Petrine Archer [.com]

The Jamaican art community is saddened by the recent death of artist and poet Seya Parboosingh. She died at 85 having spent more than fifty years here. Born Samila Joseph in 1925 in Allentown Pennsylvania, Seya changed her name in 1957 when she married expressionist painter Karl Parboosingh in New York. They moved to Jamaica the next year and with Karl's encouragement, Seya began painting and exhibiting alongside him. Their styles were remarkably different. His paintings were strident with bold, brash brushmarks that critiqued the social conventions he abhored. Seya was more introspective, reserving her poetic forms for domesticated scenes with young women that like In Sorrow (1977) seemed to blend a childlike imagination with adult poignancy. In 2000, over a number of weekly visits, I had the privilege of talking at length with Seya while we prepared an article about her life and work for the magazine Caribbean Beat. I will miss her. Read the article.

A conference honouring Marcus Garvey's birthday, the 60th anniversary of the publishing of Report on The Rastafari Movement in Kingston Jamaica, is taking place at the University (UWI, Mona) this week. It's a big celebration gathering Rastafari scholars from the African Diaspora. They are exploring ways that the Rastafari world view has influenced all areas of life under the banner 'Negotiating the African Presence: Rastafari Livity and Scholarship.'

Much has changed since Roy Augier, Rex Nettleford and M.G. Smith first offered their report to the nation about Rastas. In 1960, the movement was still in its infancy and greatly misunderstood amongst Jamaicans. Rastas were effectively demonized by wider society that could not accommodate their desire to return to Africa, beliefs about the divinity of Haile Selassie and their use of marijuana as a sacrament. Yet, in many ways Rastafari's stand against what it called 'Babylon' including corporate culture, the hypocrises of the church and excesses of state control, were visionary. Today, with the universal popularity of reggae, a global youth culture that favours outsiderism and Rastas inclusion within 'Brand Jamaica', the movement has achieved acceptance and a place of national pride for its ability to survive. Rastafari's lifestyle that promotes 'ital' vegetarianism, self reliance and ecological stewardship has proven inspirational and very much in keeping with new age thinking. It is a movement that needs to be honoured for its spiritual fortitude, and the way that its convictions have contributed to the conscience of our nation. See and extract of my paper.

The organisers of a recent Black Atlantic conference in Liverpool have launched a site devoted to the subject where all the materials from the conference as well as more useful resources can be found. The site, Black Atlantic Resource established by the University of Liverpool was inspired by the exhibition and publication Afro Modern: Journeys Through the Black Atlantic that took place at the TATE Liverpool in the spring. The Resource offers artists profiles, research documents, videos, podcasts, a blog and an extensive bibliography all related to the African Diaspora. It's a fairly ambitious site for a subject that has received insufficient attention, especially in the UK and it is significant that it has been launched in Liverpool, a city with such questionable connections to the history of slavery. If it can be sustained it might prove to be an important archive for scholars interested in black art now..., take a look, it's worth a visit.

One of the highlights of this year's Kingston on the Edge festival was an all too brief exhibition of drawings by the late artist Karl Parboosingh shown at the Bolivar in Kingston. Mounted by curator Claudia Hucke and very competently documented in its accompanying catalogue, the show presents a selection of Parboosingh's drawings taken from a sketchbook that he carried while he traveled through Europe and New York during the fifties. Additionally, there are drawings representing later works such as the preparatory sketches for his Wilton Gardens murals painted in Tivoli Kingston once he returned to Jamaica. Appropriately titled Jazz and Tings, the exhibition provides a fascinating glimpse into Parboosingh's bohemian life amongst avant garde artists that included modernists Fernand Leger and Raoul Dufy, and musicians such as Miles Davis and Charlie Parker; all major influences on Parboosingh. Created very early in his career, these drawings show little of the bold style that would define his later work. Instead, these are simple sketches that reflect Parboosingh's earliest development as an artist as well as his exploration of techniques and styles. Watercolours, line drawings and dense cross hatching reflect his search for a distinctive style. They also reveal the insecurities and weaknesses that he would learn to mask in later paintings.

Recent disturbances in Kingston's down town communities has given these areas of the city increased visibility. Especially in places such as Tivoli, we who live uptown have a sense that we are viewing these neighbourhoods for the first time. Fear of violence has meant that many of us have closed ourselves off from certain areas and rarely travel through them, even though much of Kingston falls within a 10 mile radius. As Kingston's middle class retreat further and further up town, it is a shame that our vision has become so limited even to places literally on our doorstep. Yet a visit to many of these communities reveals a history and a heritage that many would have been familiar with in earlier decades. These are communities where many of our grandparents were born. How can it be that the city of Kingston has been divided between uptown and downtown and that we have forfeited this sense of place? Can we afford to lose these connections to the past? Can we afford to abandon them to violence? As we flee the inner city and turn our backs to the sea, we must be careful not lose our sense of the past and our sense of identity.

The violence of the past week should not come as surprise to any here in Jamaica. It is a situation that we might choose not to acknowledge even though it has been staring us in the face and clearly escalating for decades. It is instructive that many of our contemporary artists, especially those featured in the current National Gallery of Jamaica exhibition Young Talent have mirrored these societal concerns in their work.

Jamaica's widening gap between rich and poor and our historical reliance on an underground economy related to drugs has created tensions and led to violence of which artists are all too aware.

Young Talent V is a high energy exhibition featuring 14 of Jamaica's most promising artists. It's the latest in a series of exhibitions presented irregularly at the National Gallery of Jamaica over the past 25 years. I took part in the first Young Talent 1 back in 1985 and I have viewed the mixed fortunes of each show and our younger artists as they haltingly challenged past presentations and tried to relate modernist approaches to local subject matter. In 1985, we felt ourselves ambitious to be working on large scale canvases that were displayed in diptych and triptych formats in a manner we considered innovative and professional. But that show for all its promise  flagged a disconnect between art, idealism and Jamaica's political realities: a tension that would shadow contemporary art practice even as it tried to straddle local and global issues. Now each artist is afforded generous gallery space as they work through their ideas in multimedia including design, installation, video, fashion and photography. This time around, Young Talent V offers stunning, sophisticated and superlative work that addresses contemporary issues related to history and identity, gender and sexuality, violence and social issues in ways that harness contemporary vernaculars. Its artists and curators deserve high praise for mounting a show that after a hiatus as a result of internal squabbling, commercialism and funding difficulties seems set to put Jamaican art back on the international art map. This is a must see show including artists Marvin Bartley, Keisha Castello, Stephen Clarke, Michael Elliot, Christopher Harris, Marlon James, Leasho Johnson, Meghan McKain, Oliver Myrie, Ebony G. Patterson, Oneika Russell, Sand, Caroline 'bops' Sardine and Phillip Thomas 

It's no surprise that a handful of these artists are already gaining attention abroad, Phillip Thomas's dramatically staged Old World paintings such as Carousel (2009), Oneika Russell's poignant videos that collage historical and contemporary themes like Drift (2010), Carolyn 'bops' Sardines cluttered boxes have all enjoyed success elsewhere. And, undoubtedly the star in this regard is Ebony G. Patterson whose gilt edged multimedia works have prestige gallery representation in the U.S. The expansive display of Ebony's powerful Gully Godz portraits and her remixed cultural object of a gutted and 'blinged out' Fiat motor car creates a buzz that is rare in local exhibitions today. The stunning reality and beauty of these works tells us that finally our artists are bringing the outside in, and turning us inside out.

Filmmakers Zulema Griffin and Sherie L. Weldon directors of Deux Conceptualist Noir recently visited Kingston as part of their new project Ink Bleach a film that highlights issues related to race, black fashion and history. Their stark minimal styling using simple African influenced fabrics as backdrops requires that interviewees (who are in the main women) speak directly to the camera about subjects such as the sexualised black body, the politics of black hair and exploitation of black fashion throughout history. But these are not stream of consciousness conversations, rather, they are intimate monologues that are pointedly constructed and tightly edited to provide a contemporary understanding of female blackness from past to present. The film's narratives are compelling especially since they tell us something we as black women have always known but have rarely discussed. Ink Bleach is an ambitious project that might just succeed in its goal of being screened at the next Sundance Festival especially because the directors have been prepared to do the leg work traveling through the African diaspora talking to women who have been dealing with these issues whether as models, academics or victims of fashion. But even without mainstream acclaim by using digital technology and the internet, Deux Conceptualiste Noir have already opened up a space for talking about race and reconceptualising blackness. To view clips and more about the film, click here Ink Bleach.

The Edna Manley Foundation's valient attempt to raise funds for Haiti by hosting an auction is instructive. The dismal sums raised teach us that despite best efforts the economic recession is taking its toll on the Jamaican art market. The catalogue listed 113 works by some 70 artists ranging from Jamaica's early pioneer painters such as John Dunkley, Carl Abrahams and Edna Manley to contemporary talent such as Marissa Holland and Michael Chambers. There was also a handful of Haitian works including one by the important artist Jeane Claude Severe. As usual, the National Gallery staff rallied to present works in a highly professional manner, displaying them ahead of time, and auctioneer William Tavares Finson handled the bidding. But even as the first round of paintings were passed up at relatively low reserve prices it was clear that Jamaican collectors have slowed their pace of buying as they fight to cope with the economic downturn. Almost half the works were withdrawn because they failed to raise enough interest to meet reserve prices, and those that did sell barely made their estimated values. The thrilling competitive bidding of past years never materialized suggesting that the days of big spending and bullish collection building are over.