1837 Isaac Belisario Lithograph Reprint Jamaican Art Black History Koo Koo Actor

Description: Isaac Belisario Lithograph Reprint Jamaica Black. 1837 Isaac Belisario Lithograph Reprint. This sale is only for "Koo Koo or Actor Boy" Print. The following information is about the prints and the artist. Reprints were made of this work in 1974 by the Institute of Jamaica it is unknown if this came from that release or not. Isaac Mendes Belisario (1795-1849) Sketches of CharacterIn the three print installments of Sketches of Character, we find a total of twelve hand-painted, lithographic prints accompanied by text written by the artist. In the preface to the first publication, Belisario states his intentions to create a faithful representation of his subjects and their habits. He alludes to the possible future loss of these traditions due to the island’s rapidly changing society. He also noted that he wished to avoid caricature. [1] While Belisario refrains from sharing his personal views on emancipation, he attempts to frame his subjects in a positive light. Belisario, a white Jewish man, seems aware of the prevalence of racial caricature at the time and its role in propagating prejudice and stereotypes, yet at times he draws on the racist visual and linguistic codes he appears to wish to escape. Most of the prints that comprise Sketches of Character are focused on different carnival and masquerade customs that developed among the enslaved population. By the late 18th century, these had become part of the Christmas and New Year’s public celebrations and were a staple of holiday events in Jamaica. In many places of the Americas, Christian carnivals and feasts became settings for syncretism. The local population, including Indigenous peoples and those of African ancestry, converged around carnival, creating or appropriating traditions, adding elements and significance of their own. Participants mostly made their own costumes, buying the materials themselves or with the assistance of sponsors, and organized themselves into character and event troupes for the parades. The first two installments in the series are almost exclusively dedicated to this subject, providing illustrations of the costumes; the order in which groups of characters, dancers, and musicians paraded; and the activities they engaged in. Two of the most striking figures are “Jaw-Bone, or House John Canoe”, and “Koo Koo, or Actor Boy,” two characters whose costumes combine visual and cultural aspects from both African and European traditions. John Canoe was part of the Jonkonnu masquerade, which has roots in West African religious practices from the Igbo, Yoruba, and Ga cultures, which still held religious significance through slavery and the 19th century. He wears a military jacket and sash, striped pants, and a long curly wig and is represented mid-dance, balancing an impressive headdress shaped like a colonial manor with a crown and palm trees. In the text Belisario points to Merry Andrew, a jester-type character from British theater tradition, as a possible reference. Actor Boy was part of another celebration, where performers engaged in theatrical competitions reciting Shakespeare and also participated in costume competitions. Actor Boy wore extravagant clothes and combined European accessories, including long wigs and fans that look back to the 18th century, with elaborate headdresses and textiles drawn from Kongolese traditions. [2] Both John Canoe and Actor Boy wear whiteface masks. These could stem from Kongolese rituals, where white masks were used to indicate the presence of ancestral spirits through the characters. [3] The use of white masks and European accessories also allowed the performers to subvert the racial and cultural boundaries that defined British colonial society.Actor Boy was part of another celebration, where performers engaged in theatrical competitions reciting Shakespeare and also participated in costume competitions. Actor Boy wore extravagant clothes and combined European accessories, including long wigs and fans that look back to the 18th century, with elaborate headdresses and textiles drawn from Kongolese traditions. [2] Both John Canoe and Actor Boy wear whiteface masks. These could stem from Kongolese rituals, where white masks were used to indicate the presence of ancestral spirits through the characters. [3] The use of white masks and European accessories also allowed the performers to subvert the racial and cultural boundaries that defined British colonial society.These appropriations speak to the freedom found in the context of carnival, which historically has been a moment where social norms and boundaries blur and are turned on their heads. The masquerades were both a method of relief and resistance for the Black population against a violent colonial system. Black participants could openly rejoice in their traditions while pushing back at a system that oppressed them, combining cultural references that allowed them to express themselves and protest their condition. [4] Dances and character troupes were often financed by white, free Black, and mixed people (both individuals and groups of people sponsoring troupes). [5] Carnival spoke to Jamaican society at large, with all sectors participating in one way or the other and the costumes and dances fascinated revelers and observers—including Belisario. Belisario worked on Sketches at a decisive moment in Jamaica, between the abolition of slavery in 1833 and the culmination of apprenticeship. [8] Its publication may reflect the optimism of many people toward the end of apprenticeship; a feeling not shared by all, especially anti-abolitionists, and plantation owners whose businesses depended on enslaved labor. Economic anxieties amongst this sector, racism, and legal measures to control and keep the newly freed population in slave-like labor were the cause of immense social and political tension between 1834 and 1838.A life between Kingston and LondonBorn in Kingston, Jamaica in 1795 to a Sephardic Jewish family, Belisario spent much of his youth in London. He studied under English landscape painter Robert Hills between 1815 and 1818. Yet he worked primarily as a stockbroker, maintaining a side practice as a portraitist and exhibiting in the Royal Academy in 1831.He moved back to Jamaica around 1832, where he dedicated himself to an artistic career. His return seems to have been motivated by health concerns and perhaps by the passing of the Jewish Emancipation Act by the Jamaican Assembly, which granted the Jewish population full civil liberties, six months after free people of color had achieved the same rights. [9] Belisario remained on the island for the next 15 years. .Belisario was likely descended from Conversos, and was therefore deeply aware of the ways he and his family had to negotiate their Jewishness in a Christian society. [10] These experiences could have attracted him to the Jamaican masquerades, as its very nature disrupted social boundaries. While his stance on slavery is unknown, the fact that this series exists and his commissions from the Marquess of Sligo and Chief Justice Joshua Rowe, who both had abolitionist sympathies, may point to the artist’s anti-slavery sentiments. [11] The ambivalence evident in Sketches of Character on the matter of emancipation may come from both an attempt to not alienate his white, Christian clientele and to advance himself and the Jewish community in Jamaica. [12]'The series has had an important legacy. Belisario’s images were models for the revival of Jonkonnu in the 1950s, and they also played a role in the creation of a new national identity in the post-independence era.' (National Gallery of Jamaica)

Price: 25 USD

Location: Marion, Indiana

End Time: 2024-12-03T20:35:28.000Z

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