feature: visual art in kingston on the rise – the ‘paint jamaica’ street art project

Jamaica approaches the latter half of its 53rd year of independence somewhat delicately. Although identified as one of the most beautiful islands in the Caribbean, it is also well known for its complex sociopolitical environment. The Jamaican society knowingly or not, prides itself on a very unique brand of separatism, that somehow manages to undermine not only the black majority, but the poorer, less fortunate as well. I’ve always found it peculiar how downtown Kingston would be considered a lower class area or branded as a ghetto because the people residing closest in proximity are less fortunate. It never really made much sense that the same ghettos had smack dab in the middle, skyscrapers that were headquarters for big corporations, yet those pockets managed to avoid the same slander as the residents. This is one of the more longstanding modes of operation for Jamaica, but a group of young artists decided to take on this issue together with a traveler Marianna Farag and myself as a writer. Very soon this initiative evolved into a full blown street art project, called Paint Jamaica. The intention was very pure and out of that the project received overwhelming waves of support, it had become a cause. The cause, to beautify the unlikely community of Fleet Street and others like it. 

By Gladstone Taylor, AFROPUNK Contributor

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Perhaps it is in the nature of Jamaicans, after so many years of enduring political tyranny, to be very critical of initiatives that are supposed to help communities. But that was in some ways one of the biggest responses to the project. This called into question a lot of things, like the feasibility of Art being able to cause real social change. After all, making a place pretty doesn’t solve its problems, or does it? 

I find that my counter to this feasibility argument, is that people somehow forget what Paint Jamaica started as. It started as a group of artists, who were in disapproval of the elitism within the art world and the larger world, deciding they would rather volunteer their time and efforts to share their art with people who were underexposed. Certainly they could not donate money, these artists were students, but they had their art. Art which they could have decided to keep in posh galleries where only certain people can appreciate them. The art has value and in that sense these artists have given so much. Yet the question remained, was it enough. Is art enough? The answer to this is simple, take a look at Fleet Street now. If you track the growth, from where it was, to the level of activity it is getting now, it is evident that this project broke boundaries, changed things.

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https://www.facebook.com/paintjamaica

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* Gladstone Taylor’s Website: www.kings7one.com

Photo credit: Paint Jamaica Photographers