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Joseph Vincent
Ellie Lescot
Caleb Mentor
Samo
Caleb Mentor and his paintings
By Hansy Marcelin
Click here to view artist work
When Caleb
Mentor arrived in the United States in 2005, it was a hard
decision but a right one for the time, given the adverse condition and
the state of the country under which artists were forced to function. He
came to New York already an established artist whose talent has already
been recognized; his work has been much acclaimed by critics and sought
after by collectors for its rich versatile style of renditions. In the
weekend edition of the Nouveliste of November 20th, 2003, the
prominent daily newspaper of the Haitian capital, Martin Telemaque and
Jobnel Pierre, both recognized critics, raved him emphatically: “an
eclectic painter in the soul” for his rich talent and varied style very
difficult to harness and categorize. With a master’s dexterity, he
oscillates at ease from hyperrealism to expressionism, from abstract to
figurative leaving little room for criticism. Caleb Mentor is a “true
value “, exclaimed M. Télémaque. He prides
himself in belonging to no particular school of painting.
Caleb Mentor is a self-proclaimed “tout mounn
jwenn’’ artist, Creole for a painter for all. Indeed, his style places
him in the avant-garde of the post-modern era as a universal modern
painter capable of rendering any work to capture the admiration of all.
Born in November 1972 in Verrettes,
Haiti, Caleb is the son of the famed primitive painter
Louines Mentor. His early works were often signed Mentor III to
denote his lineage as the third of a family of painters. Growing up, his
early motivation was to surpass his brother McArthur Mentor, also a
painter now living in Paris. It did not take him too long. His autonomy
will be claimed soon after enrolling at the Ecole
Nationale des Arts (ENARTS), decision he took after dropping out
of the University Quisqueya where he majored in
Finance and Accounting. At ENARTS, under the tutelage of established
painters and art instructors like Frank Louissaint, Ralph Allen,
Dieudonne Cedor, and his art took a decisive and commanding turn; one
that required divorcing himself from his early influences to impose his
creativity. Greatness in arts dwells not in following the rule of
others, but rather in imposing your own. By the end of his first year at
ENARTS, Caleb began to make a name for himself, tracing his own destiny
often under the harshest conditions set by the rigors of balancing a
full time study program at the university, maintaining a family life,
and the sociopolitical state of his home country. They all instead
became the driving force of his artistic production. But, in the middle
of his sophomore year, he withdrew from school to pursue a professional
career as a full time painter.
His productions took the art market by surprise
and demands started to pour. An exhaustive list of exhibits ensued:
April 1996 in Washington D.C with Jean Gothier, December 1997 at Rose
Art Gallery. In June 1998, he contributed to the fresco at his alma
mater, as part of a tribute to the late comic and actor Theodore Baubrun,
better known under the pseudonym Languichate Debordus. Later the same
year, he traveled to Boston, Massachusetts to exhibit with Patrick Covin.
In December 1999 he was honored with an invitation to participate at the
festival Memoire Art & Culture organized by Reference Art and Promotion.
After a brief layover, he returned to the hotel Olofson in November 2001
as part of homage to the Galerie Brochette. Most recently in New York,
his painting was on exhibit for a month at the Queens Museum of Art, as
part of a month long celebration of the legacy of Jean Claude (Tiga)
Garoute.
Nowadays, Caleb has been devoting his time in
studio producing masterpiece after masterpiece one of which may be seen
here. In this painting entitled “Ecstasy” we are going to look at three
major features: subject, composition and content, and how those
fundamental elements are used in the execution of the work. The most
identifiable image viewers can describe in this painting is a woman,
partially in the nude, wearing a negligee letting one voluptuous breast
out and the other covered with a see-through sheer garment. Her arms
seem to be resting backward on an object she uses to lean on in
sensually provocative fashion. Her head, leaning backward, finishes in
spiraling bow; her mouth is sealed.
Click here to view artist work
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