The priest, Jean-Daniel Lafontant, had come from Haiti to help reopen the House of World Cultures, Berlin’s distinguished but dowdy center for non-European arts and ideas. The House — or H.K.W., as everyone calls it, using its German initials — is an unwieldy beast, an anachronism with promise. (The building was an American gift to West Berlin during the Cold War.) Founded in 1989 at the dawn of multiculturalism, and just months before the fall of the Berlin Wall, H.K.W. has yawed between programs that highlight foreignness — for instance one-country exhibitions, or “world” music and films — and more complex fare.

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Persons: Jean, Daniel Lafontant, Berlin’s, Papa Legba Locations: Berlin, Haiti, American, West Berlin