The son of  a French psychiatrist, and, it is said, a Haitian mambo, Gourgue was born in Port-au-Prince and joined the Centre d'Art in 1947.  In the same year he painted his Miro-like Magic Table acquired by the Museum of Modern Art, New York.  In 1949 he won the gold medal at the Port-au-Prince Bicentennial exhibition and since then has exhibited widely.   

 

Gourgue is considered one of Haiti's leading painters.  During his years of residence in Spain he returned annually to Haiti whose landscape, folklore, and religion are the source of the images which embody his dar inner vision.  Technical sophistication makes the strange juxtapositions and spatial distortions in his nocturnal and black magic scenes appear all the more surrealistic.

 

His work is included in the permanent collections of the Musee d'Art Haitien du College Saint Pierre in Port-au-Prince, the Milwaukee Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Waterloo Museum of Art in Iowa, and the Figge Art Museum in Iowa.

 

Stebich, Ute.  A Haitian Celebration:  Art and Culture.  Milwaukee:  Milwaukee Art Museum, 1992