On Writing – Personal reflections

Fair warning: this blog post is quite personal. Nothing profound, just my thoughts laid out without much filter. I’m writing with my head in the clouds – literally – slouched in seat 41H on my way to Montreal. It’s often in this position, strapped to a seat for hours, racing a thousand miles an hour above a white sea of clouds, body still, mind drifting, that the urge to write comes to me. Ah, writing. In these airborne conditions, the exercise feels natural, but I won’t lie to myself: writing is always a challenge.

My relationship with writing goes way back. Around age six or seven, a classmate in elementary school, Clyde, gave me a multicolored journal, mostly pink, during a gift exchange our teacher organized. At first, I was surprised that a boy had given me a present – even “by obligation” and even thought I knew it was most likely his mother’s careful choice. But what struck me most was the feeling I had when I held the notebook.  Slightly padded, textured to the touch; to the nose, that unforgettable chemical scent that, twenty years later, still lingers. I still have that notebook, tucked away in a cardboard box where all my other journals are stacked. If it weren’t for my parents, who are in the middle of a move right now, I would have added a picture of it here in this post.

I inherited my love for words from Gaston, my Haitian father – a legacy I only understood the value of around age 16. He had eyes only for two things when he was a student in a small Catholic primary school run by some rather dubious White brothers in Haiti: calligraphy and the Grand Robert dictionary. For a long time, I scribbled “dEaR dIaRy” in my pink kawaii notebooks, reflections for myself alone, nothing groundbreaking: daily recaps, endless lists of friends, dreams, future plans. But as I grew older, discovering the cathartic power of writing, I learned to let go – less description of my days, more reflection on my path, my anxieties, and the joys, big and small. My writing grew up with me. Like many who commit to it, writing for me is profoundly cathartic. My surroundings blur, my eyes burn into the page, and I can write for hours without realizing it. The pleasure of playing with words, making a sentence sing, putting fleeting thoughts onto paper.

Today I know that writing is my most reliable way of being in tune with myself, of expressing what my spoken words often can’t. From my father I inherited words, from my mother, the arts. At 11, she took me to Italy. My Grand Tour. I discovered Rome with one hand in my mother’s and the other gripping my Dan Brown novel – Angels & Demons, I remember –: a straight line leading me to study art history. Today, I am far from Roman baroque; my research focuses on African arts, the older the better. I suspect one of the reasons I am so drawn to art history is its inextricable bond with writing. Every step of it -whether describing the formal qualities of a work, unraveling its context, or situating it within broader narratives – requires words and some sort of writing skills. As history or any discipline that “narrate anything”, writing doesn’t just document art history; it shapes the way we perceive, remember, and transmit it. To study art is to write, and to write about art is to actively participate in its history.

Working on the book with Nil takes me back to those childhood moments and to those deep reflections on art history and its possibilities through writing. The exercise isn’t always easy: this time it’s not about writing down the small details of my life, but navigating between my own interpretation, Nil’s precious knowledge, and the demands – or expectations – of art history in terms of storytelling and analysis of Nil’s work. The progress is slow, I admit. With the new academic year coming, it’s harder and harder to find long stretches of concentrated writing. Still, my calls with Nil are moments I treasure. Each one lights a spark and gives me back the desire to return to the keyboard.

I’ll make sure to keep you updated on the writing process in three weeks.