‘Black Magic’? This Is What Miami’s Vodou Community Really Looks Like

“I got tired of the negative perception people had when it came down to my ancestors’ tradition.”

Photographer Woosler Delisfort first picked up a camera to document the changing landscape of his home, Little Haiti in Miami, without any training or artistic intent - just out of pure instinct.

“My community was changing. It was being gentrified, so I picked up a camera and began to document.”

Delisfort documented Little Haiti for years, before shifting his lens into what he calls “African science” - deeply spiritual beliefs with roots in West Africa. He grew close to Little Haiti’s Vodou community, and is now a Vodou practitioner.

He began to take pictures of the Vodou way of life, eager to dispel stigma and prejudice around the faith.

“I got tired of the negative perception people had when it came down to my ancestors’ tradition.”

There’s roughly half a million Haitians in South Florida, with the majority based in Miami. In Little Haiti, Creole language fills the streets and bright colourful houses line the streets. While many Haitians, including Delisfort, grew up Catholic, Vodou practitioners have been growing in numbers - and many practice both religions.

It shares roots with Cuban Lucumí / Santeria and other Afro-Diasporic religions across the the United States, Caribbean and Latin America, where guidance is sought through a number of spirits, who are communicated through and honoured by sacred objects, rituals and ceremonies.

Haitian Vodou is a religion of resistance. While integral into the spiritual strength that underpinned the Haitian revolution, it has faced oppression within Haiti itself. In the 20th century, Haiti’s Catholic leaders banned and sought to eradicate its practices within the country, and today Vodou communities continue to be targeted by outsiders.

Internationally, Vodou has been routinely and unjustly portrayed as Satanist black magic in western-centric pop culture that uphold colonial narratives, propagating ignorance around the religion that Delisfort strives to remedy through his work.

Vodou has been routinely and unjustly portrayed as Satanist black magic in western-centric pop culture that uphold colonial narratives

“There are two things I don’t show: people being mounted - which is a trance, connecting with spirit. I don’t show any form of animal sacrifice - offering the blood to the spirits,” says Delisfort. “Granted, those two things are important, but because we’ve been seeing those things for so long the only image we have of my, our, tradition.”

Instead, Delisfort chooses to focus on portraits of people laughing, coming together, sharing intimate moments as a community. “I show Black joy, what I’ve been seeing growing up, what I know my tradition is all about,” he says. “To get away from this white anthropologist gaze that has been holding my tradition hostage for so long, [to show] it’s more to that.”

“I show Black joy, what I’ve been seeing growing up, what I know my tradition is all about”

While Delisfort is a Vodou practitioner, his work has captured different faiths across Miami and west Africa. Last year, his exhibition SANCTUARY: Our Sacred Place at HistoryMiami Museum showed the diverse faiths of Miami’s Indigenous, African and Caribbean communities.

“People think of Miami, they think of South Beach, tech, very white Hispanic. When people came to my show, they thought [the photographs were] Africa, Haiti or Cuba - but I purposefully only showcased South Florida,” he said. “We have so many different traditions - my show just burst everyone’s bubble.”

His approach is to spend time with each community, before even taking his camera out. He looks to bear witness to sacredness, to understand it, as any precursor to photography. As a result, his intimate, emotional images draw out the common ground within each community, instead of framing the faiths in opposition to one another.

“They are sacred spaces, I got to have that trust. When you see my image, you see trust. Baring witness to what sacredness looks like to them - regardless of Islam, Muslims, Orthodox Ethiopian church, Catholic Church - all these Black and Brown communities I’ve been documenting,” he said.

While outsiders - documentarians, travellers, people seeking religious connection - may want to tap into Miami’s deeply spiritual communities, Delisfort advises to think carefully:

“My first question is why do you want to do it? And if you battle with that you may want to step back,” he explains.

“Especially if this house you're coming to doesn’t look like you, you’re coming into a space with a camera - why bring it? Just bear witness to what this space looks like. Have this spiritual family recognise you. Don’t take pictures, take, take, take. Do research, put the camera down.”

Reflecting on one of the most impacting moments he’s captured, Delisfort points to the Vodou image of the baptism (pictured above), showing a ceremony of the Priestess and mother presenting the child to the world - to nature, to the ancestors.

“My mentor taught me to allow the picture to take itself, allowing the moment to happen. I didn’t know they were going to put the child up to the sky, and the sunrise was just coming out. I legit just witnessed this beautiful moment, the mother behind the head Priestess, it caught me,” he said.

“People always see Vodou as something dark. It's mystic, it's unknown, it's unseen, it's somewhere, somewhere in the basement or somewhere in a cave. But we're out in the open, out in nature. This young child represents what Vodou is. That’s what Vodou is - that image.”

Woosler Delisfort’s studio at Bakehouse Art Complex is open to the public during Miami Art Week 2025 on Dec 4th. Find more information alongside other Miami Art Week events on our Trippin map.