The Nude: from the perspective of artist and model

The artist and model. (click on the image to view video)

My recent posts have delved into the relationship between artist and poet, whereas my latest video explores the creative relationship be artist and model. The video supplements my book Notes on the Nude.

I hope my video will inspire a new generation of artists to pursue the challenge of working from the nude model and likewise, inspire a new generation of models. 

In a future video I will explore the relationship between artist and musician. 

A footnote to my previous post on Sheila Hyndman

In a recent article I wrote for the press that I had titled "Remembering Sheila Hyndman", the editor substituted my frequent use of Sheila's Christian name for "Ms Hyndman". Thus, in a stroke of the pen, making the intimate the impersonal. 

I doubt that Sheila - sorry, Ms Hyndman! - would approve, for she disliked editors making changes to what she wrote and I share Sheila's aversion. But as this editorial correction verges on the humorous, we'll let it pass.

It reminds me of a line in Leo Robin's lyrics "Miss Brown to You".

But go slow, oh, oh. Don't you all get too familiar. 

Sung here by Billie Holiday.

Nor shall death brag thou wander'st in his shade. (Sheila Hyndman Remembered Cont'd)

A portrait of Sheila that I painted while we were working on "Reflections".

Those you never touched in life, you will touch now. 

Those who never knew Sheila the poet, will know her now.   

(From the eulogy to Sheila by Jennie Wheatley) 

The legacy of a creating artist - whatever art form - depends on the attention given to their work after death. As Sheila's "active force" while she was with us in the world, I consider it my task to ensure that her legacy lives on. 

The title of my post is taken from Shakespeare's 18th sonnet.

Curiouser and curiouser!

Haunting the seashore where mangroves once thrived.

Today's ghostly image relates to my last post Sheila Hyndman Remembered.

`Curiouser and curiouser!' cried Alice (she was so much surprised, that for the moment she quite forgot how to speak good English).

With bated breath I await to see how my book is received in the BVI. Since her death thirty-three years ago Sheila has been given scant recognition. Perhaps she was the prophetess they do not want to be reminded of. Sheila foresaw the greed and corruption that has manifested itself in recent times. 

At the time of her death Sheila was working on a novel that spoke of her concerns. The work in progress was on the hard drive of her computer. The only copy (made on one of the early dot matrix printers) passed back and forth between us. I doubt that the hard drive and unfinished manuscript have survived. But what remains fixed in my memory, is an explanation of the book's theme, chapter by chapter, that Sheila verbalised during our time together. 

Sheila's poem “Revelations” speaks of the creative union that existed between us.

I am a seeker of wisdom

You are the active force

That manifests my truths

For the good of humanity.

I am a contemplator of what was and shall be,

You are the revealer of the link that is.

I am of the sky and would flee the cares of men.

You are the Earth, the balance that keeps my sanity.

I am night, the creator of fear and uncertainty

You are the sun, that brings me ecstasy

At the dawn of our union.

I am black with the seed of knowledge

You are fair

And the fire of your purity

Bounds me to the seat of wisdom.

Here are links to the book and video.

Sheila Hyndman Remembered

The following is taken from my foreword to the book, "Sheila Hyndman Remembered" 

In 1974 I was invited to join a radio panel discussion on the theme of creative arts in the BVI. I knew the role of the other presenters around the table, except for a young lady in school uniform. The deep impression that Sheila made when she spoke about her poetry has stayed with me ever since. While I was busy sketching scenes from the island’s past, Sheila was passionately versifying those times and profoundly questioning the future. I shared Sheila’s love and concern for her homeland and in the years that followed we worked towards a common goal.

Almost all of Sheila’s poems date from her teenage years. Her output virtually ceased as she entered adulthood, but reemerged in the late 1980’s. Four of the poems in this collection reflect her later period. From the faded pages of school exercise books and more recent typed poems, we pieced together the contents for “Reflections”. The book was printed and bound in my studio and published in 1989 as a limited edition of 250 copies. Had we not taken the initiative to publish Reflections when we did, Sheila’s poems would have been forgotten by all but the cognoscenti.

When my own work reached a low point, Sheila gave me encouragement to press on. Her influence can be found in my books “Virgin Island Sketches” and “Caribbean Sketches”, and the paintings and sculptures in my series “Daughters of the Caribbean Sun”. One of our last conversations touched upon her literary hopes for the future.

Sheila was born on August 28^th, 1958, and her sudden death in 1991 robbed the Virgin Islands of their foremost poet.

To ensure that the memory of Sheila lives on, the proceeds from the sale of the book will be used to create an annual award in her name for emerging Virgin Island Poets. 

The book is available at: https://www.studiopublications.org/product-page/sheila-hyndman-remembered

A video about the book includes readings from her poems and can be viewed at: https://youtu.be/aUb3nI3Nnkg

Visions of a Paradise Lost

The above is one of scores of sketches that I made forty years ago on a secluded beach in the British Virgin Islands. In those days the beach only saw the occasional footprints of those from the nearby village. The picture below shows the beach as it is today.

But worse is yet to come...  

The government has just signed a contract for the construction of a vending zone inclusive of 6 vending units, including 3 scaled for full service restaurants and bar operations, an outdoor eating and entertainment area and an administrative area to support the beach management function.

Fifty years ago the Virgin Island poet Sheila Hyndman prophesied the future in her poem Visions of a Paradise Lost. 

My shores stripped bare, 

My precious mangroves destroyed,

My seas poisoned,

My own descendants have sold me into slavery.

The above structure has recently been built on what was once the dramatic palm-fringed beach at Cane Garden Bay. Sheila must be turning in her grave!

Fiddling While Rome Burns

Celebrating Dominica's 46 years of Independence.

I had in mind a painting on the theme of this post, but I've been too busy making emergency modifications to one of the island's water pumps. At least the community it serves can now celebrate having running water. A message from the water company's Head of Engineering reads as follows:

I greatly appreciate the professionalism with which you carry out your work. Many thanks for your speedy fabrication and modification of the parts. They are already installed and working. Thanks again for your excellent work.

If only the same appreciation could be shown for my attempts to have art and creativity high on the Ministry of Education's agenda. Out of 16 secondary schools on the island, only one acknowledged my offer of help. 

On the other hand, I've just received a message from a school in Bangladesh thanking me for my blog posts, books and videos.  

A move in the right direction.

 

My Notes for Lifeclass Students & Models and Notes for Art Students & Aspiring Artists.

A year ago I said goodbye to Amazon and became my own online publisher. It was a move in the right direction. They can no longer dip their hand into the proceeds from sales and dictate what they deem is permissible. 

As with my videos, it has been a steep learning curve, but with my son's help on the computer, I'm over the top. The books, as with my paintings and sculptures, are a work in progress. I update them as new ideas come to mind. For the price of US$5.00 readers have the benefit of my lifetime's experience and in turn, I welcome feedback on their creative triumphs and tribulations. 

My intention is to put passion back into art. I want to lure aspiring artists away from overly focusing on technique and slavishly copying from photographs. So be warned, the books are not for the faint hearted. I can already hear the scratching of censorious pens. 

With over 100 illustrations, Notes on the Nude compliments the books that opened this post.  

All of my books can be viewed and purchased at Studio Publications.

The Importance of Art & Creativity in Schools

Click on image to view video. If that fails, use this link: https://youtu.be/JEN2bpSbwzI

In Caribbean schools, as in many other places in the world, art is placed on the back burner turned down low. In my latest video I make a plea for placing it on the front burner turned up high.

Models, where art thou?

The model at a fleeting glance.

Before paper, paint and brushes, I need a model to inspire. In recent years, models on my small island of Dominica, have been few and far between. What with being blown away by hurricanes and going on to university, all have moved on. 

To give courage to those who may be tempted, all who have modelled for me over the past forty years give assurance that they cherish happy memories of being part of the creative process. 

A recent article of mine titled, Growing Old Disgracefully directed hundreds of Dominicans to my blog. Perhaps, within their numbers is my next inspirational model. 

Three remarkable ladies

Diane Lawrenson's sculpture of Anne Lister

The first of my remarkable ladies is Anne Lister who in earlier times lived within a mile of the village where I spent my childhood and teenage years.

The second, is Helena Whitbread. She also spent her childhood within a few miles of Anne Lister's home. Helena tells of her research into the life of Anne Lister, and of her own inspirational life story in two excellent video documentaries. One about Anne Lister  and the other, about her own life.   

The third is sculptress Diane Lawrenson. I award her sculpture my best alcollade, that being, I wish I'd have created that!

I can relate to what Diane says about her work.

To be a figurative sculptor working in a medium as eternal and solid as bronze, calls for extraordinary practical abilities and creative ambition. This is the medium of Rodin and the Renaissance masters. It requires experience and understanding of the alchemy: of turning flesh into clay, clay into metal and through a process of moulding, casting, refining and patination, resulting in a form and texture that conjures up the human presence once more.

I remember Shiden Hall, the home of Anne Lister, from school trips. But in those days lesbian relationships were not talked about. Our lesson began and ended with the history of the hall.

The Art of Suggestiveness

 My latest video is not for the faint hearted; and in particular, it is not for the faint hearted painters in watercolour. My brush dribbles and drips, and runs run amok, as I attempt to capture the naked beauty of the models in my series, Daughters of the Caribbean Sun.

The model featured in the video's title image, is the same model that is featured in one of my paintings that has been selected for a forthcoming definitive book on the nude in contemporary art. A message from the publishers reads:

The selection process for the book was incredibly competitive. However, your work stood out and sparked passionate discussions.  

Without models my work would not exist. That you Collean. I am pleased that the publishers have rewarded you for the afternoon when you sweltered under the tropical sun while I made this painting.

 

Collean

The suggestiveness of a sketch

A still from my forthcoming video The Suggestiveness of a Sketch

In art suggestiveness refers to the ability of a painting to be open to multiple interpretations, thus allowing viewers to enter the creative process and see the subject from their own perspective. 

In my way of painting, suggestiveness comes from giving watercolours the freedom they deserve. I allow washes to run as they may, and in doing so they add their own contribution. Speed, daring and an open mind are of the essence.

In Triplicate

 

Three preliminary clay sketches depicting Thea LaFond winning 

an Olympic Gold Medal for Dominica in the Triple Jump. 

After weeks of work, on the modelling stand in my studio are preliminary clay sketches depicting Thea LaFond winning an Olympic Gold Medal for Dominica in the Triple Jump. 

I have faced the difficulty of portraying rapid movement without the aid of flowing drapery and how to position the figures, from hop, to skip, to jump, so that at a fleeting glance they are seen as one in their flight above ground.

All I had for reference was a video clip showing Thea in action. By viewing the video hundreds of times at quarter speed, I was able to capture the essence of the few seconds between the hop, the skip and the jump. Below are some of the sketches I made from the video and my clay sketch of the final jump.

What happens next, is in the lap of the gods, or more correctly, in the lap of committees.

Creating an illusion

Work in progress on a quarter lifesize maquette of a figure in motion.

The ultimate challenge for the figurative sculptor is that of a figure in motion. I alluded to this my post The Curse of Committees.  E. H. Gombrich in his book "Art & Illusion" writes to the effect:

...Paintings and sculptures have more beauty and greater force when they are a sketch than when they are finished...sketches express an idea in a few strokes...while a laboured effect and too much industry deprives it of force. It is an art in which the artist's skill in suggesting must be matched with the public's skill at taking hints. The literal-minded Philistine is excluded from this closed circle.  

Herein lies my challenge. Not with a single figure, but with a series of three figures that show the transition from one position to the next. You can then add the difficulty of retaining the spontaneity when enlarging the maquettes to lifesize. There will be more about this in forthcoming posts.

The sculptor Auguste Rodin was passionately interested in movement. The maquette shown below is one of a series he made on the theme of dance. 

Dance Movement "A". Rodin Museum, Paris.

 

A partly-teachable art

An image from my latest video: Your Hands Fashioned and Made Me.

Cedric Watts, in his introduction to James Joyce's novel Ulysses (an 81st birthday present to myself) he refers to the author's art of seeing or making connections between apparently unconnected entities. He refers to it as, a partly-teachable art.

He also suggests that: 

Feelings of elation and depression may affect our reflections, but in themselves they are non-verbal. Some of our sensations are simply visual, aural, tactile or olfactory. If we write an essay we become conscious of an effort to translate none-verbal ideas into words; sometimes the words don't fit, so we have to try again, matching the verbal to the notional, and often modifying the notion in the process.

I find the same applies to my paintings and sculptures. To some extent the moving image gets around the problem. Hence, my experiments with videos. 

James Joyce also had a fascination with the potential of film.  

The Curse of Committees

My preliminary sketch for a life-size sculpture of a rugby player diving for a try.

Twenty-five years ago I was asked to enter a competition for sculptures for the West Yorkshire town of Dewsbury. The brief was for two sculptures standing side by side; one depicting a 20th century rugby player and the other a 19th century mill girl. I told the judging committee (the members of which wouldn't have known a sculpture if one fell on their heads) that I found the combination and static pose ludicrous. 

As a result of my uncalled for advice, the committee made short shrift of my submission of a rugby player diving for a try and mill girls running out of the factory gates with their shawls flying.

The winning Dewsbury entry is shown below in situ.

All this comes about because I have at the back of my mind a sculpture of an athlete motion. 

Your hands fashioned and made me. (Part Two)

Following my post Your hands fashioned and made me today's picture shows work in progress on the bas relief that will be the subject of my next video. The clay to the side of the figure is what I take from so as to keep its workability the same as the rest. It serves as my pallet.

Below is the scaled preparatory drawing that I made from my initial sketch. The drawing is half size and I use proportional callipers to transfer it to the clay.

I saw it on the radio!

The topic for debate was right up my street, but the line up of panelists left a lot to be desired: poets, writers, painters, playwrights and calypsonians were excluded. 

For those who create in the comfort zone, there is freedom of creative and artistic expression. However, for those that step outside the boundaries of what's deemed acceptable, censorship - in one form or another - is alive and well. A conglomeration of different dance styles, photos that celebrate the natural beauty of the island, modest innovations in fashion and Dominica's "Princess of Song", fall well within the comfort zone. 

In terms of what's deemed permissible, it's the island's perception of culture that sets the boundaries, and you will note that the debate was organised by the Government's Division of Culture. In the Caribbean, culture is something everyone feels comfortable with, whereas art challenges the norm and is potentially controversial. 

Criticism of the arts is limited to saying something nice. Dominican playwright Alwin Bully (1948-2023) once told me that to get objective reviews of his work, he had on occasions resorted to anonymously writing his own. But they were sent back with a message to say that the editor considers the review too negative of the playwright's work and he wouldn't dream of insulting Alwin by publishing.   

The absence of public transport after dark prevented me from attending, but I was sort of able to follow the discussing via its broadcast on the island's radio station. I say "sort of" because two of the panelists gave a PowerPoint presentations. It reminded me of a brilliant promotional advertisement put out by a Virgin Island radio station fifty years ago: I saw it on the radio!

Today's Master Class

Zeke

Today's sculpture studio master class is being conducted by my grandson Zeke. He has a passion for painting and the picture shows him instructing members of his play school on the finer points of brushwork. My daughter says, He paints his heart away and everyone stands around to watch him. It brings joy to my heart, just like his grandad.  

As Pablo Picasso said, It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child.

Your hands fashioned and made me...

For my next video I will be returning to the biblical clay. The subject is my model Verlena as she is shown in the opening sketch. The sculpture is really unfinished business, for it is one that we were ready to start work on before she relocated overseas. All I have now is the sketch and some thumbnail photos taken when we were experimenting with this position or that. On the other hand, I have made three sculptures of Verlena, so I know her body by heart.

Incidentally, the clay I am using is the same clay I have used for all my sculptures over the last forty years. In true biblical belief, it has gone from dust to dust time without number. And now, it is once again about to be brought back to life. 

The sculpture will be in relief, rather than in the round. The following blog posts serve as an introduction.

https://sculpturestudiodominica.blogspot.com/2020/06/the-beautiful-frontier-between-drawing.html

https://sculpturestudiodominica.blogspot.com/2020/06/sculpture-possibilities.html

https://sculpturestudiodominica.blogspot.com/2018/05/from-biblical-clay.html

Capturing the figure at a fleeting glance

Click on the image to view the video.

A painting of my wife Denise that I made over thirty years ago, opens my video Capturing the Figure at a Fleeting Glance. 

Of all painting media, watercolour offers the freedom I need to capture the model in all of her moods and changes. When given the freedom it deserves, a watercolour wash has a creative mind of its own. It can run amok or subtly blend. Why then, do most painters deprive watercolour of its most valuable asset.

But beyond the cognoscenti, I doubt that the message "to paint from life" will sink home to the aspirant artists who practice the equivalent of "painting by numbers".

A Work of Art

My well-worn copy purchased circa 1970. Price six shillings.

Although controversial in their day, all of James Joyce's writings are now recognised as classics of 20th century literature. This documentary about the author's life and work was made sixty years ago by Ireland's National Television. By film making standards, it was made on a shoestring, but it is nevertheless a work of art and deserves an Oscar. 

As an 81st Birthday present to myself, I have ordered copies of The Dubliners, Ulysses and Finnegans Wake. I hope they are not ceased and burnt by customs on arrival. 

Variations on a Theme

 Variations on a Theme

(Click on the image to view video) 

This video further explores the abstract that lies within my representational figurative paintings. The theme attempts subjects that I dare not contemplate in my youth. As such it represents a new challenge for my octogenarian years. 

The video's sound track features Larry McKenna playing Johnny Mercer's Skylark, the lyrics of which nicely set the mood.

And in your lonely flight

Haven’t you heard the music of the night

Wonderful music

Faint as a will o’ the wisp

Crazy as a loon

Sad as a gypsy serenading the moon…

Revealing the abstract

 A Different Way of Seeing

(Click on the image to view video) 

Fifty-five years ago, as an aspiring artist, I exhibited my paintings on the pavements of France, straight from the pages of my sketchbook. There was no aloof gallery attendant between artist and buyer.  My sketches were framed by falling leaves and lit by sunlight and shadow. When exhibited as pictures on walls, they are detached from their poetic origins.

Many years ago, I began experimenting with viewing paintings beyond the limitations of size and venue. I projected them as colour slides to the size of a house wall. More recently, video editing programs have enabled me to zoom into details and pan over the image. I have found paintings within a painting and details that border on the abstract.

The looser the painting, the greater is its potential for transformation. For this to happen, the freedom of my watercolours and pastels is an enabling factor. I found a rich source of material in the hundreds of paintings that over the years I have cast aside as perceived failures. When viewing these paintings larger than life, I found inspirational passages that begged to be retrieved.

Fishing boats, crowds at the carnival and the English countryside were a rich source of paintings within a painting. And the more creative and less defined the painting, the greater its abstract content, as proved to be the case in a still life and the riotous colours found in a single spray of flowers.

For my experiments the subject of the painting was incidental and my video invites you to experience a different way of seeing.  

Revealing the abstract 

Bear with me

Detail from the 16" x 20" pastel drawing shown in the insert.

In the first instance, I ask you to bear with me. In other words, be patient while I continue my experiments of focusing on the abstract potential of details. When I finally get the concept together, you can then bare with me. In other words, join me in viewing the beauty that is revealed.

Although the drawing as a whole is stilted, the detail is relaxed.

Revelations

The revelation of seeing a minute detail enlarge to the size of house wall.

The dictionary definition of "revelation" nicely sums up what I am after: A Pleasant and enlightening surprise. The surprise first came about ten years ago when I began searching for a new way of presenting my work, in the belief that there has to be more to exhibiting paintings than static framed pictures on walls.

I began experimenting by projecting onto an eight foot screen a one inch detail of a watercolour. The result was a pleasant and enlightening surprise. With video I can now go a step further and make the image move - just a the lines and washes that I throw down on paper move when the work is in progress. 

As I have indicated in numerous past posts: the devil is in the detail!

Portraits with a difference

The last in my series of Painting from Life videos is on the subject of portraits, but portraits with a difference. The difference being working freely from the live model as against minutely copying from a photograph. The video ends with a four minute demonstration of me painting my self-portrait - warts and all. 

As my portraits do not look "just like a photograph", I doubt that the content will go down well with the majority of aspiring artists. But that's me!

I am now working on a series of experimental videos, not so much to tutor, but to inspire. 

Innovation and Creativity

Bevin Etienne is a professor at the McIntire School of Commerce at the University of Virginia. He is from my island of dominica, and is an expert in the areas of sustainability, entrepreneurship, energy and social innovation.  

Dr. Etienne is currently visiting Dominica with fifteen of his students who are focusing on Social Entrepreneurship in Small Island Developing States. The theme of their visit to my workshops and studio was innovation and creativity - and that I have in abundance!

All that Jass

 

The crowd at last year's Jazz 'n Creole

As a jazz devotee I have for years been concerned about the content of Dominica's annual Jazz 'n Creole. In the past I suggest that it be re-named, “Dominica Popular Music Festival + All Else”. 

But Dominica's Prime Minister went one better. In commenting on this year’s Jazz ‘n Creole, by accident or intent, he put the event in context when he said, I think that it has been a good Jazz. Had the word “jazz” been spelt “jass”, we could assume that he was not referring to the music but to the revellers having a jump up. 

The word jazz, in reference to the music as an art form, did not come into use until 1917. Before that it was jass.In those early days, jass was good time music in dance halls. The word being possibly derived from "jasmine", a strong perfume popular with prostitutes in the red-light district of New Orleans.

Promoting the event for what it really is would draw even bigger crowds. With a separate event devoted to jazz and its creole influence we could then begin to foster an appreciation for one of the world’s most profound art forms, and moreover, an understanding in young Dominicans that this art form was created by those of African and Creole descent. Such an event may not initially draw the crowds but it would in time appeal to the cognoscenti, as the success of real jazz festivals throughout the world have shown.

Video footage of the event left me wishing I could have been there - not to listen to the music but to sketch the crowds. 

How I wish!

Landscapes with Figures

An image from my video Landscapes with Figures

 

My most recent video delves into the challenge of adding figures to landscapes. If done spontaneously, they fall into place as natural as breath; if they are laboured over they become obtrusive.

Although my sketches are the work of seconds, I have laboured for weeks to get the message across in a video. My demonstration ends with a statement from an onlooker: He's made a mess of that!

Inheritance

 

Zeke

My daughter Trina lives in the UK and her two year old son Zeke, has recently started attending pre-school. A couple of weeks ago the school expressed concern about his speech, or rather his inability to speak. I told my daughter not to worry. 

I didn't start talking until I was five. (My brother says I've made up for it since!) I couldn't even pronounce my own name. The closest I could get to Roger was "Ory", and until their dying day my parents always referred to me as "our Ory". Perhaps, like me, he's dyslexic. If so, we have another creative person in the family.

Trina took my advice, and instead of worrying bought him a box of paints and sat him down in front of my latest video. The paints and video held him spellbound. But that isn't all. Yesterday, when she collected him from school, the teachers told her of a strange happening. At playtime, when the other children in his group played on bikes, slides and swings, he saw some of the older children painting. He promptly went over to them, picked up a pad and paint box, and very contentedly sat down in the playground and started to paint. My daughter was overjoyed. Just like his grandfather, he had found his individual place in life. 

But that isn't all. A similar story recently repeated itself in the British Virgin Islands. My son Karl is an accomplished potter. After watching my video "Releasing Your Creative Potential" his ten year old son Kem, came up with the drawing below.

If the current work of Zeke and Kem is anything to go buy, I can rest assured that my creative genes have been inherited by my grandchildren.

The secret contents of my sketch bag

Click on the image to view the secret contents of my sketch bag.

I am forever being asked about the materials I use as a watercolourist. To put the matter to rest, my latest video reveals the secret contents of my sketch bag. In amongst what you'd expect to find, there are two essential items that you would never have guessed. 

The revelation came about by way of demonstrating my way of painting landscapes; not from a sterile photograph, but from life. 

If you click on the opening image, all will be revealed - from a five dollar bill to a bottle of 1001 Carpet Cleaner.

 

Exposing the Upper Extremities

Denise

The opening painting is of my wife Denise. The photo below is of eleven year old Zendaya Robinson, who to her credit - and that of her parents - is a young author featured in a book titled, Stories by Children.

Zendaya Robinson

The title of this post comes from a comment to the news feature that highlighted Zendaya's accomplishment. It reads: 

That  how parents are dressing their little girls? Just as grownups. No good examples whatsoever. What a shame to dress a little child with bare upper extremities. 

In polite sexual terms, "Bare Upper Extremities" ranks with "Private Parts".

The painting of my wife and the photo of Zendaya speak of innocence. Both relate to dress code and the Christian horror of nakedness. Cultural dress in the Caribbean labours under the same misconceptions, as illustrated below.

The result of a competition for the design of a 

Cultural Dress for the British Virgin Islands. 

(front view left, back view right) 

This again brought its share of readers comments to the associated news item. I added to the debate as to the appropriateness of the design:

Curiously, I have found that nowhere in the Caribbean, does the traditional/cultural dress reflect the African roots of the people. For the most part it reflects the dress of their past colonial masters. Culture isn't something that can be made up. It's not a promotional product. If it's not entrenched in the belly of the people, it counts for naught.

Readers responded as follows:

What you say is partly true, but Africa has thousands of different cultures, which are hugely varied, so unless all BVI Islanders can trace their roots back to one village, then it’s laughable to focus on one culture from that continent and copy it over to the BVI.

We should leave Africa out of this, we are Caribbean people, mix every which way and that. The current national wear reflects the Caribbean, which is suited to all who live here.

When my granny used to walk with basket on her head she didn't dress like that.

Perhaps it's time for me to reopen the portfolio of my Bare Minimum fashion designs.