Saint Lucia has two Nobel Laureates: Sir William Arthur Lewis and Sir Derek Walcott. They share a birthday: January 23rd.
I had lived in Ghana since 2019 and although I had visited home once before 2024, I hadn’t stayed around long enough to participate in the week of events held to celebrate the birthdays of these two great men. When I returned to Saint Lucia in December 2023, I was determined that 2024 would be the year that this would be rectified.
On January 14th, 2024 along with my sister and cousin – we also had two littles with us – I dropped down in my hometown Laborie to paint the village. Well, I think it can be said that my intention was always to observe. I didn’t fancy myself much of a visual artist back then, so I simply wanted to watch what the real artists would come up with.
I hadn’t been near the beach but a few minutes when my eye caught the scene. A boat coming in and some men scurrying on the shore to assist. I couldn’t adjust my lens quickly enough to get the quality of photos that I wanted, but I got these. A vibe. A community. A flashback to the times where I’d walk to the beach with my grandmother as she went to purchase fresh fish from an incoming boat. A reminder that I was a child of community.
As I said, I couldn’t adjust my lens quickly enough, but to this day, these remain some of my favorite captures.
Usually, with Atlas we try to replicate the image into poster form as is, but the faces of the men obscured, I gave my artists instructions to preserve the captured feel of the pic; That thing that cannot be imagined because it has to be lived. That thing that can only be felt — and, every now and then, is worth bottling.
