Chan Pratt Archives - National Art Gallery of The Bahamas

Check Yourself: Thinking About Stereotypes and Chan Pratt’s Sincerity in Painting Over-the-Hill

19 June 2019

By Natalie Willis. A man walks along a row of houses with a crowbar in one hand, a piece of wood in the other, he is speaking to someone: a friend, an acquaintance, a family member, a neighbour perhaps? The houses are neat, patched up with care – no doubt due to the stresses of time and hurricanes alike, there’s only so much this old clapboard can take. The street is neat, orderly, a pubescent boy leans against a tree in the shade, and things feel calm, serene in the row of homes. This is not what people think of when they think of the current state of Over-the-Hill (OTH). Bain and Grants Town are woefully underserved communities, that much is certain, but they are also demonised for circumstances largely beyond their control in a cold, classist manner of stereotyping.

A Choice Landscape: The Early Work of the Late Chan Pratt and How Art Practice Gets Shaped by the Environment

21 May 2019

By Natalie Willis. There are a few names that come to mind for us when we think of the quintessential, traditional, picturesque Bahamian landscape: Hildegarde Hamilton, Alton Lowe, Eddie Minnis, Dorman Stubbs, Ricardo Knowles, and the well-collected (but not quite always at the forefront of our minds), Chan Pratt. Landscape painting is quite a contentious genre of painting for The Bahamas and certainly for the rest of the Caribbean region, and this is for good reason. The colonial photography and postcards and paintings of days-gone-by were instrumental in framing and re-shaping the region as an idyll for tourist consumption, and this growing industry would later become the backbone and difficult foundation of many Caribbean economies.

Beauty and Loss in Tessa Whitehead and Chan Pratt’s Work: A Death Foretold, yet Not Dying

20 May 2019

By Dr Ian Bethell-Bennett, The University of The Bahamas. Beauty, as we began two weeks ago, heals souls and allows us to come to a higher place where we feel more human, connected, communal and loved. Nature, green trees, and shade along roads allow us to walk in and explore the special areas and spaces around us. This exploration is seen in Jean Rhys’ novel Wide Sargasso Sea (1966), and in Tessa Whitehead’s work, the creek (2018) as beauty envelopes us in its natural form. When cement covers every inch of land, the soul is taken out of life. Singer Gloria Estefan’s Mi Tierra (1993), similar to Coulibri, the main location in Wide Sargasso Sea speaks of the loss, longing and nostalgia for a home that we have lost the deep connection to and the healing that comes from revisiting even if only metaphorically, metaphysically or through imagination.

Chan Pratt’s Work Speaks to the Urbanisation of the Bahamian Landscape

1 May 2019

By Blake Fox. Slated to open on Thursday, May 2nd, 2019 at The National Art Gallery of The Bahamas (NAGB), “Resurrection” is a retrospective of over 100 paintings by noteworthy Bahamian artist Chan Pratt. The collection prominently features Bahamian landscapes between the 1980s and ‘90s with scrupulous attention to the local flora. Having died suddenly–and at a young age–much of Pratt’s work was undocumented and there is an unfortunate lack of historical information on the artist and his practice. To resolve this lack of exposure, the NAGB is working with Dewitt Chan (DC) Pratt, Chan Pratt’s son, and over 20 collectors of Pratt’s work to pay homage to his talent which was sometimes overlooked.