About the Artist
Georges Valris was born in1953, in Cavaillon, Haiti. Valris had worked as a basket-maker, in a clothing factory and as a stevedore on a cruise ship before a friend showed him the technique of sewing sequins used in drapo Vodou, vodou flags. He sold his first flag to Galerie Marassa in Port-au-Prince, and went on to successfully market his flags to galleries, collectors and tourists.
Unlike most traditional vodou flag artists, Valris is not a houngan (priest) and, as a devout Catholic, does not in fact profess to be a devotee of vodou. While he does not see any problem with depicting the traditional vodou deities in his flags, he also designs flags of angels, saints and other strictly Christian imagery. He has also been sought out by other established international artists such as Tina Girouard, Alison Saar, Nancy Josephson and Eduard Duval-Carrie to do collaborative works.
Valris’ work has been exhibited at the UCLA Fowler Museum of Cultural History, the American Visionary Art Museum in Baltimore, and the International Folk Art Market at the Museum of International Folk Art in Santa Fe, among other institutions. His work is published in Sequin Artists of Haiti (Girouard, 1994), Sacred Arts of Haitian Vodou (Cosentino, 1995), and Spirits in Sequins (Josephson,2007). (Above biography heavily indebted to Nancy Josephson’s Spirits in Sequins).
In April through July 2022 one of Valris' works "Erzulie La Flambeau" is on exhibit at the National Gallery of Art as part of the exhibition Afro-Atlantic Histories. This drapo was loaned to the National Gallery by Indigo Arts Gallery. The show has continued to other US venues: the Los Angeles County Museum of Art through September 10, 2023, and the Dallas Museum of Art from October 22nd, 2023 to February 11th, 2024.
