LeRoy Clarke Interviewed by Maya Trotz for Jouvay.com. February, 2004.

Meeting and interviewing Leroy Clarke during carnival season in Trinidad was not just the icing on the cake, but the cake and the meal itself. He is a painter extraordinaire whose intricate and deep pieces of art fill galleries, homes and treasured places throughout the world. He's Trinidad's master artist who people make documentaries of, who authors make books of, who Ministers turn to for advice on culture and who youths flock to for advice on living. He took time out to explain the meaning and importance of the Afro-centricity of his art, to discuss the "dread" direction in which Trinidad carnival is heading and even discuss the nature of Caribbean men's polygamist behavior. At sixty five, being called a master artist is not just about the paintings, but about the man himself.

	Click here for a slide presentation of some of Leroy Clarke's paintings (jars by fence: homemade noni juice). Pictures are from a relaxed evening at his house with Felicity Richards who most graciously arranged this meeting and Keomi, a young artist who Leroy Clarke mentors.
	The idea is to translate or try to interpret things like sounds...I am thinking of some music. I think I have a sight for what I am hearing so I am trying to see if I can paint impressions of that...People say you can't paint sound or you can't paint love, but I don't think so...I want to be conscious about the language of design....one of my mentors is Wilson Harris....I don't teach directly, but I try to inspire. Click here to listen (5 minutes).
	I work from a chaotic state in terms of the painting. I create element with that whole space of bubbling colour...To leave it in that stage is cheating because you have not employed your real creative skills and your intellect...Your intellect has to come in and do a little battle with the imagination. Click here to listen (6 minutes).
	Where African people are concerned, they have a moral responsibility to deal with their house which is dilapidated and it describes our situation so I am given almost mission like to re charting the ruins...I am dealing with the world, but I can't do that until I have a self....I am not racist...I may be racial with the sense that I am dealing with my own house. The Indian man should rise in his Indian manliness and should do so so well and so well balanced and so perfect. If all of us did that and discovered our essence there would be less hatred. It has nothing to do with equality as much as it has to do with mutual understanding of the struggle to achieve self. We have to really understand what it means after 500 years to re chart the ruin and piece it together. Click Here to Listen (8 minutes).
	That is a good question for the future (about the mixtures of the Caribbean). The age that I occupy, we are still dealing with the ingredients that go into the melting pot...Years ago I remember going to see mas' and this young woman caught my eyes in a band and I followed her the whole day...The image of her is still with me...Was this a real woman in truth? What was taking me to follow this woman? Can we move to the metaphorical. Is it Trinidad that I was following? The beauty, the promise at 18 years old, my muse, my dream? Now I am old enough to reflect. She has turned her face and she is a beast. Who is she? The la diablesse with her tongue hanging out of her mouth just having fucked the dirt...How do I talk about this lost dream...I stood there and eat and drink up all of this vomit and nothing moved me (about Poison, Barbarossa, Legends band on carnival Tuesday)...If we can have discussions on this to see how tired we have become perhaps there is a redeeming chapter and I feel I am the one to talk about it...I don't think there is one man in the Caribbean who has just one woman. Click Here to Listen (28 minutes).
	You'll never forget me because that is the Obeah that I am...Click here to Listen (25 minutes)

Being presented with a signed, limited edition copy of LeRoy Clarke, Of Flesh & Salt & Wind & Current: A Retrospective. A Compilation of works by and about LeRoy Clarke. Artist/Author/Poet. Researched and Compiled by Caroline C. Ravello. Email museum@tstt.net.tt or leroyclarke@hotmail.com.

More artists: caribarts.org