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By Natalie Willis

The last in our series of two-part interviews with the artists of “We Suffer To Remain”, this week we speak to Scottish artist Graham Fagen on having his work not only as the starting point of this series of exhibitions on “Difficult Conversations”, but also on having his work brought to the Caribbean context to which it refers. “The Slave’s Lament” (2015) is a moment for us to consider the realities of this Trans-Atlantic history in contemporary contexts, and now that we’ve seen Bahamian responses with our national artists responding to this work, we take a moment to consider Fagen’s perspectives in our space.

By Keisha Oliver, The University of The Bahamas . As part of the last weekend’s Transforming Spaces (TS) 2018 tour, University of The Bahamas (UB) transformed the Hillside House gallery and courtyard into a cultural hub rooted in celebrating and reimagining Bahamian traditions through creativity.  UB faculty, staff, students and alumni came together to showcase the music, visual, culinary and literary arts under the theme ‘Historic Nassau’ from March 16 to 18th. Over the years Transforming Spaces has been committed to supporting and engaging UB art students through volunteerism and exhibition opportunities. This year UB’s participation stems from its interest to cultivate an interdisciplinary shared culture. Curated by UB Assistant Professor and Visual Arts Programme Coordinator Keisha Oliver the event was designed to identify the institution as a community dedicated to honouring the accomplishments and talents of its students, staff, faculty and alumni.

By Natalie Willis.  Last week we heard John Beadle speak to his participation in “We Suffer To Remain”, an exhibition in collaboration with the British Council. The works produced in “We Suffer To Remain”–the Bahamian leg of a 4-part journey of the British Council’s “Difficult Conversations” series of exhibitions– serve as Caribbean response to Scottish artist Graham Fagen’s work, “The Slave’s Lament”. Shown at the Venice Biennale in 2015 as a representation for Scotland in the global art biennial, and choosing to uncover the country’s complicit nature in the Slave trade and the general amnesia surrounding Britain with their role and repercussions in chattel slavery – there is more to this work than meets the eye. Here is a not-so-difficult conversation with Beadle.

By Holly Bynoe.  On March 22nd through July 29th, The National Art Gallery of The Bahamas presents the first of two historical surveys exhibitions that include works produced from 1856-1960 by visiting artists and expatriates, who were inspired by the then-colony’s landscapes, people, luminescence, coastlines and seas and bustling lifestyles. Traversing the Picturesque: For Sentimental Value draws from several familiar and a few new collections to detail the breadth and scope of how The Bahamas has been framed within the popular global imagination and the impact of the colonial and outsider gaze on the development of a historical understanding of the nation.

By Natalie Willis

This week we continue our interview with Sonia Farmer on her work for the upcoming collaborative exhibition with the British Council, “We Suffer To Remain”. It is difficult to think about just who gets to discuss our history, when some voices are silenced, and others get a proverbial loudspeaker. Farmer’s artist book “A True & Exact History”, a poem produced from her erasure of Richard Ligon’s “A True & Exact History of the Island of Barbadoes” (1657), deals with just that.

By Dr Ian Bethell-Bennett, The University of The Bahamas.  Over the last few weeks we have been journeying through “Medium: Practices and Routes of Spirituality and Mysticism” and discussing linkages with the upcoming show “We Suffer To Remain”, an international collaboration between the British Council and The National Art Gallery of The Bahamas. Writing this piece from Dubai at the Chamber of Commerce conference for Latin America and preparing for Expo2020 the polemics of culture become more clearly abstracted. So much of our culture and life resides beneath the surface. From time to time it surfaces to be revealed in stunning works of art, vibrant crafts, suggestive and politically critical music, or just fried into a fried-dry piece of chicken.  We overlook that we exist in culture and that our culture dictates how we think about who we are and how we respond to a crisis. 

By Dr Ian Bethell-Bennett

Migration, the moving image, the environment and cultural identity are all a part of the treasure chest of what could be referred to as national or cultural identity.  In the context of The Bahamas, cultural identity is distinct and unique because of the archipelagic nature of the country.  This, of course, takes into consideration all the nuances and complexities of the differences between–let’s say Bimini and Ragged Island–that have very little in common, but all form a part of what makes up Bahamian national identity. 

By Natalie Willis

Continuing on last week’s interview, the discussion builds on the rest of the body of work that Anina Major is producing for “We Suffer To Remain”, an exhibition featuring “The Slave’s Lament” (2015) by Scottish artist Graham Fagen alongside three Bahamian artists, Sonia Farmer and John Beadle included. Major’s work and much of the exhibition deals with the legacies of slavery as embodied by us as post-colonial subjects. This week she speaks to that embodiment, to pain, and to what it means to inhabit a Black feminine body in relation to the ideas brought up by this exhibition as well as recent events in the country.