Tag Archives: Leroy Clarke

Culture, General T&T

The Passing of the Pointer Man

By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe
August 31, 2021

PART 3

“Pointerman/The crossroad is self…./ seek the source of rivers/ begin here, in your hands, begin/each beginning,/new beginnings/ like vertiginous sacraments of water/ begin at the navel’s resolve, new/ incarnate flower.”

—LeRoy Clarke, Douens: Poems and Drawings

Dr. Selwyn R. CudjoePainting was LeRoy Clarke’s true forte, but he was equally adept at poetry. In Parables of Joyless Days, Clarke described himself as “The Poet Who Paints With Words.” In 1981, he shocked our sensibilities when he cried: “Carpenter, shoemaker, dancer, wirebender,/ let me be the Artist—Poet—Farmer./ I will fork this earth, with my tongue/ let me plunge into your ear/ through syllables of violet, the science of turquoise, / through populous ochres and energetic reds/ through fathomless greens, through supplicant blue, / through the arterial vegetation of the rainbow” (Douens).
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Culture, General T&T, Passed on

The Passing of the Pointer Man

By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe
August 23, 2021

PART 2

EL TUCUCHE can be made the symbol of our greatest achievements—it is graced with the sovereignty that represents our transcendent power over Douendom where we are still held in disarray and ignorance. Above all, is Aripo, symbolically, the Eye am that Eye am, the one God in whose house there are many mansions, and to which many are the paths!

—LeRoy Clarke, Parables of Our Joyless Days

Dr. Selwyn R. CudjoeIn the 1950s a modern phase of T&T’s artistic development revealed itself in the paintings of M. P. Alladin, Geoffrey and Boscoe Holder, Leo Basso, Alfred Codallo, and Carlisle Chang. In “Painting in Trinidad and Tobago,” Pat Bishop declared: “These painters were not merely taking the brave step of painting in black face but were also prepared to participate in the modification or destruction of traditional image making.”
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Culture, General T&T, Passed on, Race and Identity

The Passing of the Pointer Man

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By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe
August 16, 2021

PART 1

“I maintain that art at its best reveals to us the fullness of what it means to be human.”

—Ben Okri, The Theatre Diaries

Dr. Selwyn R. CudjoeNo creative personality writes, paints or sculpts outside of his/her time and place. Necessarily a product of his history and his geography, s/he always tries to cast a light on the perils that confront his people. In so doing, s/he reflects on the truths and failings of humanity as well. LeRoy Clarke, our master-blaster, resided in that elevated region of greatness. He took on the persona “The Eye” to illuminate the perils that confronted his nation. In the words of our Orisha devotees, he was a Seer (he would have said Obeah) man, who strove assiduously to illumine the darkness that enveloped his people.
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Africa, Culture, Gender, General T&T, Media

Homosexuality threatens the arts, fuels crime—Clarke

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By Yvonne Baboolal
February 25, 2014 – guardian.co.tt

Leroy ClarkeHomosexuality is not only threatening the arts but is used to indoctrinate gang members, says artist LeRoy Clarke. The T&T Guardian asked Clarke to elaborate on the comment he made last week at his book launch which shocked and outraged some of his fellow artists, members of the gay community and others. In a phone interview yesterday, Clarke related homosexuality to the increase in crime, saying young men are usually indoctrinated into gangs with homosexuality and because of the violation of their manhood use the gun as a symbol of their masculinity.
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