Haitian-Canadian artist Manuel Mathieu has opened his first solo exhibition in France, at Galerie Poggi in Paris, where it runs until 23 December 2026. Titled 'Ayizan', the show brings together painting, ceramics, mosaic, photography and drawing, and draws on spirituality, memory and history rooted in the artist's Haitian heritage, set against the weight of European art history.

The title is the artist's own first name, shared with a spirit in Haitian Vodou regarded as the first mambo, or priestess, linked to initiation, sacred knowledge and the protection of marketplaces. Mathieu has said he wants visitors to invoke the spirit simply by speaking the show's name aloud, and that presenting this legacy in Paris carries particular force given the colonial history binding Haiti to France. Born in Port-au-Prince in the aftermath of the Duvalier dictatorship, he left Haiti for Montreal at nineteen and later completed an MFA at Goldsmiths in London.

Among the works on view is a large painting resembling a map of the sea, from which nine ceramic forms hang on wire, suggesting horns or tusks. Its title refers to a promise Christopher Columbus is said to have made to his crew, a pointed reference given what European arrival meant for the Caribbean's Indigenous peoples. Elsewhere, fractured ceramic fragments in salmon pink, cream, rust and deep blue form a dense composition, while another canvas swirls mauve, violet and fleshy pink around a barely visible blue eye and tongue.

The exhibition arrives in a busy year for the artist. In 2020 he became the first Haitian-Canadian artist to have work acquired by the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, and in 2026 he made his Venice Biennale debut with one of the most substantial contributions to 'In Minor Keys'. He has also begun working in fragrance, creating three scents built around Haitian vetiver, and is showing new paintings and drawings at Art Basel Paris alongside fellow Canadian artist Kapwani Kiwanga.