introduction | 

alissandra cummins
Chairperson, National Art Gallery Committee

click on the map to enter Michel-Rolph Trouillot says “Slavery is a ghost, both the past and a living presence; and the problem of historical representation is how to represent that ghost, something that is and yet is not. Fragments of historical narratives point to gaps yet to be filled.”

When George Washington visited the island in the mid 18th century, Bridgetown was a considered a metropolis in much the same way that New York is regarded today, yet historical perspective has lost the immediacy and the impact that such an encounter would have had on a major leader and ultimately, a frontier culture, which he helped mould and shape in future decades for many generations to come.

Barbados has begun to address in a number of ways, these gaps in both the historical record and our knowledge and appreciation of this port city’s significance, as a commercial and communications hub. The creation of 18 sound pieces by visual artists, teachers, students and institution personnel, was the successful outcome to the National Art Gallery Committee’s New Media Workshop held in March 2005. Following a curriculum introducing the use of sound and new technologies as a medium for art conceptualized and developed by creative director / curator Joscelyn Gardner, Barbadians investigated, interrogated and interpreted life (both historic and current) in the City of Bridgetown.

The installation of Bridgetown Whisperpost into the streets of the city (and the later transmission of these works to digital storage and website) heralds the recovery of disappearing intangible heritage. Sound archives are critical as a means of constructing / reconstructing Caribbean identity, because for a dispossessed and disinherited diasporic people, it is often only through sound, oratory and music that we can weave our memories and truly celebrate our culture.

In the context of Bridgetown’s 375th anniversary and indeed Barbados’ commemoration of the Bicentenary of the Abolition of the Slave Trade in 2007, the NAGC is pleased to present this sound / art installation, a first for the Caribbean, which not only celebrates Bridgetown as a city, but gives voice to those now absent, our ancestors who lived, fought and loved, silenced either through violence or neglect for almost four centuries. We invite you to share with us this unique experience of cultural and artistic expression.