"Pretty flowers in my country are for me Like pink butterflies That smile at the sun" - Judes-Roldes For several months, Quebec illustrator Rogé prepared a series of portraits of Haitian children.
"Pretty flowers in my country are for me
Like pink butterflies
That smile at the sun"
- Judes-Roldes
For several months, Quebec illustrator Rogé prepared a series of portraits of Haitian children. Students of Camp Perrin wrote the accompanying poems, which create, with flowing consistency, Haiti, my country. These teenaged poets use the Haitian landscape as their easel. The nature that envelops them is quite clearly their main subject. While misery often storms through Haiti in the form of earthquakes, cyclones, or floods, these young men and women see their surrounding nature as assurance for a joyful, confident future.
First published in French in 2010 as Haïti mon pays, which won several awards and nominations, including:
- Governor General Finalist 2011 (children's illustration category)
- Communication-Jeunesse Selection
- Lauréat Prix Saint Exupéry 2011 (French category)
- Lauréat Prix Applied Arts 2011 (illustrations category)
- Lauréat Prix Illustration Lux 2011 (book category)
- White Ravens Selection 2012
As a child, Rogé (Roger Girard) knew that he wanted to be an artist. After earning a degree in graphic design at Université Laval, he worked in advertising for five years before working in international cooperation in the Dominican Republic. While there, he created large murals in a local village. He returned to Montreal, changed by this experience, and decided to devote himself to illustration. Since then, his creations have illustrated ad campaigns, posters and magazines, but it is the world of children?s literature and its lack of constraints that has given him the freedom to create, and develop his own style. He was a GG finalist in 2002. Rogé lives in Montreal.
