Posts published in this section include:

  1. Blog posts with updates on Colonial Networks projects;
  2. Short essays that will feature on our Critical Counter-Map (currently under construction);
  3. Scholarly texts and other contributions from project participants.

Counter-Mapping Haitian History: An Artist’s Interview with Maksaens Denis

Meredith Martin (NYU) and Hannah Williams (Queen Mary University of London) Throughout 2025, we have had the honor and pleasure of working with the Haitian-born international digital and video artist, Maksaens Denis. Maksaens generously agreed to work with us to produce an animation and digital collage which will feature as the introduction and framing design …

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Louis Julien Clarchies, c. 1767–1815: A Transatlantic Musical Legacy

Julia I. Doe (Columbia University) Louis Julien Clarchies was a violinist, composer, and director of dance orchestras who achieved transatlantic fame in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.[1] Clarchies was born into slavery in Dutch colonial Curaçao, and first rose to prominence on the public stages of Saint-Domingue. Manumitted on the eve of the …

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Mapping Slavery in the Metropole: Launch of “Slaves in Paris: A Digital Mapping Project”

Meredith Martin (NYU) and Hannah Williams (QMUL) We are excited to announce the launch of Slaves in Paris: A Digital Mapping Project, a collaboration between historian Miranda Spieler and Colonial Networks. This new website aims to uncover and visualize the drastically overlooked histories of enslaved people within the heart of France’s capital in the eighteenth-century. …

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Fleuriau’s Skin

Oliver Wunsch (Boston College) In a pastel portrait by Jean-Baptiste Perronneau, an array of colors define the face of the French plantation owner Aimé-Benjamin Fleuriau (1709–1787) (Fig. 1). A shadow of bluish grays and earthen browns creeps across his right side. On the left, yellow striations give his jaw a warm glow. Touches of pink …

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The Academy of Drawing and Painting at Sans-Souci, 1816-17

Esther Chadwick (Courtauld Institute of Art) On November 18, 1816, King Henry Christophe (1767-1820) wrote from his palace in the postrevolutionary Kingdom of Hayti to Thomas Clarkson, the British abolitionist, to announce the presence of a new art school: “Mr. Evans, the teacher of drawing and painting, is established at Sans Souci, and his school …

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Wigs and Enslaved Wigmakers

Meredith Martin (New York University) In 1786, an enslaved man called Jean-François escaped from the Lilavois plantation, where this marker is located (Fig. 1). A reward was offered for his capture in the Saint-Domingue newspaper Affiches américaines, which regularly published advertisements for enslaved “runaways” (maroons). From this ad we learn, among other things, that Jean-François …

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The Port-au-Prince Playhouse

Julia Prest (University of St Andrews) The playhouse most closely associated with the town of Port-au-Prince during the colonial era was built in 1777 and inaugurated with a performance of Martini and Durosoy’s Henri IV, ou la Bataille d’Ivry on 1 January 1778. However, public theatre also existed in Port-au-Prince prior to this date. There …

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