Victor Anicet : Le pays-Martinique; ou, Le bleu de la Restitution

This essay addresses the aesthetics and politics of "restitution" in the works of Victor Anicet, a contemporary ceramist and painter from Martinique. Specifically, it investigates the mixed-media piece titled Restitution as a site of memory, restoration, reinvention, and healing. Anicet uses the tray, a multifunctional object, to inscribe the plantation labor, along with Taïno, Vodun, Congolese, and Berber symbols that reflect fragments of Martinican culture. The color blue, which covers all of the objects in the tray, unites the fragments and serves as an agent of dynamism and memory. The visual—and tactile—creations of Anicet complement the theories of Suzanne Césaire, Edouard Glissant, Monchoachi, and Derek Walcott.