonetheless dramatic image of a charging red horse against a lush tropical background. On its back, “Haiti” is written against an azure sky.
“Rules are rules and must be respected, and that is what we have done,” Jean said. “But for us, it is important that this horse, his horse, the general’s horse, remains. For us, it remains the symbol of Haiti’s presence at the Olympics.”
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