The National Gallery of Jamaica’s Last Sundays programme for August 28, 2016, will feature a musical performance by Jane Macgizmo and guided tours of the recently opened Kingston – Part 1: The City and Art exhibition.

Denieze Anderson, popularly known as Jane Macgizmo, is a recording artiste, songwriter, producer & designer. Jane’s artistic passion was instilled at the age of seven by her parents who encouraged her to take music and art classes. She studied film production at Northern Caribbean University and also became a designer & photographer, both of which have aided her music career. Her second release “Babylon” quickly became an anthem to her supporters, as it captures the enticing and defiant nature of Jane’s music. It was the music video for this song, set in lush green scenery high in the mountains, filmed, directed, and edited by Jane and Tricia Bent that truly brought the message of the song to life and it has been in regular rotation on BET SOUL. The record label Zincfence Records has also released a dubmix of “Babylon.” Jane’s inventive persona is what propels her works, without boundaries and across genres such as dubtronica, indie reggae, jazz and EDM. The fearless creative has a catalogue of exciting music, stimulating visuals, and confident messages in preparation for the world to experience.

Jane Macgizmo

Kingston – Part 1: The City and Art is the first instalment of a two-part exhibition series that explores the role of Kingston in the development of Jamaican art and, conversely, the role of art in the development of the city of Kingston. The present edition of Kingston features artists such as Isaac Mendez Belisario, Carl Abrahams, Hope Brooks, Edna Manley, Cecil Baugh, Kapo, Di-Andre Caprice Davis, Roy Reid, and Stanford Watson and the iconic Jamaican feature film The Harder They Come (1972, dir. Perry Henzell). The exhibition examines how Jamaica’s turbulent but culturally fertile capital city has generated many of the circumstances and opportunities that have propelled the development of Jamaican art over time, from the natural resources to the economic activities and institutions. It also explores how artists have been inspired in their work by the events, personalities and tales that have defined life in the city, starting with the 1692 destruction of Port Royal, which led to the establishment of the city. Kingston – Part 1: The City and Art was curated by National Gallery Assistant Curator Monique Barnett-Davidson and continues until October 30, 2016.

Carl Abrahams – The Destruction of Port Royal (1972), AD Scott Collection, NGJ

The National Gallery of Jamaica’s doors will be open from 11 am to 4 pm on Sunday, August 28, 2016 and the musical programme will start at 1:30 pm. As is customary, admission and guided tours will be free for the day, but contributions to the National Gallery’s donations box are always welcome. The National Gallery gift and coffee shops will also be open and proceeds from these ventures help to fund programmes such as Last Sundays and exhibitions such as Kingston.

The National Gallery of Jamaica is pleased to invite submissions for the juried section of upcoming Jamaica Biennial, which will now be held from February 26 to May 28, 2017 and will thus be the 2017 Jamaica Biennial.

The Jamaica Biennial, previously known as the National Biennial, is the National Gallery’s flagship biennial exhibition. Designed to encourage the development of art in Jamaica and its local and international exposure, the Jamaica Biennial includes works of art in all media and genres by a wide variety of artists who enter the exhibition through the jury system or by special invitation. The juried section is open to all artists resident in Jamaica and of immediate Jamaican descent, irrespective of residence. While thus mainly focused on the Jamaican and Jamaican Diaspora artists, the exhibition now also includes a select number of specially invited Caribbean and other international artists. The exhibition will be shown at the National Gallery of Jamaica in Kingston; National Gallery West in Montego Bay; and other venues to be announced.

The new deadline for submissions by juried artists is now Monday, December 12, 2016. Relevant documents can be downloaded here: the Biennial brochure 2017, and the Jamaica Biennial 2017 – entry form. Please email <info@natgalja.org.jm> or call (876) 922-1561 or -3 if you have any questions or need to discuss your submission.

Letters to the invited artists are being dispatched.

Electronic submissions should be sent to <info@natgalja.org.jm>, directly or, in case of large files, via a reliable file transfer service such as WeTransfer. Please use “2017 Jamaica Biennial” and the name of the artist in the subject header for all electronic submissions.

The National Gallery of Jamaica (NGJ) is pleased to announce the resumption of its child art programme, Saturday Art-Time, on Saturday September 10, 2016.

The programme, which has been active since September 2009, has been on hiatus since March 2015.  Having renewed grant funding, the NGJ’s Education Department is looking forward to presenting new workshop activities to participants alongside staple programme art-making offerings such as drawing, painting, assemblage and collage. With new offerings such as animation, the young participants of Saturday Art-Time will continue to be given opportunities to learn about Jamaican culture and history through the gallery’s permanent collection as well as its temporary exhibitions.

Geared towards participants aged 8 to 15 years old, Saturday Art-Time has been a popular part of the National Gallery of Jamaica’s programming for its younger patrons and has been favoured by participants from a variety of social backgrounds. The present workshop series will be held during the 2016-2017 school year, with the first semester ending on December 10, 2016. The programme will also be accompanied by a child art exhibition entitled Art’iT, which was was previously held in 2011 and 2013 and reflects the effectiveness of the workshops and the enthusiastic participation of the children. Through Art’iT, which will be held towards the end of the school year, the programmes child artists receive a public platform on which they can exhibit their art and contribute to the diversity of the Jamaican artistic community.

The workshops, funded by the Culture, Health, Arts, Sports and Education fund (CHASE), will be held every Saturday morning from 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. at the National Gallery of Jamaica. The workshops will continue to be free of cost, but space is limited so applicants are encouraged to register as soon as possible. Registration forms are available at the National Gallery. For more information, contact the National Gallery’s Education Department at 922-1561/3 (Lime landline) or 618-0654/5 (Digicel fixed line) or via e-mail at info@natgalja.org.jm.

Cecil Cooper at his studio in November 2015 (Donnette Ingrid Zacca photograph)

The National Gallery of Jamaica has received the sad news of the passing of the renowned Jamaican painter, singer, and art educator Cecil Harvey Cooper, CD, on the morning of September 15, 2016.

Cecil Cooper was born in the parish of Hanover, Jamaica, in 1946 and was one of the first graduates, in 1966, of the full-time diploma that had been introduced at the Jamaica School of Art under the directorship of Barrington Watson. He also lived in the USA, where he studied and obtained a BFA and, later, an MFA from the School of Visual Arts in New York City. Cecil Cooper in 1981 became the head of the painting department of his alma mater, the Jamaica School of Art, which is now part of the Edna Manley College. He continued in that position until his retirement in 2009 and has taught and mentored many noted younger artists, such as Omari Ra, Oneika Russell, Phillip Thomas and Ebony G. Patterson.

Cecil Cooper – Night Horse (1993, Collection: NGJ)

Cecil Cooper worked mainly in paint media, using gestural painting and drawing techniques, and his thematic preoccupation with the joys and anxieties of the human condition, and particularly the central roles of women in society, reflected a romantic temperament that was also evident in his musical work as a classical tenor. He exhibited regularly at the National Gallery of Jamaica, Harmony Hall, the Mutual Gallery and, most recently, Round Hill and the Olympia Art Gallery, and at overseas galleries such as the Savacou Gallery in New York City. His work is represented in many private, corporate and public collections, including the collection of the National Gallery of Jamaica.

Senator the Hon. Tom Tavares-Finson, the Chairman of the National Gallery of Jamaica’s Board of Management, paid tribute to Cecil Cooper “as one of the artists who had had charted the direction of Jamaican art in recent decades, through his outstanding artistic work and his distinguished service to institutions such as the National Gallery and the Edna Manley College.” Dr Veerle Poupeye, the National Gallery’s Executive Director, hailed Cecil Cooper as “an artist who was completely immersed in his art as a way of life, and a passionate art educator who challenged his students to be and do their best at all times.”

Cecil Cooper and Prime Minister Holness at the opening of his Milestone exhibition, Olympia Art Gallery, June 17, 2016 (Donnette Ingrid Zacca photograph)

Cecil Cooper had celebrated his 70^th birthday in June 2016, with a major exhibition of work from 1978 to 2016, titled Milestone: Cecil Cooper at 70, which was held at the Olympia Art Gallery. He had on September 6, 2016, received the Jamaican National Honour, the Order of Distinction, Commander Class, for his invaluable contribution to the arts. Earlier on, in 1993, he had also been awarded the Institute of Jamaica’s Bronze Musgrave Medal for his contribution to painting and art education. Cecil Cooper was a member of the National Gallery of Jamaica’s current Board of Management and had also previously served in this capacity.

The Board, Management and Staff of the National Gallery of Jamaica extend their sincere condolences to Cecil Cooper’s wife Rose, his children, other members of his family, and his many friends.

Cecil Cooper – untitled (2016)

The National Gallery of Jamaica’s Last Sundays programme for September 25, 2016, will feature a performance by the award-winning Quilt Performing Arts Company and guided tours of the Kingston – Part 1: The City and Art exhibition.

Kingston – Part 1: The City and Art examines how Jamaica’s turbulent capital city has generated many of the circumstances and opportunities that have propelled the development of Jamaican art, from the natural resources to the economic activities and institutions and the events, big and small, that have marked the city’s history. The exhibition features works of art that date from the late 17^th century to the present day and portrays life in the city in all its diversity, seen through the eyes of artists such as Isaac Mendez Belisario, Sidney McLaren, David Pottinger, Osmond Watson, Carl Abrahams, Andy Jefferson, Edna Manley, Cecil Baugh, Kapo, Michael Lester and Roy Reid. The exhibition also features the iconic Jamaican feature film The Harder They Come (1972, dir. Perry Henzell), which is in many ways also a portrait of Kingston and, particularly, a time capsule of life in the city in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Kingston was curated by National Gallery Assistant Curator Monique Barnett-Davidson and continues until October 30, 2016.

The Quilt Performing Arts Company was born out of a need for a fresh, new, innovative way of creating performance art. Using Caribbean rhythms, merging poetry, dance and music, the Quilt performers have developed their own unique performance style and an evolving devised theatre technique. The performance at Last Sundays on September 25 will of consist Revolution (2016) and a new work that is yet to be titled. Revolution looks at hegemony and the ‘zombification’ of the human race. It travels through stage vignettes from the slave ships to the sound boxes of Kingston.  Artistic director Rayon Mclean and his team continue break boundaries and redefine performance spaces. This is the company’s second time in the National Gallery and the members are pumped up about serving of cocktail of art and heart.

The National Gallery’s doors will be open from 11 am to 4 pm on Sunday, September 25, 2016 and the Quilt performance will start at 1:30 pm. Admission and guided tours will be free, but contributions to the National Gallery’s donations box are gratefully accepted. The National Gallery gift and coffee shops will also be open and the gift shop is stocked for the Christmas gift-buying season. Proceeds from these ventures help to fund exhibitions and programmes such as Last Sundays.

Cecil Cooper – The Prayer (2016)

Ebony G. Patterson spoke on behalf of Cecil Cooper‘s past students today at Cecil’s funeral. She has allowed us to publish her powerful tribute.

In moments like these we always think about the absence and somehow our words in these ceremonies are an attempt at filling up something we think is missing. It is difficult to see towers in our life fall. Mr Cooper was a mountain of a man, his presence filled the room’s corner. He was a passionate man who lived his life with incredible meaning. He gave so much of him self to his practice as an artist and gave even more of himself to his family, students, his community and country. He was an generous teacher who gave his students so much and he truly loved us. He was tough on us!  He challenged us constantly, always demanding more of us, more than we thought we were capable of.  And that’s the job of a teacher.  It is to see you beyond your potential. And in the moments of frustration he would say “you ever think about trying animal husbandry”?  Or slap his face.

He never minced his words but the good teachers rarely do. He knew we didn’t know what we were truly capable of and it was his responsibility to help us guide us beyond our imagination and help us to bloom. He saw us not as who we were but who we could be.  He would always say that he knew many of us would not go onto be artists, but regardless of this  his responsibility was to discipline us, to send out in to the world as critically thinking,  problem-solving, challenging, engaging, thoughtful, meaningful individuals . He planted seeds in all of us, and we have in one way or another gone on and shared these seeds with others.  Those people we shared with have also planted these seeds in others. He did this beyond his 30 plus years of teaching and that means there are a lot of blooming trees.

Cecil Cooper – Abstract Face (Pale) Study (2016)

I am grateful that I had Mr Cooper as a mentor and, like our parents, we never imagine these anchors in our lives exiting. I couldn’t imagine myself without him in my own narrative. I hear him everyday I enter the studio, and when I speak to my own students.  I am grateful for the quiet moments we shared listening to Mutty Perkins in studio and talking about the political and social concerns of our country. But I think the most valuable lesson I learned from Mr Cooper as a student was the evidence his own of work, of his own rigour, of his own practice, of his commitment. This was clear every morning when he came to school with his toes drenched in paint.

 So we thank you Mr Cooper for SEEING US, thank you for demanding more  of us, thank you seeing beyond our potential, thank you your love , and thank you for loving us even harder during those times of frustration, thank you for holding us accountable, thank you for the late night drive-bys at the studio to make sure we were working through the night, thanks you for advice about finances and family, thanks for encouraging others to buy our work to help support our ambitions, thank you for your vulnerability , thank you for teaching us about the value of hard work  and the fulfillment and gratification that come form this , thank you for  teaching us about the importance  of  helping to build our own communities, thank you for our discipline , thank you for your generosity,  thank you  for seeing us  and, most of all, thank you for allowing US to see you. Thank you for being present.

We are for ever your students and graduates of the Cecil Cooper School of Painting. Paint, sing, and live in Paradise. We love you.

On Thursday, October 27, 2016, starting at 2:00 pm, the National Gallery of Jamaica will be hosting a panel discussion entitled Kingston: Filming the City. This event aims to explore the the work of filmmakers in depicting and interpreting Kingston life and its environs. Kingston: Filming the City is part of the educational programming associated with the NGJ’s current feature exhibition Kingston, Part 1: The City and Art, which opened on July 31 and will now close on November 5. The exhibition utilizes paintings, sculpture, ceramics, film and photography to explore the dynamic between Kingston’s growth as a major commercial as well as cultural centre and the development of Jamaican visual art practice and infrastructure.

The focus on film for the panel discussion was inspired by the inclusion of two motion-picture works in the exhibition: Chaotic Beauty (2016), a video by emerging Jamaican digital artist Di-Andre Caprice Davis, and The Harder They Come (1972), the iconic Jamaican film directed by Perry Henzell and written by himself and Trevor Rhone. Both of these productions have featured Kingston not just as a backdrop to story-telling, but as a key location element that informs narrative progression and character development. Some have argued that The Harder They Come is also a portrait of Kingston and a time-capsule representation of urban life in Jamaica in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Kingston has featured in several other memorable, locally produced and international films, including the first James Bond film Dr No (1962), Rockers (1978), Dancehall Queen (1997), Third World Cop (1999), Better Mus’ Come (2010) and Kingston Paradise (2013). Kingston also serves as the locale and backdrop to numerous Jamaican and other music videos, such as Proteje’s Kingston Be Wise (2013).

The discussion on October 27 will be moderated by lecturer of Audio-Visual History at the University of the West Indies (Mona), Dr. Julian Cresser, along with the following panellists:

• Franklyn “Chappy” St. Juste, veteran cinematographer who has been credited in films such as The Harder They Come (1972), Children of Babylon (1980) and Coolie Pink and Green (2009). St. Juste has also contributed valuable years of service to the Jamaica Information Service (JIS), Creative Production and Training Centre (CPTC) and the Caribbean Institute of Media and Communication (CARIMAC).
• Natalie Thompson, film producer and managing director of Cinecom. Some of Thompson’s acclaimed productions have included Third World Cop (1999), Knight and Day (2010) and the Marley documentary (2012).
• Nile Saulter, cinematographer and film director as well as founding member of New Caribbean Cinema. Some of his notable productions include Coast (2011), Pillowman (2013) and Everblessed (2016), a collaboration between himself and Canadian journalist Jeremy Relph.
• Randall Richards, emerging photographer, videographer and one of the founders of ARRC Creative Media Ltd. Richards’ recent productions have included the music video for music single by Reggae artiste Protogé, Kingston Be Wise (2013).

Also as an accompanying mini-campaign to the Kingston: Filming The City panel discussion, persons are being invited to create 10 to 20 second videos about Kingston and post them to the NGJ Education Department Facebook page, using the hashtag #ngjkingstonfilm. The final day for posting will be on November 4, 2016. All posts will be reviewed by the National Gallery of Jamaica before appearing on the page’s timeline.

The panel discussion is free and open to the public. Persons in attendance will also have an opportunity to view the Kingston, Part 1: The City and Art exhibition.

The National Gallery of Jamaica (NGJ) will have special opening hours for its Last Sundays on October 30, 2016. The gallery will exceptionally be open to the public from 1:00 to 5:00 pm on that day and will feature the Cecil Cooper Tribute exhibition and a special musical performance by Peter Lloyd, which will start at 2 pm.

October 30 will be the final day to see the National Gallery’s special tribute exhibition honouring renowned Jamaican painter, singer, art educator and NGJ Board member Cecil Cooper C.D. who passed away on September 15, 2016. This exhibit features work that spans his artistic career, including two works from the National Gallery Collection. Cooper worked mainly in paint media, using gestural painting and drawing techniques, and his thematic preoccupation with the joys and anxieties of the human condition, and particularly the central roles of women in society, reflected a romantic temperament that was also evident in his musical work as a classical tenor. Also on view are Selections from the National Collection, the Pre-Twentieth Century Galleries, The Edna Manley Galleries, The Kapo Galleries and the A.D. Scott Collection, which provide a wide-ranging overview of Jamaica’s artistic and cultural history.

International recording artist Peter Lloyd is one of Jamaica’s most respected entertainers. While he is best known as a singer and songwriter, he entered the creative industry as an actor and has also achieved a highly successful career in film and television and music production. His impressive music catalogue includes four number one singles – Tonight in Japan; Searching in the United States, UK and Jamaica, Oh My Darling in Jamaica and Blood On Your Hands worldwide. In recent years the acclaimed singer has had several Top10 singles, Wake Dem Up, Dance Hall Queen, Pose, and Gold Digga to name a few. Currently Peter Lloyd’s newest single Pure Love is poised to be the singer’s next major hit, with the momentum it has generated since its release in March 2016. Peter Lloyd is one of the finest live performers in the Reggae genre and has headlined major festivals and shows across Europe, United States of America and Jamaica. Among the singer’s notable achievements is a feature on CNN’s ROOTS: Our Journeys Home, becoming one of an exclusive group of reggae artiste to appear on CNN. “I give 100% for my fans; my life means nothing without them. My purpose is to heal the world, that’s why they call me the Love Messenger,” says Peter Lloyd.

Peter Lloyd

As is customary, admission will be free on October 30 and there will also be free tours, but contributions to the National Gallery’s donations box are always appreciated. The NGJ gift and coffee shops will be open for business and proceeds from these ventures help to fund programmes such as Last Sundays. The gift shop is fully stocked for the Christmas gift-buying season.

The National Gallery of Jamaica invites educators and teachers-in-training to attend our third annual one-day seminar entitled Art Exhibitions as Teaching Tools, which will be held on Friday, November 18, 2016. The seminar will take place from 10:00 am to 1:30 pm, at the National Gallery, and is offered free of cost. Developed specifically for persons who provide education services to student groups from early childhood to secondary school level, the seminar provides an introduction to understanding exhibitions and explores several approaches for developing lesson activities derived from taking student groups to visit exhibitions and displays of artwork in a museum or any other location.  The content and activities of the seminar will be presented by members of the NGJ Education Department and will focus on utilizing aspects of the permanent display to illustrate three main topic areas:

• An Introduction to Exhibitions
• Utilizing an Art Exhibition as an Educational Resource
• Case Study

Though the seminar is based in the practice of art museums, the tour as well as education strategies that will be explored can also be applied to a number of other subject areas. The annual teachers’ seminar, which was initiated in 2014, has enjoyed very positive feedback from past attendees and we look forward to having you join us. Interested persons should contact the Education Department at 922-1561 for further information; no pre-registration is required.

Who’s on your Christmas card list this year? Visit the National Gallery Gift Shop today for high quality and affordable holiday greeting cards that will help you to keep in touch with loved ones near and far.

This holiday season, the NGJ Gift Shop celebrates over one century of Jamaican art with 24 holiday greeting cards, featuring richly printed reproductions of paintings and photography selected from the National Art Collection.

Our 2016 selection has works by modern Jamaican artists Carl Abrahams, Michael Lester, Karl Parboosingh, Allan ‘Zion’ Johnson, Mallica “Kapo” Reynolds, Gaston Tabois, Barrington Watson and Osmond Watson. The selection also includes pre-twentieth century and turn-of-the-century artists Isaac Mendes Belisario, Adolphe Duperly and Sons, as well as, Joseph Bartholomew Kidd.

These artworks, which have continually captured the hearts and imaginations of visitors to our museum, portray riveting and exquisite depictions of beautiful landscapes, cityscapes and portraits.

The National Gallery Gift Shop also offers an assortment of fine, Jamaican-made merchandise, including: jewellery, prints, paintings, photographs, postcards, handcrafted woodwork items, T-shirts, ceramics, aromatic spa products and home décor.

There is something for everyone!

We are open Tuesdays to Thursdays, from 10 am to 4:30 pm and on Fridays from 10 am to 4 pm. On Saturdays, 10 am to 3 pm and every last Sunday of the month from 11 am to 4 pm.

The Gift Shop plays an important role in supporting the education and exhibition programmes of the National Gallery of Jamaica and your patronage is very much appreciated.

The National Gallery of Jamaica’s Last Sundays programme for November 27, 2016, will feature a special musical performance by emerging artiste Jazmyn.

Multifaceted singer, dancer and artist Jazmyn has been singing on her church’s choir since the tender age of 5, Jazmyn went on to develop her talents at Ardenne High School where she was a member of the music and dance club; and further explored her passion for performing at the University of the West Indies, as a member of the Quilt Performing Arts Company and as a member of the Pop Society and University Dance Society. As an actress, she co-starred alongside No-Maddz in Capture Land, a short film directed by Nabil Elderkin as well as the short film Proscenium which was the winner of the 2015 Jampro Film Festival Best Short Film Audience Award and was nominated for best narrative short film. Her musical style is a mixture of Reggae, Jazz and Soul with Global influences and she will be performing covers as well as previously unheard original compositions. Jazmyn aspires to reach souls through her creative expressions and hopes to expand national and regional appreciation for the arts.

Visitors will also be able to view the Kapo and Edna Manley Galleries, the Historical Galleries, and the A.D. Scott Galleries, A Special Tribute to Barrington Watson as well as a temporary exhibition consisting of selections from the Gallery’s modern Jamaican collection, featuring major works by Albert Huie, Marlon James, Eugene Hyde Everald Brown Colin Garland, Carl Abrahams, David Pottinger, Albert Artwell, Karl Parboosingh, Gloria Escoffery, Rex Dixon, Renee Cox and others.

The National Gallery’s doors will be open from 11 am to 4 pm on Sunday, November 27, 2016 and the programme will start at 1:30 pm. As is customary, admission will be free and there will also be free tours of the National Collection, but contributions to the National Gallery’s donations box are always appreciated. The National Gallery gift and coffee shops will be open for business and proceeds from these ventures help to fund programmes such as Last Sundays as well as our exhibitions.

The National Gallery of Jamaica is pleased to present Spiritual Yards: Home Ground of Jamaica’s Intuitives, which features selections from the Wayne and Myrene Cox Collection. The exhibition opens on Sunday, December 11, with the formalities starting at 1:30 pm, starting with opening remarks by Wayne Cox and followed by a musical performance by the Nexus Performing Arts Company.

The theme of Spiritual Yards was proposed by Wayne Cox, who co-curated this exhibition, and explores how many of the artists who have been recognized as Intuitives are rooted in popular religious and spiritual practices, especially the Revival religions and also Rastafari. Several produced or contributed to so-called spiritual yards, also known as home ground, or sacred spaces that featured ritual and symbolic objects and images that are meant to engage or represent the spirits, which was either the start of their artistic practice or remained as its main focus. As Wayne Cox has rightly argued, these spiritual yards are often their most outstanding works of art and their cultural significance in the Jamaican context warrants further exploration. Spiritual Yards features the work of ten such artists, namely Errol Lloyd “Powah” Atherton, Vincent Atherton, Everald Brown, Pastor Winston Brown, Leonard Daley, Reginald English, Elijah (Geneva Mais Jarrett), William “Woody” Joseph, Errol McKenzie, and Sylvester Stephens, along with photographs and video material on their life, work and spiritual yards from the Wayne and Myrene Cox archives. Spiritual Yards will be on view until January 29, 2017.

Wayne Cox and his wife Myrene have collected and documented the work of Jamaica’s Intuitives for 30 years. Their homes in Port Maria and in Royal Palm Beach, Florida, serve as important repositories of the work of these artists. Works of the Wayne and Myrene Cox Collection have been widely exhibited internationally. Wayne has written exhibition catalogue essays for a number of exhibitions, including Intuitives III at the National Gallery of Jamaica. He has presented at symposiums including Taking the Road Less Traveled: Built Environments of Vernacular Artists at the Kohler Art Center and Uncommon Visions at the American Folk Art Museum in the United States. In 2005, Art and Antiques named the Coxes to their list of the “Top 100 Art Collectors in the United States.”

In what is now an established Holiday Season tradition at the National Gallery of Jamaica, the programme on Sunday, December 11 will include the award-winning Nexus Performing Arts Company, with a performance which will start right after the short 1:30 pm opening function for Spiritual Yards. The Nexus Performing Arts Company was formed in 2001 by Hugh Douse, Artistic Director, voice tutor, singer, actor, conductor, songwriter, and a former Director of Culture in Education. The group has a broad musical repertoire that draws on Gospel, Negro Spirituals, Semi-classical, Popular music including Reggae and show tunes, African and Classical music of the European and African traditions. The performance by Nexus will take the form of a musical tour of the galleries, with selections inspired by the Spiritual Yards exhibition.

Since the last Sunday of December of 2016 coincides with Christmas Day there will be no Last Sundays programme on December 25. The programme presented on December 11 thus takes the place of what would have been our Last Sundays event for December. Admission on December 11 is free but donations are always welcome. The gift and coffee shop will be open for business and the gift shop is well stocked with Jamaican-made art and craft items and a wide selection of Christmas cards that feature outstanding examples of Jamaican art. Proceeds from these ventures and donations help to fund the National Gallery’s programmes and exhibitions.

The exhibition Spiritual Yards: Home Ground of Jamaica’s Intuitives – Selections from the Wayne and Myrene Cox Collection opens on December 11. As usual, we are posting texts that appear in the catalogue and serve as text panels in the exhibition. Here is the first installment of these posts, the catalogue introduction by Executive Director Veerle Poupeye.

The story of John Dunkley’s discovery by the emerging Jamaican cultural establishment of the late 1930s is well-known. The then Secretary of the Institute of Jamaica, Delves Molesworth, was impressed by Dunkley’s elaborately decorated barber shop on Princess Street, which included paintings and carved elements, and Dunkley was soon recognized as a major, self-taught artistic talent and included in exhibitions and collections. Dunkley’s work did not emerge from the popular tradition of the “spiritual yard,” which is the focus of this exhibition, although the mystical symbolism apparent in his work may have related to his Masonic beliefs. His barbershop however reflected a similar impulse to create a cohesive aesthetic and symbolic environment. Dunkley’s story also drives home that there must have been spiritual yards in various parts of the island at that time. However, none of the producers of the ritual and symbolic objects and images that would been part of such yards made the transition to the formal art world, even though popular culture, including Revival practices, served as iconic subject matter in the nationalist art of that era. This was clearly a function of how “art” was defined in the context of the early nationalist movement, which was premised on middle class cultural values, and what was deemed worthy of documentation and preservation or recuperation as “art,” to which Dunkley more readily conformed.

It took until the 1950s and 60s for this to change, thanks to the advances in the cultural anthropology of the Caribbean and changing public and official attitudes towards popular culture. Rastafari and Black Power were a major factor in this, as these movements challenged the old cultural hierarchies and assertively claimed space for all aspects of black culture. The young politician Edward Seaga, who had been trained in sociology and had done pioneering research on Jamaica’s Revival religions, became an influential advocate of the art of Mallica “Kapo” Reynolds, who was a Zion Revival leader. Kapo also found an avid supporter in John Pringle, Jamaica’s first Director of Tourism. Aspects of the popular culture were, interestingly enough, used in the promotion of Jamaican tourism, as Jamaica was trying to assert a more distinctive voice in the lucrative but socially problematic and culturally reductive “sun, sea and sand” tourism industry which was emerging during that period. Some of the earliest photographs of Kapo and Brother Everald Brown, another self-taught artist who was associated with the religious side of Rastafari, were commissioned by the Jamaica Tourist Board, as well as being produced by, more predictably, the pioneering anthropologists and cultural researchers of that period. Kapo and Brother Brown had both established spiritual yards before they were recognized as major artists, and maintained such spaces throughout their lives, and several of these photographs document the early incarnations of their spiritual yards. Their work was also exhibited and collected by the Institute of Jamaica from the late 1960s onwards and the National Gallery inherited most of these early holdings.

Everald Brown at his church yard, the Assembly of the Living, photographed by Penny Tweedie for the Jamaica Tourist Board in 1972

The National Gallery in the late 1970s became the main institutional advocate of the self-taught artists in Jamaica and its then Director/Curator David Boxer coined the term “Intuitive” to describe them. The genre developed rapidly and this benefitted greatly from a cadre of enthusiasts, such as Annabella Proudlock of Harmony Hall gallery; Boxer himself, also in his capacity as a private collector; and, somewhat later on, Wayne Cox and Herman van Asbroeck. These Intuitives enthusiasts maintained close associations of patronage and support with the artists and helped to uncover new or previously unknown talent. The term Intuitive was a vast improvement over designations such as primitive or naïve but the conceptualization and promotion of the Intuitives was not without its problems and controversies. Here is not the place to dwell on those issues, several of which have already received attention as part of the critical evaluation of Jamaica’s art-historiography and are part of our ongoing self-evaluation, but one criticism that needs to be singled out is that the original Intuitives concept was too premised on the notion that such artists are motivated by inner compulsion, as individualist outsiders, and not enough on how they are rooted in the popular culture.

Wayne Cox’s approach to collecting Intuitive art is particularly noteworthy from that perspective, in that he has paid significant attention to the Intuitives’ cultural context and conducted extensive research and documentation, which has resulted in a unique archive of extended interviews, photographs and video material, which has added to the importance of his collection. Wayne has also collected and documented artists who had not yet received much mainstream attention or whose work conformed less readily with the lingering aesthetic biases that shaped the Intuitive canon. We are therefore very excited to exhibit selections from the Wayne and Myrene Cox Collection and to do so in a way that interprets the featured artists in their cultural context, by focusing on their involvement in the creation of spiritual yards—an important but as yet under-documented aspect of Jamaica’s cultural heritage. Spiritual Yards features the work of ten such artists, namely Errol Lloyd “Powah” Atherton, Vincent Atherton, Everald Brown, Pastor Winston Brown, Leonard Daley, Reginald English, Elijah (Geneva Mais Jarrett), William “Woody” Josephs, Errol McKenzie, and Sylvester Stephens, as well as an introduction to the concept of the spiritual yard, which is illustrated with works from the Cox collection that that depict such yards and related practices.

The theme of the Spiritual Yards exhibition was suggested by Wayne Cox himself, who has also contributed the main catalogue essay, much of the biographical material on the artists, and the high resolution photographs of the artists and the video material that help to contextualize this exhibition, as well as sixty works from his collection. We are immensely grateful for Wayne’s generosity in facilitating and supporting this exhibition, and should acknowledge that it is not the first time we have benefited from his goodwill—he also contributed significantly to our Everald Brown retrospective in 2004 and our Intuitives III exhibition in 2006. It has been a real pleasure and privilege to work with Wayne again and we thank him, and his wife Myrene, for their enthusiastic and very generous support.

Elijah (photo Wayne Cox – all rights reserved)

Here is our second post from the catalogue of the exhibition Spiritual Yards: Home Ground of Jamaica’s Intuitives – Selections from the Wayne and Myrene Cox Collection, which opens on December 11 – part 1 of the catalogue essay by Wayne Cox.

Elijah

In the mid-1990s, if one turned east from Maxfield Avenue onto Brown’s Lane in the Rose Town neighbourhood of Kingston, the zinc wall lining the road on the right changed abruptly from raw and rusted to vibrant and painted—covered with murals depicting angels, conquering lions and biblical scenes such as the Magi. The bottom half of the zinc gate to the yard there was painted red. The whole gate was overpainted with admonitions and moral messages and quotations from the Bible. The sign above the gate identified the location as Elijah Tabernacle. Inside the yard, spiritual murals covered the walls of the buildings. I watched Elijah, leading a service, turn toward the outside gate, point with her rod and quote Jesus. “I want my blood to be painted on the gates of Zion.” Elijah added, “That’s why my gate is painted red…It is the blood of Christ.”[1]

Before she was Elijah, she was Geneva Mais Jarrett. As an adult, she decided to get baptized after an illness. The woman performing the baptism saw an overwhelming number of angels surrounding Jarrett during the baptism. She also saw the Prophet Elijah. Jarrett then began her life of spiritual service under her new name, Elijah.

Her Revival Zion service sought spirit possession as a goal. Her murals helped in drawing spirits, as did other physical aspects, such as water basins and poles through which spirits could enter from below the ground or within the water. Other poles contained chest-high platforms, referred to as seals, on which were placed offerings of food and libation to attract the spirits.[2] Music, singing, dancing, clapping and marching around the water basin counter clockwise were the welcoming call to the spirits.[3] In Revival Zion the spirits who might answer the call include the Holy Spirit, Old Testament prophets, and archangels.[4] A Swiss woman who admired her murals visited her and suggested she also paint these types of scenes on canvas. Elijah did and soon was included in international exhibitions and at the National Gallery of Jamaica.

Detail of Errol Lloyd Atherton’s spiritual yard (photo Wayne Cox – all rights reserved)

Home Ground

Barry Chevannes believed Jamaica’s Intuitives “draw inspiration from their native religions. In the cosmology of the Jamaican people, their worldview, there is no great distinction between this world and the next world. You can easily pass from one dimension to another.”[5] For many of the Intuitives, their first canvas often was their own yard. This practice occurs throughout the Pan-African Diaspora. Before these artists made works for patrons, they worked to transform their own space. Often, that is their greatest work. Visual enactments are known as yard show or yard work or home ground. Judith McWillie, Professor Emeritus at the University of Georgia and a scholar of postcolonial art and visual culture, spent years documenting yards of this type in the United States. She said those who undertake to empower their yard with intensity are ones who “maintain the belief that life can be transformed through ritual intentionality (art) when it is celebrated by men and women who assume the epic history of a People and convert it to themselves as individuals. Theirs is the ability to live mythically and in depth, on an intimate scale, while holding on to the idea that such a life flashes brightly from the center of all life.”[6]

These yards are often complex places of protection, resistance, power, affirmation, spiritual invocation and healing, ancestral memory, creative invention, community improvement and much more. The noted scholar of African and African Diasporic culture and Professor of Art History at Yale University Robert Farris Thompson sees them as “acts of defense and affirmation. Black yard art…has emerged as an independent African-American aesthetic of immense consequence and influence.”[7] Scholar and curator Randall Morris believes this practice is diaspora-wide and he documented the yards of several Jamaican Intuitives. In his essay for his exhibition HomeGround-Art of the Pan-African Diaspora (2012), that included a number of Jamaica’s Intuitives, he wrote:

The artists in this exhibition are all culture-bearers (who) have taken upon themselves the weight of carrying tradition personally, and manifesting it by various means…it is an ancient calling.[8]

Leonard Daley (photo Wayne Cox – all rights reserved)

Leonard Daley

Much is known and popularly understood about street art in Jamaica, as most of it reflects well-known Rasta iconography and accessible subjects such as National Heroes, politics and popular culture. Intense yard shows are different. In 1979, Boxer saw his first painting by Leonard Daley when he viewed the wall in a garage on Donhead Avenue in Kingston. “The angst that streamed from the walls was tempered by the extra-ordinary inventiveness of the depictions of the various animal and human forms, and the distorted tortured heads…Bosch incarnate.”[9]

Daley created a new yard display whenever he moved. The “meanings” of his canvases are seldom apparent to a viewer. They were clearly understood to Daley, but he did not intend to present them didactically, rather as prompts or provocations for the viewer to deposit into his or her own mind to aid in their own transformation. It is like dub music without the tune as a guidepost. When he uses words it is to raise questions about society’s contradictions. “Which judge can have me not guilty when I am guilty?” he asks in his painting I Am a Wrongdoer/Who Can Judge the Seven Big Men? (1994-95).

Sylvester Stephens (photo Wayne Cox – all rights reserved)

Sylvester Stephens

One shouldn’t judge a yard show by its cover. At a roadside stand on the main road in Hopewell, Hanover, Sylvester Stephens makes and sells works of open-fired terra cotta. The sign at the road says flower pots and wedding gifts for sale. But his yard serves a further purpose. The sign on his building said “Riding into Jerusalem.” Stephens maintains a highly spiritualized yard designed to help him draw forth strength from his ancestors. He displayed his works on platforms similar to some Revival seals, like those in Elijah’s Revival yard—head-high bamboos poles implanted in the ground with platforms to hold the clay works. In a Pukkumina yard, the function of the pole is one of a passageway for the sprits below to come forth.[10] He marked the poles with spiritual symbols. The works themselves weren’t flower pots, nor conventional wedding gifts. They were usually spiritual works and large-scale homages to his ancestors and spiritual leaders, such as Henry/Spirit of the Clay and Elsie. Come to buy a pot, take a ride with Sylvester into Jerusalem instead.

Reginald English (photo Wayne Cox – all rights reserved)

Reginald English

Reginald English’s roadside stand in Boscobel in the 1990s displayed works of carved metal. The culture English was bearing was Jonkunnu. He was a Jonkunnu performer—Cowhead. He carved out figures from Jonkunnu and spirit figures such as River Mummas. Some others he called “whoodies,” spirit figures from deep in the countryside, ones he often depicted naked.

William “Woody” Joseph (photo Wayne Cox – all rights reserved)

William “Woody” Joseph

Joseph one day went to the river near his home on a hillside overlooking Castleton, St Mary, to heal his foot by washing it with water. He grabbed hold of a piece of wood in the water and was inspired to carve it. He continued carving wood for the next 30 years as a spiritual service. “I carve to capture the heart of justice,” he told me in the early 1990s. He did not elaborate his house and yard except for adding a large inside sign: “Human Woody Creation Peace and Justice.” Ferdinand Protzman of the Washington Post in a review said his carvings were “imbued with a kind of spirituality that makes them appear to be on the verge of singing, shouting, or simply ascending to heaven. Sculpture with such spiritual resonance and evocative power is rare in this world. It is only produced by great artists.”[11]

#     #     #

About Wayne Cox

Wayne Cox and his wife Myrene have collected and documented the work of Jamaica’s Intuitives for 30 years. Their homes in Port Maria and in Royal Palm Beach, Florida, serve as important repositories of the work of these artists. Works of the Wayne and Myrene Cox Collection have been widely exhibited internationally. Wayne has written exhibition catalogue essays for a number of exhibitions, including “Intuitives III” at the National Gallery of Jamaica. He has presented at symposiums including “Taking the Road Less Traveled: Built Environments of Vernacular Artists” at the Kohler Art Center and “Uncommon Visions” at the American Folk Art Museum in the United States. In 2005, Art and Antiques named the Coxes to their list of the “Top 100 Art Collectors in the United States.”  Wayne Cox’s email is artjamaica2@yahoo.com.

References

[1] Wayne Cox interview with Elijah, 1996

[2] In Jamaica’s Revival religions the word “seal” generally refers to a site imbued with particular spiritual presence. This may refer to the yard as a whole, which is also known as the “seal ground” or to specific locations and objects, such as a centre pole, water basins, spiritual constructions and ground drawings. (See for instance: Edward Seaga. Revival Cults in Jamaica. Kingston: Institute of Jamaica, 1969).

[3] Dr Clinton Hutton refers to “an altar, a seal, as it is adorned with objects to induce spiritual possession.” In: Paul Williams. “The Symbolic Revival Turban,” Gleaner, March 22, 2015.

[4] Diane Austin-Broos. Jamaica Genesis/Religion and the Politics of Moral Order. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997, p62-63.

[5] Remarks at Art for Life’s Sake, a symposium on Jamaican Intuitive Art, National Gallery of Jamaica, October 26, 2006.

[6] Judith McWilllie. Another Face of the Diamond: Pathways through the Black Atlantic South. New York: INTAR Latin American Gallery, 1989, p10.

[7] Robert Farris Thompson. Black Art: Ancestral Legacy. New York: Dallas Museum of Art/Harry N. Abrams, 1989, p123.

[8] Randall Morris. HomeGround—Art of the Pan-African Diaspora. New York: Cavin-Morris Gallery/ISSUU, 2012, p2.

[9] David Boxer. Fifteen Intuitives. Kingston: National Gallery of Art, 1987, p8.

[10] While Zion Revival engages mainly with Biblical or “heavenly” spirits, Pukkumina engages the ancestors or “ground” spirits. (See: Edward Seaga. Revival Cults in Jamaica. Kingston: Institute of Jamaica, 1969).

[11] Ferdinand Protzman. “Jamaica’s True Colors,” Washington Post, September 2, 1999.

Pastor Winston Brown (Photo Wayne Cox – all rights reserved)

Here is part II of Wayne Cox’s catalogue essay for the exhibition Spiritual Yards: Home Ground of Jamaica’s Intuitives – Selections from the Wayne and Myrene Cox Collection, which opens on December 11. Part I can be found here.

Pastor Winston Brown

Pastor Winston Brown created the Garden of Eden attraction at his home on the main road just east of Hope Bay, Portland. It is by far the most vibrantly colored of Jamaica’s yard shows. At the roadside, he has signs with spiritual messages, seals, rows of zinc panels, even his whole house, all covered with unique patterning. He preaches occasionally in the area, sermonizing on his visions.

Vincent Atherton (Photo Wayne Cox – all rights reserved)

Vincent Atherton and Errol Lloyd Atherton

Errol Lloyd Atherton lived back in the countryside in Albany, St Mary. He knew the power of carved effigies from his father Vincent who carved to help him gain control over unpredictable forces. Vincent carved highly evocative heads, the tops of which were carved out or burned out, becoming vessels. In 1999, he carved two figures—one to propitiate the century leaving and another to welcome the new one arriving.  His son Lloyd was known as “Powah” in part because of the “powah” his yard possessed.^[1] He participated in Kumina-influenced “Bongo” meetings that brought forth spirit possession, particularly, by the ancestors.

Errol Lloyd “Powah” Atherton (photo Wayne Cox – all rights reserved)

Lloyd displayed numerous stands on bamboo poles, many holding highly charged figures carved by his father or himself. On some he added material such as dried herbs, libations, metal objects and toy figures. The zinc at the border of his yard was painted with messages to please the ancestors. He hung a three-meter long strap of metal he says was an earlier relative’s gong. A gowned figure hung in effigy from a tree high above his front gate. He incised panels of zinc fencing, some in the shape of crosses, with designs and spirit words. Backlit by the sun, the panel’s spirit message would shine through. He placed round objects reflecting the power of the circle passed down from the Kongo cosmogram that evokes the redemptive healing of the daily movement of the sun where the day’s troubles are lifted each night during one’s time with the ancestors when the sun goes below the ground.^[2]  

Brother Everald Brown (photo Wayne Cox – all rights reserved)

Everald Brown

Some of Everald Brown’s earliest images at his church on Spanish Town Road in Kingston invoke his creolized knowledge of the cosmogram in both its circle and diamond forms. Among his first paintings were ones of each archangel.  In Outer Circle, he painted an aerial view of a plan for a future spirit yard. It included the cosmogram in its circle form with the initial of each archangel at its corners. The plan included an antenna surmounted by a symbolic object, which he built at his later home in Murray Mountain. There he also built seals on poles. A spot in his yard was marked SIS (Spiritual Inner Self), the importance of inner vision he learned from his Rastafarian tutor Joseph Hibbert.^[3] He used what nature provided—croton leaves for divination and the images on the limestone where he saw biblical images.

Errol McKenzie (photo Wayne Cox – all rights reserved)

Errol McKenzie

Thirty years ago, Errol McKenzie in Walderston, Manchester, placed his life in service to a spirit figure, the Moon Mother. “She talks to me every day, and tells me what to do.”^[4] And he does. She exists in varying forms. In the 1980s, in her guise as the Black Moon Mother, she told him to build her a house in stone in the form of her body and include ways to protect her. He did and he lives in the house.

At the front of the house is the Black Moon Mother’s head, the features of which are apparent only after McKenzie explains them. On the inside walls he constructed vines he views as spiritually beneficial through a Bible reference and the word association de vine means divine. Much of what he carved uses a singular biomorphic or botanical language. He called one room the womb room. It had an uneven low ceiling. Embossed on a section of the floor were concrete humps. These, he said, were the seeds of the Black Moon Mother.

In the 2000s, the Moon Mother told him to knock down the womb room and use those stones to form a heart to be shared by the Black Moon Mother of the original house and a new White Moon Mother he was to build of stones—he would break and then stack along the hillside. The White Moon Mother, depicted in running motion, now covers the entire hillside. He often paints the Moon Mother in her various guises. His Black Moon Island has drawn international attention for the metaphoric power of his sacred space.

This admiration is not shared by some who live nearby. His devotion to and display of a god others do not know nor wish to know causes some to fear him. Similarly, just beyond the border of Brother Brown’s yard was a rusted abandoned pickup. I asked a neighbor about it. He said it was there to protect people like him from Brother Brown. Like most Intuitives, McKenzie is privy to visions others are not—visions that carry a moral burden to serve. For these culture-bearers, that is their sacrifice. And that is their gift.

About Wayne Cox

Wayne Cox and his wife Myrene have collected and documented the work of Jamaica’s Intuitives for 30 years. Their homes in Port Maria and in Royal Palm Beach, Florida, serve as important repositories of the work of these artists. Works of the Wayne and Myrene Cox Collection have been widely exhibited internationally. Wayne has written exhibition catalogue essays for a number of exhibitions, including “Intuitives III” at the National Gallery of Jamaica. He has presented at symposiums including “Taking the Road Less Traveled: Built Environments of Vernacular Artists” at the Kohler Art Center and “Uncommon Visions” at the American Folk Art Museum in the United States. In 2005, Art and Antiques named the Coxes to their list of the “Top 100 Art Collectors in the United States.”  Wayne Cox’s email is artjamaica2@yahoo.com.

References

^[1] Powah is Jamaican Patwa for “power.”

^[2] “The priests of Bakongo mapped the journey of the soul within an ancient series of geometric cosmograms. Circles or diamonds or spiral-from designs were used to encode a central message of the classical religion: woman as such or man as such are seconds suns, born in the east, flourishing in the north, fading in the east, and spiritually reborn as ancestors in the south…In Black North America, (the symbol took on additional meaning), under the apparent influence of Revelations 7:1, to ‘the four corners of the world,’ or ‘the four winds of heaven.’” (Robert Farris Thompson. Another Face of the Diamond. New York: INTAR Latin American Gallery, 1988, p29).

^[3] Joseph Hibbert was one of the pioneers of Rastafari in Jamaica and represents its religious, mystical side. (Leonard Barrett. The Rastafarians: The Dreadlocks of Jamaica. London: Heineman, 1977. p82-83)

^[4] Wayne Cox interview with Errol McKenzie, January 22, 2012

Spiritual Yards: Home Ground of Jamaica’s Intuitives – Selections from the Wayne and Myrene Cox Collection will be on view at the NGJ from December 11, 2016 to January 29, 2017. Here is the first of a series of short features on the artists in the exhibition, organized according to which gallery their work appears in, and accompanied by rare video footage on each of them, courtesy of Wayne Cox (all rights reserved).

Pastor Winston Brown (b1932) was born in Manchester and moved to Hope Bay, Portland, as a young adult. He was employed in Public Works for the Parish Council and later kept a shop. In his spare time, he would visit various churches, sermonizing based on his visions. He built a house just west of Hope Bay, adding on a room at a time. Pastor Brown began with creating assemblages mounted on poles. He painted vibrant floral and abstract design on his walls and on objects outside. On the street, he constructed signs and assemblages with spiritual messages, calling this place the Garden of Eden attraction. He has leaned zinc fencing painted with his designs along the slope of the hill across the street. He has a bench there where he lies down, reads his Bible and waves to drivers passing through the Garden of Eden.

Reginald English (1929-1997) was a Jonkunnu performer, who was known for creating painted metal cut-outs depicting Jonkunnu characters and spirit figures he called “whoodies” which he believed lived in the countryside. During the 1980s and 1990s, English created and sold these works of cut-out metal at a stand on the main road just east of Boscobel, St Mary. English often recycled discarded metal to make his figures, which displayed strong gestural characteristics, and he used metallic automotive spray paint to provide vivid and radiant colouring. His work was has been exhibited both locally and overseas, most notably in the exhibitions Prophets and Messengers (2000) and Intuitives III (2006) at the Mutual Gallery in Kingston and National Gallery of Jamaica, as well as the Redemption Songs exhibition in the United States, held in 1997. English also represented in the permanent collection of the Patricia and Phillip Frost Art Museum in Miami.

Spiritual Yards: Home Ground of Jamaica’s Intuitives – Selections from the Wayne and Myrene Cox Collection, opens on December 11. Here is a post on three of the artists in the exhibition, along with video footage, courtesy of Wayne Cox.

Errol Lloyd “Powah” Atherton (1961-2012) lived in Albany, St Mary. He participated in Kumina-influenced Bongo meetings and had a deep sense of the power of the ancestors. He was also the son of intuitive artist, Vincent Atherton, creating, in Randall Morris’ words, “one of the most powerful yard shows in Jamaica with offertory seals honouring the carvings of his father, Vincent.” In addition to carving, he also painted words on wood and zinc to invoke the ancestors. Powah’s work has been exhibited locally since around 2000, when it was featured in the exhibition Prophets and Messengers, held at the Mutual Gallery in Kingston, Jamaica. His work was also featured in 2008 as a part of the National Biennial, held at the National Gallery of Jamaica. He is represented in a number of private and public collections—local and overseas—including the collection of the Patricia and Phillip Frost Art Museum in Miami.

Vincent Atherton (1924-2007) lived in Albany, St Mary. He worked as a groundskeeper at the Green Castle estate and he had a carving shack on the property. It was during this time that he developed his carving skills, initially focusing on utilitarian wooden items such as axe handles and vases before transitioning into his own conceptual forms, which included effigy figures, amulets, helmets and staffs. A number of these are reminiscent of similar objects carved in Taino and some African traditions. Atherton described the objects as possessing great spiritual power and influence for protecting and guarding or to pacify spiritual forces. In some instances, he carved such objects in response to specific events and phenomena, for example, during the transition into the new millennium in 2000. Several of his sons were also carvers, more importantly, Errol Lloyd Atherton. Vincent Atherton’s work has been exhibited locally, most notably in the exhibition Intuitives III (2006) held at the National Gallery of Jamaica, and has also been widely exhibited in the United States. His work is in the collection of the Patricia and Phillip Frost Art Museum in Miami.

Everald Brown (1917-2003) also called “Brother Brown,” was born in Clarendon as the fifth of seven children and the only son of his parents Robert and Nelly Brown. His mother was a religious Baptist, who influenced him on his spiritual path. In 1946, Brother Brown married Jenny Gray with whom he had ten children. One year later they settled at 82 ½ Spanish Town Road, a yard which housed several religious groups. There he became aware of Rastafari and the Ethiopian Orthodox church, establishing the Assembly of the Living as a self-appointed mission of the latter. Around 1973, as a result increasingly volatile social environment of West Kingston, Brother Brown relocated his family and mission to Murray Mountain in deep rural St Ann. Much of the imagery in his artworks were expressions from his visions. Many of these included mystical depictions of landscapes, animals, plants and other beings of the physical as well as supernatural world. He has become highly regarded for creating a rather diverse complement of highly decorated art and religious objects including paintings, wood carvings and a variety of musical instruments of his own design. According to him, “my painting is not just an expression of what is, but what I would like things to be—what things should be.” His artistic legacy has been maintained to an extent by his children, some of whom are also regarded as established Jamaican artists. In 1973, he was awarded a Silver Musgrave Medal for Art by the Institute of Jamaica. Brother Brown was a frequent exhibitor in numerous local and international. Notable showings include the Intuitives exhibition series of the National Gallery of Jamaica and the most comprehensive posthumous exhibition of his work, The Rainbow Valley: Everald Brown, A Retrospective, organized by the National Gallery of Jamaica in 2004. He is represented in a number of private and public collections, locally and internationally.

Isaac Mendes Belisario – Koo-Koo, or Actor Boy (From Sketches of Character, 1837-38), Collection: NGJ

The National Gallery of Jamaica wishes its friends and stakeholders all the very best for the Holiday Season and for a happy and prosperous new year in 2017.

Jamaica is blessed with rich Christmas-time traditions–seasonal food and drink traditions, Grand Market, Jonkonnu, and the religious observations that mark the season, to mention a few–and we invite you to recognize and celebrate the unique cultural dimensions of the Holiday Season in Jamaica. It is in this spirit that we have illustrated this message with one of the most famous Jonkonnu-related images, from Isaac Mendes Belisario’s Emancipation-era Sketches of Character (1837-38).

The Holiday Season is also a great time to visit the National Gallery, and to bring along any visiting family or friends. At the National Gallery of Jamaica in Kingston, we have on display Spiritual Yards: Home Ground of Jamaica’s Intuitives – Selections from the Wayne and Myrene Cox Collection, which explores the tradition of creating spiritual yards through the work of ten self-taught, Intuitive artists with art works and documentary material from the Wayne and Myrene Cox Collection. The ten artists are: Errol Lloyd Atherton, Vincent Atherton, Everald Brown, Pastor Winston Brown, Elijah, Reginald English, Leonard Daley, William “Woody” Joseph, Errol McKenzie, and Sylvester Stephens. We also have on view our Historical Galleries, with works of art from the Taino to the late 19^th century; the Edna Manley and Kapo Galleries; the A.D. Scott Gallery, which explores art around Independence; the early Intuitives Gallery; and a temporary display with Selections from the Permanent Collection–together these exhibitions provide our visitors with a comprehensive overview of Jamaican art history. At National Gallery West at the Montego Bay Cultural Centre, we have just opened Marcia Biggs: Impressions of Life, which features select paintings, drawings and watercolours by the popular Montego Bay artist Marcia Biggs, who passed away unexpectedly at age 38 in 1998.

Our Holiday opening hours at the National Gallery of Jamaica in Kingston are as follows:

• Saturday, December 24: open from 10 am to 3 pm
• Sunday, December 25 to Tuesday, December 27: closed
• Wednesday, December 28 and Thursday, December 29: open from 10 am to 4:30 pm
• Friday, December 30: open from 10 am to 4 pm
• Saturday, December 31: open from 10 am to 3 om
• Sunday, January 1 and January 2: closed

At National Gallery West, the opening hours will be as follows:

• Saturday, December 24: open from 10 am to 5 pm
• Sunday, December 25 to Tuesday, December 27: closed
• Wednesday, December 28 to Saturday, December 31: open from 10 am to 5 pm
• Sunday, January 1 and January 2: closed

We resume regular opening hours on Tuesday, January 3 at both locations.

And in the next year, we will be preparing for the Jamaica Biennial 2017, which will open with a sequence of functions in Kingston and Montego Bay from February 24 to 26, and which will feature ambitious and thought-provoking works of art by a wide range of Jamaican, Jamaican Diaspora and other Caribbean artists.

We look forward to seeing you soon!