The Official opening of the Cultural Development Foundation’s (CDF) Emancipation Exhibition installation for 2019 was held today on the 2nd Floor of the Baywalk Mall. Deputy Executive Director of CDF, Celeste Burton in her remarks had this to say:
“We are certainly grateful first to our collaborators the Saint Lucia Archeological and Historical Society and the National Archives of Saint Lucia who are partnering with us to make this activity possible, and to bring to the Saint Lucian community another opportunity to celebrate what is uniquely Saint Lucian. We are also grateful to the Ministry and other stakeholders who continue to believe in and support the efforts of the CDF in fulfilling its mandate of cultural development – especially education and promotion. As I reflect on the theme for this exhibition several ideas, some new and some not so new come to mind. To my mind the theme “SLAVERY: HUMAN TRAFFICKING: YESTERDAY’S FREEDOM, TODAY’S FIGHT” is a very serious, a strong and a very deep one that if anything should encourage us to examine our current level of autonomy and independence, but also move us to consequently assess our efforts at recognizing, celebrating and committing to the fight for the freedoms that we enjoy today. The theme brings me and I am sure many of my colleagues to the perennial question that we hear asked over and over every year first when we celebrate our Independence in February and then again when we celebrate Emancipation in August. And that is “Whether we as a Saint Lucian community are independent or free? Whether we are still dependent or in bondage?”
I particular want to focus, not on the answer to these questions as I am sure that many responses with all degrees of explanations have been proposed over the years. But in the context of the goals of institutions like the CDF and the Archeological Society and with respect to the sub-section of the theme YESTERDAY’S FREEDOM, TODAY’S FIGHT” I wish to note that the fight for freedom started centuries ago, specific to our history of slavery and the colonialism of our islands, and specific to the trafficking of our ancestors from homelands to colonized countries, but the fight for our freedom did not end with emancipation. Through this exhibition of our artistic expression, and the celebration of our cultural heritage we wish to transport our community to a new place and develop the minds of our people an acceptance that the fight is still on, but that it is different in nature. We may not be physically escaping slave masters on plantations, staging protests or negotiating or demanding our freedom to work and be compensated like our ancestors did, but we wish our fight to be demonstrated in our belief in the gifts, talents and contributions of our people to defining the Saint Lucian landscape that we boasts so much about when the many opportunities arise. We wish to transport our people to an unequivocal appreciation of the Saint Lucian history and culture and create avenues for the fight to persist in the future, as we continue to enhance the quality, the depth and the significance of our fight for freedom. And so CDF along with our partners brings this exhibition to our Saint Lucian community and our visitors as a statement of expression of the fight that we have recognized that we have made our business and that we are undoubtedly committed to. The statement is a simple one: That as Saint Lucians we have achieved a level of freedom and it is manifested everyday in our cultural expressions and folk practices, and we see evident today in the pieces of art that are on display here, that the artists featured in our exhibition this year have used their talents and their Saint Lucian experience to present their interpretations to us and we celebrate and embrace this as part of the journey. This is a sophisticated, creative expression of the freedom that we make to the world of who we are and how our “Saint Lucian-ness” among other things is defined. I wish therefore to invite you, over the next few weeks to view the exhibits with that in mind and to encourage all your friends to come have that experience as well. Let us continue to believe in the beauty of art and artistic creations and let us propel our youth to enjoy and develop what we celebrate and promote as one important aspect of our Freedom. Saint Lucian Art is strong, its alive, its powerful and it represents our fight – Today’s fight to transport minds to positive realities. I thank you.”
The exhibition will be open daily from 9am-7pm (except Sundays) and will be taken down on Friday 30th August, 2019.
