Looking at the Spirits - Hieroglyphics and Minshall

Peter Minshall in his top hat to the Clico Exhibition, Port of Spain, Trinidad, 2006

For fans of Trinidad and Tobago's carnival icon, Peter Minshall, what you are really experiencing is an invitation into the inner workings of his mind, art and vision. This is a retrospective of carnival drawings and concepts including a series of intimate letters to his mother in tribute to Josephine Baker from 1971. Here is a glimpse where ideas materialize from crude or unrecognizable doodles to the most memorable carnival costumes to cross the Grand Stand at the Queen’s Park Savannah.



A series of schematic drawings on paper, post-it notes, and other ideas protected under an acrylic panel with the works simply pinned up with metal clips from a gallery that is apt for small drawings, but not larger as the space can be claustrophobia.

Looking at the Spirits, was first co-curated by Luis Camnitzer and Todd Gulick at The Drawing Center, New York, 2005, then finds itself in the walkway of the Clico's Art Gallery, Port of Spain, Sonja Dumas, the curator of the Gallery also included sketches from Minshall’s 2006 carnival production, The Sacred Heart.


One of over a hundred drawings including this arm from the King costume Mancrab for the band River produced in 1983.