Haiti.
Haiti
1980
Haitian comics are a small field that grew from press drawing and Creole-language publishing.
The Creole comic Mèt Larouzé, adapted from Jacques Roumain's novel Gouverneurs de la rosée, appeared in 1980, and the painter Philippe Dodard drew press cartoons for Le Nouvelliste from the late 1970s. The first local albums came in 2006 and 2007 with Ralph Penel Pierre's Les frères Lobo and Teddy Keser Mombrun's Alain Possible, a series Mombrun has kept going in regular albums.
9
6
1980
2000s
Artists from Haiti in the archive.
Comics from Haiti in the archive.
Mèt Larouzé, the earliest comic from Haiti in the archive.
The decade when the most new comics from Haiti began.
bande dessinée
Haiti in 4 chapters
A short history you can leaf through. Click a page, use the arrow keys, or press Turn the page to read on.
Haiti.
4 chapters
Chapter 1
1940
to 1979
A Haitian artist abroad
1940
to 1979
Chapter 01
A Haitian artist abroad
The earliest known Haitian comics artist, André LeBlanc, made his whole career outside the country. Born in Haiti in 1921 and raised in the United States, he assisted Will Eisner on The Spirit, worked on newspaper strips such as The Phantom and Rex Morgan, M.D., created the jungle girl Morena Flor in Brazil and drew The Picture Bible in 1979.
1978
to 2005
Chapter 02
Press drawing and Creole comics
In the late 1970s, under the Duvalier regime, the painter Philippe Dodard began drawing press cartoons for Le Nouvelliste, and in December 1980 one of his drawings filled the paper's front page. In January 1980 the paper Bon Nouvèl published Fanfan's Mèt Larouzé, a Creole comics version of Gouverneurs de la rosée. In 1998 Ralph Penel Pierre joined the publisher Éditions Henri Deschamps as an illustrator.
2006
to 2017
Chapter 03
The first albums
Les frères Lobo (2006) and Alain Possible et compagnie (2007) were the only two Haitian albums of those years. Mombrun's schoolboy prankster Alain Possible also ran weekly in Le Nouvelliste's magazine Ticket and returned in albums sold at the Livres en folie book fair. In 2011 the Fondation Bande Dessinée Haïtienne exhibited history comics at the Institut français, Chevelin Pierre founded his own imprint in 2012, and Mombrun started the World Cup caricature project Footikomik in 2014.
2018
to today
Chapter 04
New platforms
In 2018 The Nib published The Revolution That Gave Birth to Haiti by the historian Laurent Dubois and the Haitian artist Rocky Cotard, later printed in English and Creole. Chris Marvens launched the comics magazine Matthieu Mag in 2022 before his death in 2025, and in 2024 the Direction Nationale du Livre opened Haiti's first national contest for comics manuscripts.
The comics to know
- Mèt Larouzé1980 · comic stripFanfan. Creole comics adaptation of Jacques Roumain's Gouverneurs de la rosée.
- Les frères Lobo2006 · comic book seriesRalph Penel Pierre. Album about three street children in Port-au-Prince.
- Alain Possible et compagnie2007Teddy Keser Mombrun. First album of the long-running schoolboy humour series.
- The Revolution That Gave Birth to Haiti2018 · webcomicLaurent Dubois and Rocky Cotard. Comic on the Haitian Revolution for classrooms.
- Matthieu Mag2022 · comics magazineChris Marvens. Online magazine for Haitian comics.
The people to know
- André LeBlanc1921 to 1998Haitian-born artist of American and Brazilian comics.
- Philippe DodardBorn 1954Painter who drew press cartoons for Le Nouvelliste from the late 1970s.
- Teddy Keser MombrunLe Nouvelliste cartoonist and creator of Alain Possible.
- Ralph Penel PierreCreator of Les frères Lobo.
- Chevelin PierreDjasmy Chevelin PierreBorn 1974Artist of the graphic novel Bizango.
- Chris Marvens1995 to 2025Founder of Matthieu Mag.