Overview:
Brooklyn-based Haitian American placemaker Stephanie Pierre has opened Kafou, a Haitian art-inspired gallery in East Flatbush, featuring seven artists exploring themes of space, place, migration and identity. The gallery operates on a community-centered model, charging artists a reduced commission in exchange for their active involvement in managing and promoting their own work.
Kafou, a new gallery rooted in Haitian and Diaspora art, opened in East Flatbush, Brooklyn, last month and has already extended its inaugural exhibition. Haitian American community developer Stephanie Pierre founded the gallery, which hosted its opening reception on April 16, 2026. The event drew enough public interest to extend the debut show, “Space as Place,” through May 17.
Fellow artist Roy Clement inspired the gallery’s name when he casually referred to the space as kafou, a crossroads in Haitian Creole, after someone asked what it should be called.
The space aims to serve as exactly that — a crossroads and gathering place amid a rapidly changing Brooklyn that continues to shift power dynamics and displace families. When visitors enter, they immediately see a clear statement of the gallery’s purpose.
“A Space can only be measured — until it’s assigned a meaning. At that moment of conversion, an ordinary space becomes a Place: the thing that gives our shared reality definition and depth.”
The quote, mounted on the gallery wall, greeted visitors as they entered. Pierre reinforced that message by guiding attendees through the space and explaining the significance of each piece.
Featured artists included ceramic sculptor Bianca Allen; artivist Marie Medijne Antoine; interdisciplinary photographer Jordan Dubreuil; photographers Wilfrid Ignace, Richard Louissant and Claire Saintil; and political artist Zarita Zevallos.
The gallery encouraged active engagement, with several works commenting on the violence in Port-au-Prince and the displacement that has forced many people to migrate. In Zevallos’ “Manifestasyon,” a tire — commonly set on fire during protests to disrupt daily life — frames a sheet spilling outward, evoking the bags many Haitians use to pack belongings and flee to safety.
Zarita Zevallos’ installation “Manifestasyon”. Photo by Ruth Jean-Marie for the Haitian Times.
Their work spanned photography, acrylic painting and sculpture, offering perspectives on migration from Haiti and the experience of womanhood.
Bodeline “Bo” Dautruche, a Brooklyn native and recipient of Lakou Nou’s Artist Residency attended on the first public day.
“I really enjoyed the show because it speaks to the creativity of Blackness and Black people, and in this case specifically Haitian people,” she said. “How we can take anything, any situation, any space, and create something beautiful no matter the circumstance. When certain histories and realities try to write us out, we write ourselves every single time.”
Pierre sat down with The Haitian Times the following Saturday at her studio as a playlist of Black diaspora music — opening with Boukman Eksperyans and ending with Wyclef — played in the background.
A product of East Flatbush who attended Clara Barton High School just miles from where Kafou now stands, Pierre built her career in community development, not the art world. But when a teacher once asked her what she wanted to be, her answer was simple: “the exception to the rule.”
Opening Kafou, she says, feels like the fullest expression of that.
“I think my responsibility as a curator, gallery owner, and placemaker — it’s my responsibility to hold this place and myself as authentically as possible.”
Pierre did not originally plan to open a gallery. While taking yoga classes nearby, a friend asked her to scout the vacant room next door as a potential film location. The space stayed with her. Later, when the owners offered her the lease — with artwork from a previous tenant still hanging on the walls — Pierre accepted despite having no formal background in art or curation.
Her business model sets Kafou apart from the start. While most galleries take a 50 percent commission, Pierre charges 30 percent, on the condition that artists take on a share of the administrative and promotional work.
“I don’t have to take 50 percent from you, but I’m going to require more of you because you should be investing the time in moving your own work,” she said. “This will help build skills that you can take anywhere. The artists are going to leave with more than solely selling their work.”
Pierre also plans to partner with local businesses to give artists broader visibility and to host workshop days where artists can get structured feedback on their work, an extension of the community-building she has practiced throughout her career.
She is equally clear-eyed about the discipline that kind of work requires.
“If you do not take the time to vet your partners, to vet your opportunities, even the people putting you onto opportunities, it will hurt you,” she said. “I don’t want to make it super ‘businessy’ but there’s still an order to things.”
Pierre has embarked upon another moment of being “the exception to the rule”, creating new rules and inviting others to do the same.
