Dr Rita Pemberton
The development of the visual arts in Tobago, which was influenced by the island’s history, culture and environment, occurred in four phases which began from the earliest times, when the island was occupied by the First Peoples.
They were the island’s first visual artists, whose art was an integral part of their everyday lives. They lived with and through their art, which can be seen in their tools and weapons of stone, shells, wood and animal bones, their simple household furnishings and their religious images.
In the formal organisation of an art movement, three broad periods can be detected, commencing with the Tobago Art Group (TAG), from just before independence up to about 1980; the Art Committee of Tobago (ACT), up to about 2000; and leading up to the current Tobago Visual Arts Association (TVAA).
The second phase was that of the Europeans who submitted maps and images of the island to convince their home governments of the merits of gaining possession of the island and the prospects it offered for profitable colonisation.
The first known images of it were those captured by Sir William Young II, baronet, and Governor of Tobago from 1807-1815, who provided images of Tobago’s scenery in 1807-1812 intended to sell the idea of the investment potential the island offered.
In 1834, D Mc Arthur produced an image entitled Scarboro.
The internationally renowned English photographer Norman Parkinson, who took up residence in Tobago in 1954, captured several images of the island, some of which were used at major international fashion shows.
During the second phase, when the British gained possession of the island in 1763, Africans were introduced to provide labour on the sugar and other plantations established there. Their overly demanding work schedule precluded their involvement in visual arts, and in addition, everything African was cast in the negative and classified as primitive, pagan, obscene, subhuman and therefore undesirable, and to be stamped out in favour of European-style “civilisation.” This negativity was endorsed by schools and churches and by the ruling and upwardly mobile groups which upheld adherence to European values and practices for a long time.
However, the Africans resisted and gave expression to their cultural traditions, which served as their source of strength. The strongest contribution of enslaved Africans was to the performing arts, in music and dance.
Art was not considered a serious subject for the early, church-run schools, and where it was offered in the later-established primary schools, it was diversionary. When secondary schools were established, art was not considered suitable for students at the grammar-type institutions, who should be prepared for careers in “useful professions.”
[caption id="attachment_1007080" align="alignnone" width="255"] Dr Rita Pemberton -[/caption]
The precursor to change came through a push from below during the third phase of the development of art. The first Tobagonians to become involved in the visual arts w
