Tucked in every crevice were business cards, Barely Legal, Car Craft or Vinyl Ninja. In Trinidad and Tobago, when we see something we like, we says to ourselves, I can do dat,
Concept cars? Two Datsun pickups, one Honda and few Korean models
The winner of the day, a Datsun pickup with no engine
Fabio concealed on the bonnet of a car
An airbrushed roll on roll off car which took three days to complete
A good contender for the competition
My Daddy is Lower Than Your Daddy. A Datsun pickup with its bay motorized by hydraulics.
At the Center of Excellence, Trinidad and Tobago, an automotive show on concepts cars draws a small crowd to a vast and empty space.
Dust off all those old 78s, 33s, 45s and take a closer look at the jacket, you may uncover a treasure.
“There was no event that had more impact on the global spread of calypso as the million selling album by Harry Belafonte. For about 6 months, the American entertainment industry was convinced that calypso would kill Rock and roll. Records were rushed out, dances were created, films released, and nightclubs changed their décor but then it seemed to be over before it.."
This retrospective worth seeing because as it gives an insight of how music indigenous to Trinidad and Tobago finds a place on a World stage
The Graphic Design of the age is the first thing that makes an impact when looking at the memorabilia from Ray Funk’s collection. The mimicry of the art of the times is clear, yet the fact that the subject is calypso, makes the viewing that more exciting. Advertising was not exactly in its infancy, but it was still a relatively young profession in the 40’s and 50’s.
What strikes me with the record albums, magazine advertisings and posters is the use of typography. Quite clearly the designer had to convey a sense of the music and tried to do so with hand drawn typography in some cases. The testament to the power of calypso may not be clear to the younger viewer gazing on Harry Belafonte’s face as he grins skywards with the strong brush script text stating, calypso with an exclamation point. Yet even today many people, particularly in America associate Trinidad and Tobago with Harry Belafonte’s Rum and Coconut water. - Adele
Co-curated by Ray Funk and Steve Stuempfle, the curator of the Historical Museum of Southern Florida, and Sonja Dumas, the curator of the Clico Gallery.
Saint Christopher Church restored, Carenage, Trinidad and Tobago
As this photograph of the Caribbean sea was taken, a small gathering of people, both elders to children were at the water's edge praying, unperturbed. This is a place known by the community as a drug port, but on this day, it was converted into a sacred ground.
At the Presidente Cinema, on the Eastern Main Road, Trinidad, the management have decided to slot Big Momma’s House 2 with Syriana. These are known as "Doubles". (This cinema is closed)
In Trinidad and Tobago movie goers conduct themselves in ways that can be only described by experience. From Balcony, House or Pit everyone is a movie critique. if a scene becomes too drawn out in the romantic area, a director from the audience would shout, Oh Gorm, Oh Gorm, fock she done nah man.
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Terms and meaning
Balcony - upper floor seats
House - Mid range seats on the main floor
Pit - Seat 5' from the screen
Oh Gorm -An exclamation of want
A movie ad from a newspaper clipping, 1956
Blessing Hair Luxury and Yes Tyres, Eastern main road, Trinidad West Indies
I saw a girl in Port-of-Spain whose hair was very nicely braided. I asked her who did it and she told me. So I decided to go to that person.I had been going to that person for a year when an incident happened at the salon that I could never have expected.I knew that two of the women did not get along well with each other. One of the women was very trendy and looked like one of America’s famous rappers and the other was overweight and the antithesis of the first one. I do not recall how the ‘beef’ began. I do know that it was very small and petty, but as petty things go, they can get under the skin no matter how big you may think you are. On the day in question, my hairdresser was doing my hair in long extended braids, and I was sitting down, expecting the eight hours to drag on. That was as much as I expected. Miss Large and in charge came over to my hairdresser, whom I shall call miss (Quiet reason) and said that she was aware that Miss Rapper was claiming that she, large and in charge had stolen her small curling iron. Ms. Large and in charge said that this was stupidness and that she knew that she always had a mark on her curling irons, so Miss Rapper was being a fool if she thought that she would stoop so low as to steal something so trifling, far less from her.About an hour later Miss Rapper came over to my hairdresser and softly relayed to her that she believed that Miss large and in charge had stolen her curling iron and that she could prove it. Miss Quiet reason said that she felt that they should either talk about it with each other or forget about it, because from time to time people did borrow each others stuff, although usually they would say, and that it must have been a misunderstanding.I thought that that went pretty well, and I settled back in my seat. Well, an hour passed and both women were squaring off about the curling iron on either side of me with Miss Quiet reason in the middle. It did not end their! Miss Large and in charge went for the curling iron to prove that it was indeed her property. She stated that that she always put a tiny scratch mark on her property. Much to my shock and complete disbelief, Miss Rapper who had earlier agreed that she was God fearing and above pettiness and would let it go, decided then and there to grab the curling iron and a tussle ensued.
Curling iron tussle
Now can you imagine one woman at least two hundred pounds and another about one hundred and thirty pounds fighting over a curling iron. What made matters worse was that Miss Rapper, Miss God fearing, above pettiness, began to curse in the foulest language I have ever had the misfortune to hear from a woman. I actually had to intervene and say that this was a place of work and that their behavior was unprofessional. This actually prompted Miss large and in charge to develop ‘shame.’ As she made it very clear to me that she did not want me to lose respect for her. By then Miss Rapper had stormed out of the salon, having sworn up and down that she was above everyone and everything in the place. In all of my years of going to get my hair done I haven ever experienced anything like that, nor do I hope to ever experience it again. Needless to say, both women ended up leaving the salon.
PS: When I went back several weeks later, after Miss Quiet reason called me and apologized and asked me to come back, it turned out that Miss Rapper came back to the salon the next day and admitted that she had made a mistake and that the curling iron was not hers after all.- Adele
A public scupture of C.E.P.E.P at Santa Cruz, Trinidad,
Abbreviated (CEPEP) Community Environmental Protection and Enhancement Programme, These public servants can be distinguished by their overalls, backpacks, grass trimmers, cutlasses, cell phones, hairstyles and orange water pails. They are the people who keep Trinidad and Tobago's streets clean.
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A Cepep worker to another: Ah force she stiff out meh cacahole
Terms and meaning
Cacahole - Anus
Jenannlyds - Shop till you drop, Eastern main road, Trinidad
Here comes another strangely compelling window display and signage. The name of the store is difficult to read because the sign painter assumed that double and tripling the colour around thet ext would make it ’bigger’ and more noticeable. The store boasts fashionable shoes, clothing, cosmetics and accessories and for some reason very roomy panties that they go out of their way to display in wirehoops, just so that the passer by can see just how much they support the fuller figured woman. Actually many stores in Port of Spain use wire frames to show that tube top dresses and flared Polyesterblend pants can stretch to unimagined widths. Topped only by the equally wide bodied ladies one can see around the country in lime green trousers with matching bag and shoes, sometimes a bit of the colour also streaked into hair resembling a Pineapple at its freshest.
Panty World
These women have high self-esteem and show it. They even go as far sometimes as powdering their décolletage with a smattering of powder. I’ve been told that this signifies having bathed recently andjust gotten dressed. When open this store sells even more than the sign boasts and has been there for as long as I canremember on Barataria Main Road, slowly becoming athing of the past, or maybe not necessarily so, as the panties suggest. - Adele
The Sphinx at Lavenitille, Trinidad
Jamaican imagery is so common that everybody of a certain age has something in yellow, red and green. It is everywhere. Yet this specimen of the Sphinx like doubling of a lion and a man at its centre is very sensitive and appealing. The artist shows a regard for the colours of the shed and for the most prominent spot to put his painting. The lack of text and the simplicity of the drawing, particularly the use of black that defines the man’s hair that also looks like a mountain when you look at the image as a whole makes it more interesting because it is not as straight forward as it may have seemed at first. On further investigation the hair on the right and on the left of the lions are deliberately different. This purposefulness also enhances the work. The red mouths of the lions and their bared teeth tell us that the artist is using imagination, especially for the paws of the lion. There is difficulty in deciding what to do with the profile of the lions, and they look like cartoon people and less like actual lions. But overall the painting is one of the more memorable that I have seen in some time. See and a painting of Hail Salessie and thebookmann header. - Adele
Bob Marley and Ethiopia, Trinidad and Tobago
A star onto an eclipse
Embah's Midnight Robber sculpture at CCA7, Trinidad in November 2004
The Art magazine, Artforum asked a group of International Artists, which exhibitions were the very best for 2005? “Embah, if only the eyes can speak…Meditation is his key, and to see these paintings is to look through the keyhole of the door in the creative process,” were the remarks by Chris Ofili. The British painter resides in Trinidad and is quite supportive of the eccentric sculptor. Embah, a self taught artist and former bookbinder has the knack for the kitsch, his decorative sculptures are distinctly Trinidadian, and composes mainly of his inner passion, West Indian cricket.
Above: The Midnight Robber, a noted carnival character to this Caribbean island.
I did one of the soucouyant in flight too, but someone came and bought that one and took it away
A detail of Samuel Waldron's Soucouyant - Folklore from Trinidad and Tobago
Samuel Waldron is one of the unsung artist represented in Trinidad and Tobago. He has been working with concrete since a child and knows the material quite intimately. From his home in Point Fortin, South Trinidad, his process of creating these life sized concrete sculptures begins with wire cages which are bathed in water, then a thin solution of concrete is added.
The sculptor works the mold by hand and with handmade tools made specifically for this process. As the mixture begins to harden and even though his eye sight is failing, he manages to build every gesture and detail. His noble or cultural figures reflect the quirkiness of Trinidad and Tobago. There is a striptease dancer, the dogs mating, African drummers, Stick fighters and images that represent Hinduism in what he calls his personal Museum set up in his yard.
Alexandra Daisy Voisin Parang Queen of Trinidad and Tobago cast in concrete
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Soucouyant - A human who transforms at night into a fiery ball and takes your soul if ever you see it
The former NP Gas Station on Wrightson Road, Port of Spain
This is the end of Saint Christopher Taxi Co-operative gas station which had an unusual pentagon platform and roof. The unique NP gas station is one of the many original NP stations that are being demolished and replaced by a modernized quickshop franchise.
Joining with such wonders as the kaleidoscope Millennium Wheel and Hooped blue and white Eiffel Tower, is the spanking new Soca Warriors Cinderella Rapunzel Tower decked in red, black and white, the national colours of Trinidad and Tobago
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The St. Vincent Jetty Lighthouse was built from the latter part of the nineteenth century and the beckon could be seen as far as ten miles.The leaning lighthouse has been given a few coats of paint and the sponsors have made it their point to paint their logo on the monument.
Termite not welcome
A building treated for termites in Port of Spain, Trinidad, but could be a public art work, 2006
This site specific peice is called, Fumigation, and it is made from sheets of nylon material which cascades from the roof, and completely wraps around this building. The burgundy and orange striped polypropylene canapé is secured by sand weights. What is interesting with this work is that it has the canny resemblance to the Wrapped Reichstag by Christo and Jeanne-Claude. But we all know this is just the covering to fumigate a termite infestation.
In December, Adele Todd at gallery Soft Box
Right off the bat it is important to note that by no means did any of us go to all the shows in the last year. So to some it may seem unfair to do a summing up. Yet in many respects one can sum up the year without going to everything, simply because so many shows are a great deal alike. The reason to sum up the year has to do with trying to pin down what artists in Trinidad and Tobago are saying in their work today and what they may be saying for the future. One of the controversial moments of 2005 came when the artist Willie Chen wrote about Harold Herminez. He was so incensed by what he saw that that warranted a trip to San Fernando.
Harold Herminez - a bullet for
Artists off the beaten track like Wendy Nanan and Tessa Alexander did work based on India. Wendy Nanan focused on meditation and Tessa Alexander had visited India and her works focus was on her experiences. Some old stalwarts like LeRoy Clarke, Neal Massy and Karen Sylvester did not disappoint their public with much of the same sort of fair that has marked their long careers. However in the instance of Massy and Sylvester it seemed clear to me that they were trying to push past some of their tried, tested and proven techniques.
Art in Trinidad and Tobago is largely one of safe, traditional buying styles, featuring such works as pastoral scenes, flowers and birds, market, mountain and river scenes. Occasionally we will also see a venture into painting the national instrument. But 2005 had some interesting moments worthy of noting, like the exhibition of five jewellers works, Barbra Jardine, Rachel Ross, Jasmine Girvan, Janice Derrick and Sarah May Marshall, something that has rarely been seen and very long overdue.
Ananci”, Pendant Ornament. sterling silver, 18carat gold, snail shell, carved bone, pink tourmaline, garnet
Fire & Flux Exhibition at the National Museum
There was also work seen at a new place called Soft Box. Soft Box focuses on alternative work and that is very important. There are many modes of expression and everyone should be able to see many types of works. The visual spectrum must be expanded and more and more artists need to be able to explore a range of works. It is not enough to do work that the public expects, but work that they not only do not expect, work that can engage them.
Trinidad and Tobago has lost its idyllic innocence and artists have a great responsibility to themselves and their space and without some sort of assessment of what is going on in art, we are relegated to constant re-invention.
Adele Todd
thebookmann
Art Trinidad Adele Todd Richard Bolai thebookmann
The Forbidden City, Beijing, 2005
It is an honor and a pleasure to be invited to a biennale. For many in the art world, the argument has been made that there are too many of them. But for artists who take their work very seriously, it is an opportunity to see what is going on in the field. The range of works that I was exposed to with my visit to China was at some points quite dizzying. There was definitely an overload of visual stimulus. What struck me most was the appreciation for art. The delegates of the biennale were encouraged to see the art practice of the very young, the very old and all the in between. You could not deny the towering history of the country. I kept feeling that all I could do was take everything in, not process it right away, and indeed, that was the case. There is a sense that what you experience is so much larger than one’s capacity to understand the depth of the place. My country could fit into China’s a million times! What was also always clear was the quality of what I saw. No matter what kind of work it was, sculpture or Abstraction, everything was of the highest quality possible. As artists, we were very aware of wanting to see the real China, despite all of the chaperoning that went on, and one or two people had been to China before and were able to tell us of their experiences in other cities. Naturally, going to Tiananmen Square was extremely emotional, even to write it now, makes me feel it. Who could forget the lone, brave man with the flower before the tanks!
Queen of the jungle at the Second Beijing Art Biennale, 2005
Anselm Keifer was the heavyweight of the show, along with Sandro Chia. No surprise there. But there was also a lot of exciting work to see from people whose names I have kept with me, some now good friends. What China taught me was balance, an awareness of everything happening alongside everything else. An unfathomably big place, where the people are no different in desire and intent than anywhere else. They desire the same things. They worry about their country moving to fast to change, yet change is everywhere. The old China is disappearing faster than you can blink. The people are resourceful. The young are impatient. The technology, seductive. The industrial boom, worrisome. China has to find answers faster than anywhere else where pollution is concerned. Yet, you feel the history, and you know that a super power is making itself. China is a Tiger. - Adele
Stephen Andrews' work at the InterAmericas Space, Caribbean Contemporary Art (CCA7), Trinidad, West Indies
The Canada Council Artist in Residence, Stephen Andrews applies a clever method of transferring images on to paper. At a distance, these drawings look like halftone screen prints. His overlays of red, cyan and yellow colour pencils are convincing enough to fool the viewer.
Colour drawings of car crashes
The ideas behind these drawings is to the show the death and its aftermath. In one of his drawings, a deer is stunned by the headlights of an approaching car. What happens next, we all know. These drawings is about the artist's fascination with its premised.
Highlighting the American war in Iraq by pencil rubbings
Nari Approo with a papier maché mask of an Imp
Nari Approo is a true carnival master of his craft; Robber Talk, Lucifer, Black Indian, Fancy Sailor, Jab Molassi and Imp. He says that he is one of the best dancers of dancing the mas in the history of Trinidad carnival. This gem of a man works mostly with wire bending and papier maché. But at venues leading up to carnival, his stamina show through as a prime masquerader. He can wail, chip and recite the Black Indian talk wearing a costume that can weigh over 40 pounds, and in tropical temperatures exceeding 30 degrees. Traditional mas players such as Nari are important to the history of Trinidad and Tobago in keeping the traditions of old time mas alive.
One of his heavy carnival costumes
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Terms and meaning
Traditional carnival characters to Trinidad and Tobago- Midnight Robber, Lucifer, Black Indian, Fancy Sailor, Jab Molassi and Imp
Dancing the mas - The way a masquerader should perform in his costume and that of its role
Old time mas - Traditional carnival from Trinidad and Tobago
Wail, Chip - A type of carnival dance
Thank you, Please come again
Bar art in the country, Trinidad
Enter one of the many Rum shops in Trinidad and Tobago and you’ll be entertained by the imagery that beautifies the place. Here is a painting of a sexy bather as part of the bar's decor. Take a closer look and you will notice that a mischievous patron has stuck a Stag beer label to her navel.
Centre of the Universe - Bookwork, 2006, 21ins x 12 ins x 9.5ins
Gray boards, resin on paper, oils Chinese tissue paper, inlay; Japanese washi thread.
Alexandria was established in 331 B.C. by Alexander the Great. For a thousand years Alexandria maintained its superiority and held its place as the apex of great thought and culture. Its library held treasures of knowledge and research, which became a valuable source of inspiration to both artists and writers whose works became models stimulating other intellectuals around the Mediterranean. The Artbook is part of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina 2nd Biennale for Artist's Book, Alexandrina, Egypt 2006
Covers: 8.5 x 8.5 ins resin on dyed paper, oils Pages 32: Computer generated Islamic patterns on paper, resin, oils.Japanese washi thread Spine: Goat skin
This project posed a challenged because the intention was to include a reading stand as part of bookwork. The structure had to be simple, collapsible and be reassembled without any difficulty.
Detail of the Artbook, Centre of the Universe, 2006
Tabanca - A panorama view of Port of Spain at the crest of the Lady Young road, Trinidad
This is a popular tourist site in Trinidad and Tobago. The road that take you there snakes around a hill called Lady Young. At the summit, there is the lookout which gives a panorama view of Port of Spain and San Fernando. At certain peak times, lovers come out to court and during the day, sweet vendors set up their tents to tantalize tourists with their variety of preserved fruit.
Preservatives at tourist prices
But beyond the guard rail, there is a reminder how callous we are about the environment. We just love to litter.
Here is an example what could be found on any given day:
!. Disposable food containers
2. Plastic bottles of Coca Cola
3. Boxes of KFC
4. Used condoms
5. Sweetie wrappers
5. Styrofoam lunch boxes and snack raps
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Terms and meaning.
Tabanca - Love sickness
Prancing Japanese in Mino, Japan with a Trinidad and Tobago twist
A washi carnival costume, Mino, Japan, 2005
Look closely at the image above. This is a proud moment for Trinidad and Tobago. Don’t mind the blur, what is important is that the camera has captured Japanese children wearing carnival costumes made from washi and they are also prancing to steelband music played by a Japanese pan player. The Trinidadian artist Marlon Griffith designed these costumes at the Mino Paper Village Artist Residency in 2005.
Artist in Residency is Japan’s key to promote their culture through the vision of international practicing Artists. The Mino Paper Village project since 1998 have invited artist to the city of Mino, a rural town in Japan’s Gifu prefecture historically known for its handmade paper washi.
Thebookmann's Washi Lantern, 2002
One of Mino’s annual festivals is the Washi Paper Lantern competition. Over 700 entries throughout Japan participate. The exhibition includes professional and non=professionals and draws a crowd of over 20 thousand people through the two narrow streets in the village of Mino.
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