Lapeyrouse cemetery is one of the oldest graveyards in Trinidad and Tobago and on this night, November the second, All Souls Day is observed. The cemetery is quite clean and a scent of incense adds a sweet palette to the air. Loved-ones light candles in remembrance to the dead together with a few shifty characters seeking the more pleasurable virtues of the living.
All Saints Day, Festum omnium sanctorum falls on November 1st, followed by All Souls' Day on November 2rd. The photomontage is of Lapeyrouse cemetery Trinidad, West Indies.
Sometimes you come across a moment that stirs your senses from a image that seems so important. And as you capture it, it is in the capturing that a memory is stirred that leads you to another image painted on canvas.
This is when a thought occurs that you have seen it before. It is the impact. It stops in you tracks and in its recognition is what makes art important. It is the moment of the experience that can last for a lifetime. It may be small or large but art is impacting.
This is the wall of Lapeyrouse cemetery in Port of Spain, Trinidad and a figure of a person is caught in a heavy down pore, protected by a light pink umbrella. What is unique about this photograph is that the likeness and composition has been captured before by a renown artist. The painting, Lapeyrouse Wall hangs within the walls of the Moma in New York.
Where I see my future - The tender-hearted post-card painter
Since his Artist residency in 2000, the Scottish painter, Peter Doig has made the island of Trinidad his home. Mr. Doig is a simple man who likes the pleasures of the ordinary which Trinidad and Tobago brings. Eating a Roti, going down the islands or just off to Las Cuevas to surf. But also, he is working by observing and studying compositions that would later be transformed into paintings.
Mr. Doig's paintings are quaint, leisurely and soothing to the eye. They are also fairly large. The pieces are uncluttered but rather complex at the sametime. The palette is cool and soft as if a polarizing filter is used to reduce the harshness of Trinidad's tropical glare. What we can be induced from his work, is that overlapping puzzle shapes conform to make up the composition. It is as if you were peeping through a refractive lens. In all, it is in the manner in which the subjects are portrayed which captures the gentleness of the painter's heart. Trinidad has brought a safe haven to a painter known internationally in Art circles. Mr. Doig is very aware of this status and is able to separate the aspects of the business, to his influence on local artists. To gravitate towards him perhaps may sprinkle a bit of luck. But he shows restrain over the pushy ones. Success has its drawbacks. But more importantly, it is the role in which Trinidad and Tobago will be indebted to, by his spectrum of the people, culture and landmarks that reflect every aspect of this idyllic paradise.
Where Peter Doig goes from here depends on the subject. He may simply run out of things to paint (Trinidad wise) and take to the sea, to explore caves, coves and reefs which the island of Tobago has to offer. Image above: The Lapeyrouse cemetery wall, Trinidad West Indies. Lapeyrouse Wall, oil on canvas, 200 x 250.cm, 2004. Collection of the MOMA, New York See Lapeyrouse cemetery
This is Laperose cemetery in Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago. And out of the blue, yellow and pink, the Familia Bermudez Scandella have decided to spruce up their mausoleum with an aesthetic that can only appeal to themselves as magnífico.
Masons have constructed a facade and outlined the columns with a colour called sexy pink. The inner vault compartments are painted with the colour ochre. The piazza is covered with an unusual symbol of a pink circle within a circle. But other than baroque frontispiece to the centre of the mausoleum, a planter's pot rests to the your upper right.
This is a fine example of the kitschness of Trinidad and Tobago and the manner in which some families respect their dead.- thebookmann
I surrender, I unconditionally surrender for my atrocities against mankind, and for a society that accepted it.
This day marks the victory of Europe over Germany in 1945. It is an ominous reminder that the intoxicating drug to have supreme power is short lived with its consequences outlasting the annals of time. The animosity against Germans still exists, not matter how apologetic and remorse they have been.
In the city of Hamburg, the Ohlsdorf cemetery is Europe's largest . Established in 1877, the grounds are also known as the Garden cemetery. These photographs were taken on a bleak day in 1994. the park is so large that you need a car to commute to end to end. - thebookmann
This is the chapel of the Necropolis cemetery, Toronto’s oldest graveyard. The grounds are located near the Beaches, East Queen Street, and the place is considered one of the most beautiful cemeteries in the city, but a little disturbing.There are rumored that many young souls linger there. These photographs are one of the earliest taken by thebookmann in 1988. The church window rosette and stain glass windows depict the Christian symbol of Christ and an angelic angel as a child. -thebookmann
Where I layth shall you remember me On the shallow incline near Saint Clair, off Yonge street, Toronto you can enter the main gates of Canada's most historic cemetery, Mount Pleasant. The 200 acre grounds is a labyrinth of walkways and valleys. These photographs were taken in 1992 on a cool fall evening. In the series of decay and rebirth, thebookmann was intrigued by the beauty of remembrance, and the ways traditions in death were placed. It was also to give a comparison, that these places all have a similarity behind them, if you step back and take the time to look. What is amusing at Mount Pleasant is that families have placed plastic flowers on some graves. This freshly cleaned grave shows the evidence behind and in between the scrubs.
At Mount Pleasant, the tombstones, obelisks are immaculate, not a stone is defaced. And for many Canadians who are doubtful about the beauty of their city, the cemetery speaks of a tranquil bliss. Many prominent Canadians such as prime minister William Lyon Mackenzie King and the pianist Glenn Gould are buried there. -thebookmann
These photographs were taken from cemeteries located throughout the islands of Trinidad and Tobago, West Indies. The attempt is to document the ways death is treated, marked and commemorated. What is disturbing is the lack of respect paid to the dead and the disrespect of the country’s past. In time these monuments will decay and disappear completely.
Port of Spain, Lapeyrouse cemetery
Over the last ten years thebookmanni has been interested in the themes of time and decay. He has traveled all over Trinidad and Tobago amassing photographs from cemeteries. It has been solitary and grimy work. It has wrought personal views on life and death, but also on traditions and rituals. He has asked aloud many times, what is happening with the preservation of our monuments? I have been fortunate to travel with him to a few places and seen first hand the sort of work involved. It takes a keen eye to not just take images of tombs, but of the personality behind the architecture. He lets us see the love and care of the living, as some family members leave photographs, write the family name in paint, leave plastic flowers, candles and incense.
Our cemeteries are historical documents. We can see areas that once were restricted to families of the highest classes. Areas where the Jews fleeing Nazi Germany are buried, the many orders of priest and nuns, new names of families who have come up in the world in a generation or two side by side with those who have gone down or remained in stasis.
Over darken skies, Port of Spain, a dilapidated Muslim mausoleum with its Arabic circular archway to the burial chamber and the copper covered dome which has been completely desecrated. And in death we rest side by side. Two mausoleums of Christian and Muslims families are opposite each other at the Laperose cemetery in Port of Spain, Trinidad, West Indies, a testament that in the end we all become part in earth.
Over darken skies, Port of Spain, a dilapidated Muslim mausoleum with its Arabic circular archway to the burial chamber and the copper covered dome which has been completely desecrated.
A place where all creeds lay, dust to dust, sided by side An epitaph of Berta and Isidor Marx at the Bet Olam Jewish section of the Mucurapo Cemetery, Port of Spain, Trinidad, West Indies
In 2006, Trinidad and Tobago celebrates two hundred years of the Chinese arrival
On the small island of Trinidad, West Indies, in the district of Woodbrook, Port of Spain, Jews, Christians and Muslims are entombed together in a Cemetery established since 1926. At Mucurapo, towards the north-east side of the cemetery, there is a large section allocated to the German Jews and the Chinese indenture migrants whose circumstances brought to Trinidad and Tobago, and to their final resting place.
Rates for every kind of burial at Mucurapo Cemetery: Muslims graves; $1035.00 dollars Oversized, (over 25 years), $1074.00 dollars, 6ft grave regular (over 25), $480.00 dollars, Vault, $115.00 dollars and no refund of $75.00 dollars if any obstacles are encountered during the excavation. .................................................................................................................. Obstacles may mean coffin
The devil's pack - Even the dead need burglar proofing Newspapers used to block in the sunlight, a comic strip to the right of the window frame.
Like many mausoleums in Laperose cemetery, vagrants have vandalized any crypt they can break into. What they leave behind is turmoil by the families who are helpless to restore these mausoleums to the state they once were. The burglar proofing seems not to work for the devil's idle hand, Trinidad, West Indies.
An ornate fortified mausoleum with arched burglar proofing and protected by a decorative wrought iron fence But one inhabitant has decided to make this mausoleum his home, unfurnished. It looks like a work of Art by default with stacks of spherical crumbled newsprint placed neatly against the forward buttress, and cobalt interior adds charm to the place aesthetically. As contemporary art continues to focus on the mundane and of death, here is opportunity to see a work in progress, once you have courage to enter the gates of Laperose.
................................................................................................................ Terms and meanings
Devil's idle hand - To be preoccupied with a activity which is destructive by any means
Views expressed on thebookmann are not affiliated with any Art Organizations and an “Art Review” may be open to interpretation as it is an observation at face value.
Amendments to such articles if misleading or with grammatical errors shall be corrected accordingly.
Richard Bolai lives and works from Trinidad, West Indies. He is a bookbinder,Graphic designer and the author of thebookmann, which from 2004, has written and photographed independently aspects of Trinidad and Tobago's art culture.
In 2008, he began a series of self studies called Feinin which incorporated digital superpositions of artists who have left a mark in art history by using the internet as the core of reference. He also produced parodies relating to anthropological studies of Trinidad and Tobago, for example, folklore or observations of the society via class and stereotypes
The work then expanded by actually creating dimensional replicas, capturing a map over the subjects to explore the underling subconscious in the form of art. This aided the ability to analyze art by producing art parodies to understand the meaning behind it. No money was spent or assistance in producing these compositions from common items found in his home, a chair, a mirror, or old tyre.
