Without exception, each Carifesta celebration has opened and closed with great Carnival-style processions and jump-ups. It is therefore only appropriate that a depiction of Carnival opens this exhibit on Carifesta.
As one of the few female visual artists who exhibited at Carifesta ’72, the Trinidadian painter Sybil Atteck (1911-1975) is one of the titular “Women of Carifesta” whose legacy we celebrate on this site. Though preceding the first Carifesta by a decade, Sybil Atteck’s vibrant painting, Spirit of Carnival I, can serve as an excellent representation of the spirit of Caribbean festivals. It resonates with events like Carifesta precisely because of its use of abstract and expressionist elements, not realist figuration. Spirit of Carnival I was also included in the Trinidad and Tobago contribution to the São Paulo biennale of 1963, and has therefore already served as an ambassador of the artist’s home country.
By choosing this painting for the website landing page, instead of the painting she exhibited at Carifesta (a more muted work entitled "Water Tower") we suggest a connection between Carifesta and one of its major inspirations and storied predecessors, the Trinidad Carnival. The painting’s depiction of Carnival as both exuberance and struggle resonated with the heady days of Trinidad and Tobago’s recent independence and celebrated one of the new nation’s cultural traditions. In the same way, Carifesta filled its participants both with optimism and certain apprehensions. It attempted to reflect and create a new sense of regional unity. Could the region’s divisions be overcome in the crucible of pan-Caribbean festivity?