'A Natural History' Screens at Pérez Art Museum Miami

Production still from A Natural History 5 Sequence 2, 2014

As a part of the Perez Art Museum Miami's recent film programme, 'At the Crossroads: Critical Film and Video from the Caribbean', my most recent video will be screened. They are running a month-long programme of 5 screenings. Each screening shows a film/video work which has more of a contemporary art- lean accompanied by a feature-length Caribbean-centric film.

This work marks the last in the series. 'A Natural History' really originated and was fuelled by my life in Japan. It was a series of visual images contemplating what my identity was as it shifted meanings between the Caribbean and East Asia. The work also responded to the lovely yet somehow lonely landscapes of Kyoto, where I spent 5 years. Materials used in the making of the video such as Japan-bought pencil crayons, sumi ink and brushes allowed me to think about the content of this work. The act of making several digital and traditional media drawings over and over also re-enforced this. 

Having fully returned to my island home of Jamaica for about eight months now, other influences have begun to creep into my work....other stories... other places. 'A Natural History 5 Sequence 2' really marks the end of that particular narrative in my work. It is fitting, as while creating it I felt I really could say what I wanted to say when I began the first video back in 2010. Interest in the concepts of Primitivism and Intuitive Art have also been important in its making. 

Find out more about the screening of this work and others here