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okay I think we’re going to get started hi everyone good evening and welcome to the art gallery of Hamilton or welcome

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back my name is Alexandra and I’m the lead of interpretation here at the gallery is the sound okay can you hear

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me okay great louder um tonight I’m thrilled to welcome

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artists Roger Ferreira and Kareem Anthony Ferreira you are here today to talk about their joint exhibition that

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we’re so proud to be in right now called Gatherings as you may you probably know

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Roger and Kareem Our Father and Son both artists and we’re so honored to be presenting their work together here at

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the agh with this exhibition I would like to start by acknowledging that we are here on the traditional

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territories of the Eerie neutral Huron wendat hodnessone and mississaugas this

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land is covered by the dish with one spoon wampum belt Covenant which was an agreement between the hotnessone and

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anishinabec to share and care for the resources around the Great Lakes We further acknowledge that this land is

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covered by the Between the Lakes purchased 1792 between the crown and the mississaugas of the Credit First Nation

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we as an institution recognize that a land acknowledgment is only one small step in the reconciliation process

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especially for Colonial spaces such as Galleries and museums there is much work to be done to better represent the

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voices and stories of this land that we occupy as settlers and that includes ensuring that the artworks that hang on

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our galleries walls really represent the diverse community that we are so proud to be a part of

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also on this day of remembrance I would also like to take a moment to honor and remember those who serve and sacrifice

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for our country both today and throughout history we show our gratitude and respect for their courage in the

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form of a poppy worn close to our hearts it is now my pleasure to hand it over to our curator of Contemporary Art Melissa

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Bennett who will introduce both Roger and Kareem thank you

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[Applause] hi everyone can you hear me okay

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okay I’m Melissa Bennett curator of Contemporary Art at the art gallery of Hamilton

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and I’m really happy that you’re all able to make it here tonight um normally the exhibition space doesn’t

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have all these chairs in it but we thought it would be better for you to be able to look at the art while we’re

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talking um so please feel free to kind of wander around and take a good look so I’m

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really pleased to welcome and introduce Roger and Kareem so Roger is from Trinidad though he was

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born in Winnipeg he and his family arrived in Hamilton in the late 1980s and he quickly established himself in

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the Arts Community taking on public mural projects and working with Children and Youth to share his skills and

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artistic vision he founded a downtown artists Co-op and regularly worked with other artists to

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support exhibition practices in Hamilton having taught at Columbia College and in

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the Catholic school system for over 15 years and including today Roger has been

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teaching since 8 A.M this morning so I’m very Andy had shop after school

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so thank you for being here at 7 pm um the this exhibit so he has built a

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substantive career as an art teacher in this city um and through all that time he has also

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built a substantive art practice and this exhibition serves as a retrospective covering four

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themes and approaches and major developments in his in his painting over

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the years and sculpture and the four themes um include his focus on family and Black

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Culture the Landscapes of Canada and Trinidad activism and spirituality and

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I’d be happy to point out the sections really quickly that’s the sort of the landscape area

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this is the activism area and I can go on and on about each individual work when we have time

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this is spirituality and this is kind of family and life in Canada in Trinidad

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and then we also have Kareem who is Roger’s son so Kareem was born in 1989 in Hamilton and studied fine art at

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McMaster University before completing his MFA at the University of Arizona in 2020 in his impressive large-scale

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paintings that you can see here he revisits family trips to Trinidad and vice versa when family was visiting

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Canada working from old photos often taken during these family gatherings Kareem

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builds richly textured images that reflect his experience of feeling rooted in two homelands Hamilton and Trinidad

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now represented by leading international galleries in Los Angeles New York Brussels and Toronto and with a

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prestigious list of collectors all around the world this is a much anticipated Gathering of Kareem’s work

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in his hometown because many of these paintings were made in the U.S and have

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not been seen by hamiltonians because they stayed in the U.S after his MFA

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thesis exhibition so those are the official bios and now I get to tell you quickly before I invite

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you all to speak about your work um that I had the pleasure of meeting Roger about 10 years ago when I first

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started working in this position at the gallery and I remember your work and I remember actually that watercolor right

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there it’s a beach mayaro Trinidad it’s the top one of the two I remember seeing

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that a long time ago and being being intrigued by Roger’s work and then seeing it several times in Hamilton

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through the years and then just always I believe I met you

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but didn’t um didn’t have much of a relationship until recently when we started working on this

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project and I was really inspired in learning that Kareem had also developed a painting practice recently and I

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wanted to see what that would look like if we brought it all together and each time I

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started to think a little bit more about it I just it was I uncovered more and more amazing reasons why it would be so

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good to bring this all together in one room and particularly for Roger I know

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I’ve seen your work and I’ve read about it in many places but to see everything

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together in three decades of practice is a really wholesome and fruitful and

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thoughtful way of experiencing everything that you’ve been doing in multimedia and also being able to see

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the influences that you’ve had in the Hamilton Arts community and in Black activism in Hamilton particularly with

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the and Still I Rise project which celebrated 100 Years of black activism in Hamilton

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which for which he was the lead artist and then I saw Kareem’s work was

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skyrocketing in the media um having been collected so quickly um out of his emerging out of his

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master’s degree class only in 2020 he graduated so this

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is this is like skywriting skyrocketing hot news in Hamilton that this artist is

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like all of a sudden um so successful out of the gate and that’s a really exciting time to invite

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an artist to work together so I first went to the Ferreira household in Dundas

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and I was welcomed there still during the pandemic we all had masks on but I was warmly

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welcomed into your family and as soon as I earned into your home and as soon as I

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got in there I thought oh yes because Roger had pulled out many of the things he had made and covered the whole living

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room and dining room and all the walls and everything was stacked and I thought there’s more than enough here to work

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with um and then I was asking Roger about every single piece where did you

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make this what’s the timeline here what were you focused on and we talked about these categories that we could kind of place your work into and and how this

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was all going to work and then I was going around the room and and then I got to this Shelf

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that Kathy pointed out in the dining room and it just says a lot because the entire shelf is full of the awards that

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they’re so remarkable distinguished family has won over the years in

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Hamilton for all of your incredible work so Kathy is a leader in her field of Social Work Kareem is obviously an

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artistic leader but also award-winning athlete and the two other sons are also

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award-winning and Roger is award-winning and the whole family is spectacular so I’m since then I keep learning more and

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more about how amazing they are and all of that is to say how very honored I am

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to be working with you that you let me and the gallery work with your work and

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bring it here together and add layers of interpretation and offer it to our

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audiences we feel very responsible in taking work out of your home that you’ll

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trust us to describe it properly to people and

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that’s that was my intention and all of that has fallen away because all that has come back is just people saying how

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much how much they love the show how much it means to them coming through here and that’s that’s now overtaken

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everything the the immense positive response that we’ve received

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so there’s lots to say about each of the works in the show and before I turn it

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over one last thing I want to ask is I believe that you all came here for a reason and it may be that you’re

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wondering something about one painting in here so if you each want to start to think of a question that you might like

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to ask I would love to know what you’re wondering about the work and why the

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artist made something or who’s in the image or who their favorite artist is or anything at all so I’ll open it up to

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questions after they speak but I would love to to have an interactive conversation

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um and so I asked Roger and Kareem to each pick two Works to please describe to us and that gives us more than enough

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to talk about because there’s a lot to talk about who would like to go first

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okay um first of all thank you for uh um first of all the opportunity to show

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back in Hamilton as I was away and as I’ve said that a

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lot of the work was made in the states and while I was making it it was tough because I

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knew that there wouldn’t necessarily be an opportunity for it to be shown in Hamilton

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so when you pitched the idea of being able to bring works from you know

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Private Collection that was the perfect opportunity to still have some of these

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Works back in Hamilton so thank you for having for uh pitching it and uh thank you all for coming out to

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um take in this artist talk I

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have picked out two pieces to talk about but I do want I would like to start with

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a little background on my work just a little more in depth into the ideas of

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my work and the process of making it um is that okay

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um so as was said my work is about

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growing up in two places in one in the kind of conversation that

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both Trinidad and Hamilton Ontario

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is having or has been having throughout my life and growing up

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being a part of two communities in two countries that are are different but

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also in some ways the same and I’ve been doing my best to kind of

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explore the the viewpoints that each place has of

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the other and kind of seeing how of adapted or picked up different things

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from each place so when you think sorry so when the

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people that I grew up around in Hamilton when they think of think or thought

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about the Caribbean growing up a lot of feedback or comments that I got is that

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they viewed Trinidad as a specifically tourist destination so when

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I would go home over the holidays to see family they’d be like oh you’re going on vacation thinking of like a like a Sandals Resort

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people like braiding their hair um so it was a very

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idealized marketed Viewpoint of what the Caribbean is and then thinking of the

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flip side of that kind of understanding what my cousins and aunts and stuff in the Caribbean

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think of what Canada is not a lot of them have even made it up here or been here before so

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it’s a very um kind of outside viewpoints of Canada is

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somewhat of like a winter ice Tundra like you know kind of very generalized ideas

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of what it actually is so I’ve been trying to like pick out specific things

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to represent both of those um viewpoints

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so a lot of my work you’ll see a lot of I’ve been playing with

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um I’ve been playing up the commercialized ideas of the Caribbean by bringing out a

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lot of Island print um like Hawaiian shirts and thinking of

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those patterns and what they mean and and what people associate the

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the symbols or specific flowers or fauna that you see

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in those patterns and how they instantly think of the Caribbean um kind of playing up that

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that idea so I’ve been taking that in and and putting it into these pictures

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of my families and like family specific family memories and

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um yeah so

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the two picks the two pieces that I’ve kind of picked out are are these two uh behind us here

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to kind of speak on that idea of a commercialized idea of the Caribbean

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this piece right here is called day at our beach the actual photos that were that were

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taken and compiled are I believe it was from a

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um a birthday party that happened actually in Hamilton

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and what I loved about what I loved when I just saw the

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the image you have this image of us actually in water

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and in you know playing and that that’s supposed to represent

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my parents trying to keep us connected to the Caribbean tried to bring that

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idea of like going to the beach um but bring it into Hamilton

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and what I loved about it was that the the front of the swimming pool you get this

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commercialized version of what they’re trying to sell to you when you have all these you know

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um children’s um drawings but they’re all like

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engaging in the water like with the water sports and things like that and that’s like the commercialized idea of

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the beach that they’re trying to sell to you so that you have those two layers of

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you know my parents bringing that beach to us and then but also using this marketed thing that is being being sold

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to you and then what I tried to do by by taking that and placing it

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onto a beach that’s uh Maracas Bay that is a a beach that we go to when we’re in

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Trinidad it’s a family beach it’s very um

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Personnel to me every time we go it has the best bacon shark

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uh and that is a I must go when we when you go to Trinidad so by taking it and

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placing it it’s it’s in a way connecting those three ideas

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of Trinidad being in Canada our parents trying to

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keep keeping us connected with the Caribbean and keeping us connected to our family there and still

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have us um

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like knowing our roots but also in a way seeing how

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in North America the these ideas of Beach and water sports and the Caribbean is also being

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sold back to us um so that’s day at a beach

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um the next one has a very long title that I uh that I chose but don’t always remember

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but I believe it’s boys at a ti-cats game with their friends

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in October 99 . a very long title but

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very easily describes what what is going on in this

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image and it’s obviously connected to Hamilton because that’s the that’s the the hometown Hamilton experience

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two things I want to mention with this I picked the name because that is also

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the what was written on the back of the actual

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image that was taken the actual photo that I used that was what was

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written on the back and that is very indicative of

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the time where disposable cameras were a thing but it was also a way that our

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families being in Hamilton could stay connected with our families in Trinidad

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back in the day when you got those disposal cameras when you took them you can get two prints you don’t I know you all remember that

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and obviously one pack would be sent to the Caribbean and one we would keep that one that we

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would keep so that was before cell phones that’s how we stay connected

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and stayed informed on the lives are of our my aunts and my

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cousins so that was just a little kind of connection to that

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and well I also I love about this piece is

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it’s it’s the flip side to a lot of the um Caribbean

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uh the Viewpoint of the Caribbean it’s it’s the Viewpoint of North America we

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are out in the middle of a winter at a sporting event and what I love about it is that

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this is a picture of me and my three brothers so are my two brothers three of us and we all got to bring one friend to

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the game and it’s interesting that the three of us all are bundled up in hats and coats and

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all three of our friends don’t have hats [Laughter]

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yeah knowing very clear that our parents aren’t aren’t used to this cold weather

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and made sure we bundle up and this is a piece that

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I really really wanted to have shown in

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Hamilton with the connection to the Thai cats and it’s a an experience

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that you have to have growing up in growing up in Hamilton going to attack

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that game and also I was lucky enough to go to the old diver one so

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it’s also connected to to me playing football as Melissa said so

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one thing that I love that you’re bringing up is that is the question of who Took the photo

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because some of them are Composites like the day at the beach is is three different images put together

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and to do that you use a projector just in case anyone’s wondering it’s uh so

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well like an overhead projector before that the um all the all the images are from as I

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said from family photos but some of them are vernacular images that I actually before the even before the projectors I

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have like taken and kind of pieced together and uh using Photoshop to kind

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of set up the image and then you know using projectors to to blow it up and move things around

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um in the larger scale yeah that’s something that’s really sweet that comes up in a few of your works so the ti-cats

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one is is straight from a from a photograph and it was Raj I assume it was Roger taking the photo so it’s sweet

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because some of these are like this painting wouldn’t exist unless Roger decided to take a photo at that time so

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it it further emphasizes the relation obviously the relationship between you two but it brings the whole show

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together even more and for example the one on the end is called small appliances that helped

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us fit yeah and that’s Roger just on the side and it looks like he’s taking a selfie of the moment her selfies right

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there so I’m curious actually how many of these I

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didn’t count like how many of these did Roger take be just curious one time I’ll think about that but it’s just it’s very

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sweet to think more and more about how your practices overlap and how you obviously watched him painting and

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making work as you were a child so thank you

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I didn’t mean to to end what you’re saying that’s a good place to end I think

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do you want to speak about a couple yeah or three I could talk about

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for me doing the art was both uh a place

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for me it was a way to get away from the stress and also to do something that I

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in my heart I always felt I must

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so the first painting a show is my arrow it’s

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these are paintings that have been like markers or mild posts in

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my career so that’s the first time that a teacher said that I was good

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um this is the watercolor the watercolor on the top of the two vertical ones yeah yeah so some people ask me when did I

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start knowing I I could paint so I remember crying for uh one of those

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watercolor sets you know they have the paint in the page already and my cousin got and he when he put the water on it

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just the colors all appeared so I wanted one of those instead of a

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hat and gun from the Western things and after that I won our Colgate

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competition I think I was about 10 years old but I had to wait until because there was no

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no art in school I went to St Mary’s College and didn’t have art as a subject you had to be able

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to afford to pay a private teacher for any kind of lessons

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so I began to work at the botanic gardens I did some drawings and stuff

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and then I was able to pay Mrs Howard she would go on to the beach on

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Saturdays and take her class to the beach and different places I didn’t get to go to

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and my arrow was the last

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painting I did where she said you know I think I’ve taught you all I can

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so you should try and get go away or something to learn some more

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what is especially and she taught me the difference between a painter and an artist

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now people can paint things like a photograph but when you begin to manipulate the

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feeling the emotion the feeling of the Wind

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if you look at the painting you will see that the wind is a lot of wind blowing and at that day

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it was pretty windy but I was able to capture the wind and and she said yeah this is it you got to do something else

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so I never went back to her after that I Was preparing to come abroad

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but because I was Canadian I was born in Winnipeg it seemed that you know that’s the place

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to go to and Kathy’s sister was here so yeah that’s how we began to make plans to

25:54

come to Canada after we came I went to Scott Park because they had a

26:01

daycare and I could put my son into daycare there and go to

26:08

classes because they didn’t accept my qualifications as a

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tropical agronomist I went to Ikea which is Eastern Caribbean and I taught Farmers how to

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Farm using new techniques that the government wanted us to teach them

26:30

so that was my that was my the top of my career I wanted to go to university so

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when I came to Canada I made plans to go to university Kathy made plans to go to university and she changed her job as

26:43

well and I went to Scott Park for a year

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and there was the first time I was in an art class I was like wow this is awesome

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right they had paint before that when I went to Mrs Howard I

27:01

had two brushes and each of them cost me like almost a fortune you know because like 20 bucks for me it was at that time

27:08

was pretty expensive a brush so I only had two brushes and I saw

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those same brushes in the classroom I was like wow you mean we get to use these for

27:19

free so I started to uh paint

27:24

everything I could I tried this I tried that I tried printmaking I was just hopping from one discipline because I

27:31

didn’t know I just knew I could draw but I didn’t know how to do any other other media

27:37

so I tried everything and that’s why you see a number of different approaches because I’m always trying

27:43

something new I don’t want to get bored or lacks I’m always pushing the boundaries trying to get something new

27:50

going so the other painting I want to show you is

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uh when the other time I was told that my painting was good and it

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was it transcended the class was

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it’s in the corner there so the assignment is the first time I

28:17

got an actual art assignment and I had to research

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so I was learning to research and learning about other artists and I researched an artist I was

28:30

flipping through the art books and I saw this guy achimboldo which is a

28:36

16th century Italian but he was doing something which I never

28:43

saw before he was using the person’s career like if they they

28:49

sold meat he would use meat if there were a fishmonger he would use fish and

28:54

Squid to make the person’s face so he’s got so you know this is a challenge you’re using portraiture

29:01

and you you’re using still life to create portraiture I say yeah if I could do this

29:08

I might get some good comments on my teacher so I researched after action

29:13

Boulder and then I thought of making it into something Caribbean

29:19

so for you to appropriate an artist you have to make it yours right because

29:25

why bother so I decided to make it root crops and there was a song I liked root not

29:31

you Roots dread kinky dread from Bob Marley so it began to use it as an

29:37

allegory for you are what you eat and if you continue to consume your own

29:44

Roots you will always be strong so I

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saw Bob Marley’s backup group they were called cistern

29:56

and I named her sister and I used all the root crops you could think about

30:01

so the ears are ginger the onions edoes from Africa

30:08

cassava you know all of the root cups and after I did the watercolor it turned

30:14

out pretty good for I thought and the teacher was happy but I decided I’m gonna push it a little

30:21

more I’m going to use this new paint called acrylics which I never used before and I did the male version which

30:30

I kind of used I also tried to do a self-portrait I don’t know if it came

30:35

out good or not but I use self portrait and I was doing too many things at the

30:42

same time but I wanted to do everything at the same time and so that’s uh

30:48

Idle Man I tell man is what they the Rastafarians call a person who is

30:56

cool who doesn’t eat meat eating meat is is not part of the some

31:02

Rastafarians uh cult or their religion

31:08

so I use vegetables again to make up his face so that’s

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one two the last one I want to show you before is another time which I made a transcending

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leap and the teacher said yeah give me a

31:27

thumbs up was uh if you look outside there’s a a professor named Hugh you will see him and um he went at McMaster

31:33

I went to McMaster and there was also an assignment I had to

31:41

come up with a group of paintings by a certain time now I was kind of leaving it to the last

31:48

minute and I had to hand it in on Monday I think and

31:54

at home the boys were jumping and we bought some new Ikea furniture but the boys were jumping on the

32:00

furniture and it it busted right through so I was like oh man two two problems I

32:06

got an assignment and I got busted furniture so I looked at a

32:12

frame of dfinity and I thought you know if they had put just a piece of plywood it would be fine

32:18

but they use like a piece of sugar bag what we called um nylon or something to bag to make

32:27

this sofa that held up the cushions so I ripped it

32:33

off and then I put I took canvas and free and um stretched the canvas on it

32:40

and then I said okay I got my canvas for next week and I had a small newspaper clipping of

32:46

a woman who was being ignored at the church steps by some other women

32:54

who were dressed in their finest so said hey that looks to me

33:00

like the Good Samaritan I don’t know if you know the story of the Good Samaritan

33:06

but his fellow Jews didn’t

33:12

pick him up after he was assaulted and his money taken and he was beaten up

33:17

but a Samaritan who was his enemy took him up

33:23

cleaned them up and took him to the hotel and say you know whatever it costs I will pay

33:29

and then Jesus asked who is his neighbor is it his countrymen or is it this

33:35

Samaritan who is his enemy and it stumped a lot of people so I used that but I used woman

33:43

for the Good Samaritan so these two women are ignoring somebody who has a baby and who is homeless

33:50

on the steps of the church so again I’m putting

33:57

I’m taking from today from tomorrow from yesterday and I’m

34:03

trying to make it into one thing at the same time yeah can I ask you to tell about one

34:09

more just because people always ask about the largest painting or the largest one

34:15

uh again I’m learning to study

34:22

For the First Time study artists in general and I have art history to do

34:29

and I have art to do at the same time because I’m taking an art history and art degree

34:35

and that one was one I had to hand in for a culminating activity

34:41

so I looked at I was studying Guernica by Picasso

34:47

and his this his work was about the Spanish war in which there was a

34:53

massacre and I looked at that and I said wow you know he did it in pen in pen and ink

35:01

it was just a drawing but I thought at that time Rwanda was going on in the

35:08

news so I looked at the newspaper and I saw Rwanda and I thought this is kind of

35:15

similar here we’re having a massacre in history and we have a massacre today

35:21

this thing is is not new it’s human beings seem to be doing

35:27

this to each other from ever so I took

35:33

different clippings and I assembled them together and then I use I didn’t use uh

35:39

like cream has the benefit of a projector but I just I didn’t have that at the time but I

35:46

just um use took a clipping I I use Picasso as the

35:51

the work if you see if you put grenica next to it you would see the similarity

35:56

it starts with a triangle people are standing straight up and then they they the society crashes and you can see

36:05

that in the painting somebody is that guy in the green is being pushed by somebody else and then he is pushing

36:11

against other people and they’re all falling down and at the end of it you see there’s a

36:16

dead a dead person and a person suffering they are melting

36:21

so it’s just the collapse of the society

36:27

into Anarchy and you know the same thing

36:32

that Picasso witnessed it’s an amazing painting and I always

36:39

think like what would happen if if you had four more canvases what what you would

36:46

paint if it if it had been at the time or even now if if you were to

36:52

keep going at that scale that’s my that’s my wish for you after the show thanks

36:57

so I uh I don’t know if if you understand how I don’t know if my my

37:03

mind works like other people’s but I’m always collecting information and seeing things and then maybe I’ll sketch it or

37:10

maybe I’ll take a picture of it and I keep it for later that’s like fun and I don’t know if I some of them many of

37:16

them I never get to but when I needed something I had something connects

37:22

then I go searching and then I find it and then I try to bring it back yeah

37:27

Kareem do you have like an inventory of ideas that is coming to next

37:33

next um I yes I still have a lot of different

37:40

images that I’ve kind of like stockpiled and plan to work with

37:45

different kind of ideas that uh that I’m trying to play up um so yeah I do have a lot and I’ve

37:52

actually been starting to reach out to like cousins and stuff to see what

37:58

stockpiled images they they have and to see how it you know it compares to the

38:03

one that I have so it could go in a lot of different directions yeah

38:09

I’d love to check if you have questions that you would like either artists to speak to

38:15

you your hand up is up first

38:30

yeah um I have a watercolor book that says the same thing if as a if you’re a

38:35

painter lots of painters just can replicate

38:41

what they actually see so that’s fine but then

38:48

if you take it beyond that whereas it is something new you are

38:54

creative your creative mind is making something that never existed before

39:00

you know you are capturing something which is beyond the natural it seems

39:07

then you are considered the book says you are considered an artist

39:12

because it it’s you it’s not something that you can find anywhere else

39:17

it’s an original piece and you can do that in anything you know you can do that with film with fashion

39:23

right it’s something that has never appeared on this Earth before so that’s

39:28

the transcending to an artist

39:34

yeah definitely I mean you could tell a Kareem Ferreira it’s his own even the framing of it you

39:44

know it’s a unique thing that never existed before so

39:51

Bob

40:07

yes like I’ve been talking to some of my cousins uh

40:14

and asking them to just do what I’ve done and you know look at

40:19

their collection of old family photos and you know pull up pull out some

40:24

interesting ones for me if they can or want to um just to kind of see what they have and

40:31

how it kind of compares to the collection that I’ve collected or sorry we’ve conducted over the years

40:37

they actually are all my parents photos that I’ve taken and have been using but

40:45

yeah I have quite a few cousins my uh

40:53

they’re all in Trinidad I have yeah I think I’m my mom’s side alone I

41:00

think we had around it was around 20 or something cousins on that one side yeah and then

41:06

I think I think 21st cousins yeah Kathy comes from a family of nine yeah

41:13

I come from a family of six so

41:24

it is it is right now this you know I as this is the work that I’m currently exploring up in

41:30

luckily enough to have these uh personal memories like collected over

41:38

the years and you know bringing together

41:45

these old photos they they they not they aren’t always

41:52

pieced together in like uh sequential orders so sometimes I’ll put together

41:57

images that aren’t um lined up like

42:04

you could have someone replicated in it in the image like the image in the hall

42:09

when you’re coming in there’s uh two shots of me in the same photo

42:15

piece together just um due to

42:21

you know concept the idea of it being my memory seeing it and remembering it

42:27

many different ways me memory remembering it different from someone else who was there

42:34

um and I’d love that the bring together of

42:39

this old form of Photography this new form of Technology being able to scan it and

42:46

move around in in Photoshop the idea of portraiture it all kind of

42:52

connects it into into one piece so yeah

43:06

thank you that’s an at the natural kind of thing that happens or happens in it you know

43:13

when there’s a camera out someone always tries to you know look at the camera and

43:18

so that’s a thank you there’s another question in the back

43:56

um the dinner scene on this wall um first of all each piece

44:04

due to the you know the process and the size I

44:09

work on a few at a time so a lot of times I’ll

44:15

like start with start the process of you know cutting the canvas and prepping the canvas and then

44:21

um at the same time when I’m not in the studio I can be putting together the images and and all

44:27

that stuff and then once once that’s done and the canvases are done then it’s like prepping the surface

44:34

um so a lot of them are being worked on like simultaneously but on average they

44:40

probably take like a month and a half two months from like idea

44:46

um starting the campus and then painting the painting is actually probably the the quickest part of it

44:54

um depending on if I can you know sit down and get into the mood or stay focused and

45:01

but and that dinner scene particularly

45:07

um a lot of the

45:14

images do come from Gatherings and that’s why it is the the name and the

45:21

theme but it’s the coming together of family the coming together of

45:27

People Like Us and

45:33

that particular um Peace is

45:38

a very special memory that I have of growing up in

45:44

Hamilton the the woman in the the middle that’s kind

45:49

of focused around is a close family friend

45:56

um my Aunt Karen’s mom and we would spend a lot of particular

46:04

like Thanksgiving and Christmases spent at her house and she

46:09

I always opened her door to us and we always and we still are are very close so that that particular piece isn’t so

46:17

much about the the event that’s kind of the second the

46:23

secondary aspect of it is more about you know highlighting her as this

46:30

um more than more than a person more than a person to me and

46:35

that’s why she’s like the main focal point and the the Gathering in that image is actually is secondary

46:42

but yeah I don’t know if that

47:03

um you know that’s a hard one that to

47:12

to answer because it is something that growing up I knew

47:20

out of all the subjects in school like that and Jim I knew I could do without thinking like it just came

47:26

naturally to me and it is something that I just

47:31

um was drawn to I liked the the the ability to kind of solve a problem

47:39

um and and the want to like make things I’ve always I’ve always had

47:45

but art was always and there’s always an activity like

47:53

going to school or or playing sports like there was always something

47:59

that we were either involved as kids or my dad was involved in that had some

48:05

sort of artistic Outlet so it was always around so it was obviously a big

48:11

influence whether that was his projects whether that was

48:19

um you know things in the community that we took part in my dad also ran summer

48:24

camps every summer as and they were always art focused so

48:31

I I yes I probably would have pursued it but it but also I I could have not

48:39

it was just always a part of my my upbringing

48:51

I I keep telling them all I’m just glad to be here I’m just happy uh two things I want to tell you about

48:58

when we say aunts and uncles these people are not really our aunts you know because we adopted them because when we

49:04

came to Canada we didn’t sorry um and

49:10

in our village yeah it’s in in our it’s in it’s in our

49:16

village it’s like finding forests I don’t know if you know that movie but in our village your moms and dad’s friends

49:24

you know you refer to them as Auntie and Uncle that’s it you don’t say Mr

49:29

so-and-so or you don’t say Fred or you know no you it’s close enough but he’s firing you

49:37

know he still has to be respected so Uncle so on so if he if he’s hanging if it’s your mom’s friend or your dad’s

49:42

friend you know that’s it and the other thing about Kareem I’d like to add cream always had that talent but you know

49:49

sometimes what I noticed there’s a guy in school in Trinidad who

49:54

was better than I was when I was I admired him he used to draw a lot of cowboy pictures I always

50:01

admired his works I went back to Trinidad and I saw him so Sylvester what’s going on I said are you still

50:07

drawing do I stopped drawing since in in sentence Primary School

50:12

he never continued yeah so what I know so I thought you

50:18

know somebody I if Kareem is good take him along bring him along and so I made them forcibly

50:26

there it is I wanted them to be part of Hamilton

50:31

history so I and the answer I Rise project I took them all the way to Guelph and I made them paint the wheels

50:39

of the thing you know or when we had um the project on the school

50:46

I made them sign their names or write a poem or something so when they get older and they say

50:53

you know my dad made me I’m part of that I I designed I have to do that painting

50:58

you know so that is the other party you can’t really eat you don’t know how to how can you give

51:04

that you know you just I have to babysit them I have nowhere else to take them you got to do what I

51:10

do right I’m from I see this when we were doing

51:15

uh for instance murals I would say okay you know how to paint a wall you just paint this for me and he’s there he’s

51:22

busy doing something he’s not getting in trouble I know where he is

51:28

so and look at what happened [Laughter]

51:36

yes I think there was a question up front yeah

51:53

Okay so this is the sculpture in the corner this

51:59

is the sculpture in the corner there so I began to right now my uh

52:05

my mind and my whole body everything is towards finding out more about Jesus

52:13

I was introduced to him but I never really had a personal relationship

52:19

and for me he said when I started to read the Bible

52:24

more I realized he had to have one to get into heaven so he he says to people I never knew you

52:34

he said I did all this stuff I was an acolyte it was I helped in church but then he says hey I don’t know you so

52:41

that’s what I believe everyone needs to have a personal relationship with God so

52:46

for that one I was exploring all the times that that God had saved the DNA so

52:54

that his son could come true right and when God was President for his

53:00

people so this one here in the corner is when if you look behind you you see a

53:06

type of Arc it’s called that’s when um you know Moses mom put

53:12

him into the so it’s it is called an ark in Hebrew

53:18

and this is the Ark of the government when God would dwelt with his people and protected him

53:23

and then the other time was Noah’s Ark when he also saved Noah he was a good man and he tried to keep him from

53:30

getting so the devil has always been trying to mess with the DNA so that Jesus wouldn’t be able wouldn’t even

53:35

have a virgin to come through and see if the rest of humanity so that’s my belief

53:40

and that is what I tried to express so I did the three arcs Noah’s Ark it’s too

53:45

big for me to I’m just kidding it’s about this size it’s not and I would and my my uh

53:54

my ceramic teachers in the crowd tonight so can you raise your hand this is where

53:59

[Laughter] so she taught me uh I did a a stint at

54:08

dvsa for Columbia College so I could teach Ceramics she taught me and I tried

54:15

to make us bigger project again I’m pushing the envelope I wonder how much how how what what’s the largest thing I

54:22

could do in this kill and and that is the largest thing I could do in the kill

54:31

yes thank you I I have to have something a challenge and that’s what you know it mentally if

54:38

you do art and it’s not mentally challenging to the people who are looking at it oh I’ve seen that you know

54:44

that’s the approach anyway yes in the back yeah

55:00

not anymore foreign I have worked with Kareem lately and

55:08

Kareem is teaching me a lot of stuff because he is in the present he has all this

55:14

stuff that wow I didn’t know you could do that right look for instance I had to log this big painting around I

55:22

and it couldn’t fit in my my car and I had to ask the boys to wear gloves and

55:28

hold it down in the winter to Move It from McMaster so we would tie it down but it still would be blowing up and everybody’s hand

55:35

is not true story foreign so but look at what Kareem has invented

55:41

he put a thick canvas on that and he rolls that up and sends it to Belgium who knew it looks simple but I didn’t

55:49

think of that so I don’t tell Kareem what to do it he

55:58

is this one here because I’m in it [Laughter]

56:06

laughs

56:12

um my favorite actually my favorite

56:18

some of my favorite work that my dad has made was some of the prints he did when he was at Mac

56:25

um he actually has one of them hanging in that show next door I should also check that out

56:33

um I liked it so much I found them in the basement and then got them framed

56:39

and then he took them back to put it in the show laughs

56:47

um but yeah that those pieces are like it wasn’t until I actually

56:53

[Music] like took a class and understood the process of of those prints that I

57:00

actually like understood how difficult they were and and you know seeing them again I was like

57:06

wow I don’t know these like this was a a very good body of work but painting wise

57:11

um I I can definitely see

57:16

where I you know picked up some of the

57:21

the painting techniques that I have in my work I can see a connection to these

57:27

two the two larger ones um just the way that

57:33

the paint is handled I can kind of see where things that I’ve pulled and you and the um bag and some of the dresses

57:41

in the Haiti painting the

57:47

vertical one there’s a lot of actual collage elements into it and I can you

57:54

know also where I picked up some of the ideas of not necessarily not necessarily even the

58:01

ideas of it but when I started painting I I already knew that that was something that was

58:08

possible you know being able to see it in my dad’s work um thinking about

58:14

not just painting on a flat surface but putting something down and be still being able to paint on top

58:23

of it so you when you look at the painting you read it two different ways when you see it from

58:30

afar it looks like a flat painted surface but you go up you can actually see some of the textures that you think

58:36

is painted is actually the actual object that is collaged onto it

58:42

um yeah and that’s you know what I’ve kind of Taken and done my best to adapt in my

58:48

work I didn’t notice that until you brought it together because now I look across it

58:56

wait a second here you know it’s similar what’s going on

59:01

here right but I never noticed no I never noticed that

59:07

the collaging was similar so some of the work is when you put it

59:13

together like we never I for me all a lot of this stuff was in the basement you know

59:19

stored up not cataloged or anything just like okay I’m had enough of this painting put it away

59:26

and then I pull it out or finish it but for the show it was a challenge now

59:33

wait a second here I’m in the art gallery I can’t you know I can’t I can’t mess around here this is a professional I gotta I

59:40

gotta come good and then he said Dad um my paintings are

59:47

much larger than yours uh maybe you need some more canvas so he brought this big

59:53

canvases to me and said for my Christmas you know so I have no excuse now I got

59:59

professional canvas professional brushes I got to come up to speed so thank you

1:00:06

for that I never noticed that he had collage from from my paintings in there although I saw his

1:00:13

paintings and I saw mine but I never connected it but once you’re in the same room you’re

1:00:18

like you know so it’s a surprise and then uh

1:00:24

yeah

1:00:36

good question um I liked uh he should introduce me to

1:00:43

Basquiat and I like how he is I take a little bit

1:00:50

from different people um his immediacy and it’s not like you don’t care but

1:00:58

it it’s about getting the message across more than anything else right and

1:01:04

whatever you have to do to get the message across you do is before I used to be painting like uh

1:01:11

for commercial purposes because for most of my earlier works it was trying to

1:01:16

make money let’s face it I got some big boys I gotta feed them I got University to take care of right I

1:01:23

promised them I don’t know if it was I foolishly promised them that if they did reach certain thing we would have we

1:01:30

would cover the rest of the stuff right so I’m just kidding so it’s just always

1:01:35

uh like forces she’s coming after me and I have to Ride Like the Wind so I was always

1:01:41

trying to to sell stuff as well as a Hustle so I didn’t really think about

1:01:47

following anybody I just took oh I like this part of this work I like this part of that person’s work and I and I’d use

1:01:54

it they

1:02:01

oh okay yes

1:02:06

I see what you mean I’ve seen his work I’ve I just

1:02:11

I just appropriate what I want from other people and yeah and I don’t

1:02:17

yeah I just make it mine

1:02:24

thank you

1:02:36

yes

1:02:45

yes that’s uh

1:02:51

so that’s that’s Rosa Park and that’s her Prison number

1:02:57

yeah so what we do as artists is we we leave things in there that you will

1:03:04

question and unanswered questions either because we don’t know the answer or we would

1:03:11

like some discussion about it like I see the same thing in Kareem’s work right you know like for instance that one

1:03:17

there’s a foot going somewhere and you don’t see who it’s connected to him so it’s always that that’s what I mean

1:03:24

by the human mind likes to be teased likes to be

1:03:31

you know because as soon as they work something out they’re like I know what that is about but

1:03:36

if it’s a question you’re like this is bothering me I I have to answer this question you know

1:03:43

so that’s it yes that painting is called peace March and

1:03:49

I’m sure you recognized the other figures in it there’s Gandhi

1:03:54

Rosa Parks Malcolm X yeah that Malcolm X um Martin Luther King Martin Luther King

1:04:05

yeah so this is not again this is Imagination

1:04:10

the mountains are a Wilderness so we are walking in a Wilderness in the dark

1:04:17

right but the Bible says we are the light of the world so these people

1:04:24

have held up different types of light like there’s a flashlight there’s a

1:04:29

torch there is a candle right and all of us for freedom

1:04:36

for truth we have to shine our light we have to say something against the

1:04:42

darkness that is increasing in the world we see it all every day so if you have to you have to

1:04:48

shine our light and there’s those are the people that started it but if you see people following everybody has to do that in

1:04:55

order for the room to get brighter so it’s a Wilderness the mountains are in the wilderness they’re in the like in

1:05:00

a desert in the dark but it’s allegorical it’s not

1:05:06

Maggie

1:05:39

thank you

1:05:45

um yeah I mean I I as I said this this show and you know

1:05:52

showing at this place was it is a dream that I’ve had

1:05:58

you know growing up in Hamilton and coming from um you know being surrounded by Art and

1:06:06

even every summer when we would have my dad would do the

1:06:12

the art camps this was always a stop that would be like one of the

1:06:19

field trips that he would take us to so growing up here and coming here every

1:06:25

you know every summer and seeing the artwork and being around the artwork

1:06:30

and it has it has been a dream to to one day have my work on the walls and

1:06:39

there’s like no better feeling be able to do it with with my with my dad so

1:06:45

I hope you have taken a moment to understand how you know big this is and

1:06:51

how how Full Circle it’s come being

1:06:59

and seeing you know this place over the years but now

1:07:05

having your work on the roles and and me having the honor to have my work on the

1:07:10

walls with you um and to go from here it’s

1:07:16

I feel it’s only to bigger and better things hopefully

1:07:22

um I have I still have a story to tell I still have I’m still

1:07:29

growing on that story every day that I that I’m living so I am

1:07:36

trying to do my best to communicate what my

1:07:43

my immediate family is what my my family and my relatives in Trinidad my

1:07:48

grandparents um I’m trying to represent

1:07:56

the you know it’s a son of a of immigrants you know first

1:08:04

first generation um represent black artists black youth

1:08:09

in Hamilton black youth in Canada and I hope that my work is going to

1:08:16

continue to kind of push push the limits of what that means to be all those

1:08:22

different things um I guess that’s the dream to continue to

1:08:28

kind of push those boundaries and um have people connect with my work on as many

1:08:35

different fronts as possible I guess that’s that’s where I’m going

1:08:44

what about you it has been a dream man until the dream

1:08:51

was like ah this will never happen and then it happened

1:08:56

so you know when you pray for something and you could even you could forget

1:09:02

about it but God doesn’t forget and when I heard that I was like

1:09:09

I take a few deep breaths because I don’t want to get you know I don’t want to wake up the mic and everything

1:09:15

because I’ll get emotional but yeah it’s been a

1:09:20

33 decades and a bit of dreaming

1:09:27

right 61 so but I feel like a young man inside so

1:09:34

I’ll keep going I’ll keep going because I’ve been

1:09:41

rejuvenated by this and I haven’t told anything I’ve just basically thought you know

1:09:47

is always trying to survive it’s always trying to survive when you get a chance to just

1:09:53

and you’re at the age where you don’t care what people think you know what I’m saying I guess that’s

1:09:59

my dream my dream for his work is to now that you know I feel a lot of a lot of

1:10:06

uh well growing up he obviously had us three and as he said his work did take a

1:10:12

somewhat of a turn to to provide to provide for us and to give me the

1:10:19

opportunity to to pursue the career that I wanted my brothers as well and I hope that dream

1:10:26

for his work is that he he now can you know explore whatever he wants and it doesn’t need to be

1:10:33

for that reason financially you know he can he can explore things that he wants for because he wants to do it so I guess

1:10:41

that’s my dream for his work as well I am I’m amazed I’m just happy to be

1:10:47

here I’d like you to see that

1:10:53

what else can I say that’s because you deserve to be here and yeah

1:10:59

thank you so much for for being here on behalf of the gallery we’re so grateful

1:11:04

to show this work and to offer it to people to learn from and relate to and

1:11:11

just be in this like really joyful space of beautiful paintings or work that

1:11:16

you’ve made and um we’re just we feel really lucky that that we get to to kind of share this

1:11:22

time with you and the exhibition is still on until January early January so

1:11:28

there’s still lots of time for everyone to bring their friends um

1:11:33

so I think we’re going to wrap it up unless there’s anything else that you would like to share

1:11:40

um I think I think that’s a good place to end it unless any there’s any more questions any questions oh one more

1:12:14

for the way

1:12:25

so the yes the um

1:12:31

the way that I have it mounted did come from you know again

1:12:38

being in a situation where I needed to solve a problem and I think what’s what’s great about it is it’s

1:12:45

um indicative of being from you know from two places at once so

1:12:51

I actually preferred to work on like panel board like wood because it

1:12:58

was very rigid and I never really liked working on stretch canvas

1:13:03

and in 2018 I did a residency in Trinidad

1:13:10

at Alice yard and I made these I wanted to work large scale like I had been working

1:13:17

but I had the problem of being able to ship it and bring it with me from Trinidad back to Arizona so

1:13:26

thinking about how to be able to do that it

1:13:32

it isn’t completely my idea I’m not taking credit for that at all it was I’ve actually an artist that I enjoy is

1:13:40

a Carrie James Marshall he’s an American painter and some of his work is also

1:13:47

hung in a similar way where he has these kind of large

1:13:55

Flats of material that he attaches his paintings to and they they can also be rolled up in a similar way

1:14:02

so that that was just you know adapting to to the situation I had and but it was a

1:14:11

way that I could also work on the paintings flat against the wall and still have

1:14:16

that richness of the wall but them being on canvas and then being able to roll

1:14:21

them up in and you know shift them easily but I also love them

1:14:29

because they have a like a very unique feel to them they

1:14:36

also read as object or as an object and they they

1:14:41

when handling they have like a very unique weight to them that um

1:14:47

I never really got with stretch canvas moving to the actual surface

1:14:54

um again coming from working on panel I

1:15:00

I would also really enjoy using like found wood that I would find

1:15:07

and the wood would come with its own kind of texture and own history of where

1:15:13

it was and then I loved being able to take that and paint on it and then

1:15:19

evolving from that I was really enjoying the collage and of the surface

1:15:24

and not working from a flat white surface building building up the ground

1:15:30

and I was also exploring um

1:15:37

a trait that I that I see in my family I see in the Caribbean the idea of

1:15:44

reusing and repurposing found materials in a way to

1:15:52

preserve memory like keeping things when someone passes you know keeping their

1:15:58

stuff and keeping relics and things to to prolong their memory and and keep

1:16:05

them close to you and

1:16:10

there’s again two sides to that there is

1:16:17

a positive because you are you know keeping the memory there’s a positive because you are you know taking

1:16:23

an object and giving it another life and reusing it and repurposing it but also there is

1:16:29

at times uh an overbuild of of items and then you get when you think

1:16:36

of like clutter and like um houses being packed full of these

1:16:43

sacred memories but on the outside it looks

1:16:49

unkept or um

1:16:54

unclean or something like that so you know playing with playing with that idea of of

1:17:02

finding these objects and and bringing them together for a visual aesthetic but also

1:17:09

understanding that there’s this like build up of of of ground and that was

1:17:14

something that I was kind of pursuing previously and it isn’t the fork run of

1:17:20

this work so it is just kept kind of as the ground of the work

1:17:26

but moving forward I was I was you know taking that idea of

1:17:31

of the island print and the island symbols and I wanted to think of a way to

1:17:39

kind of embed more more information into the work so what I started to do

1:17:45

was to you know cut paper and it was too

1:17:52

in a way symbolize you know in like kindergarten classes when they when

1:17:57

they give kids paper to fold up and then cut into snowflakes it was supposed to be like an

1:18:04

abstraction of that so you would have the Island prints kind of collage into the

1:18:10

surface where you can see um on the surface but there’s these like

1:18:16

cut paper snowflakes that are embedded into the surface

1:18:22

but then to take it a step further I was thinking well how can I get the island print into the surface and

1:18:28

then I started to take out specific identifying things of the island

1:18:35

plant-like specific hibiscus flowers or like tropical fish

1:18:41

and then cutting them either cutting them out in paper I played around with using

1:18:47

like a laser cutter to cut out shapes into paper

1:18:52

and then I would have these kind of stencils that I either cut up and glued onto the surface

1:18:58

I use them to to spray paint you know the relief onto

1:19:05

the surface as well I was you know pushing gel medium through so they would

1:19:10

be these like hunks of gel medium that I could then paint over in the shape of those those forms so it’s just

1:19:17

a way to again bring more meaning into the surface and and bring more

1:19:25

memories or ideas into it as well so

1:19:32

the surface you know has its own kind of um

1:19:37

history or or or representation as well as the actual image and again to play to

1:19:43

that idea of seeing a work and it having two or multiple different

1:19:48

ways of viewing it um seeing it as the image and seeing

1:19:55

the work that goes into the image and the cutting up of the of the photos the

1:20:01

cutting the cutting up of the memories the bringing together memories just seeing the photo but then actually

1:20:08

seeing it as this physical object coming closer and then seeing

1:20:13

the the work and the stuff the the work that goes into the surface as a

1:20:20

completely different um pieces in itself

1:20:27

and how those uh the layering and how

1:20:33

having the painting on top of it and how that works differently yeah

1:20:39

it’s definitely a it’s definitely a revelatory moment when people like they

1:20:44

they see they work from over there and then they come closer and closer and then they’re like whoa who is this this like I think it does or even when people

1:20:51

see it online they they have no idea and then they come seat and personally like whoa yeah so yeah well thank you so much

1:20:58

for for spending time and sharing all of this very valuable beautiful information

1:21:04

about your work and thank you all for coming and we have a bar straight down

1:21:10

there that’s open for a half an hour if you want to stay and enjoy refreshments

1:21:15

and other than that I think as I said the show is on until January 8th and please come back

1:21:21

and thank you again thank you [Applause]

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