Xaymaca Exhibition to open on May 8

National Gallery West, the National Gallery of Jamaica’s new branch at the Montego Bay Cultural Centre, Sam Sharpe Square, is pleased to present its new exhibition, Xaymaca: Nature and the Landscape in Jamaican Art, which is scheduled to open to the public on Friday, May 8. Taking the Taino name for the island of Jamaica, which translates as “land of wood and water,” as its point of departure, the Xaymaca exhibition celebrates the spectacular natural beauty of Jamaica, seen through the eyes of Jamaican and visiting artists from the colonial period to the present, but also acknowledges how nature and the land carry the baggage of history and contemporary politics.

The exhibition features major works from the National Gallery of Jamaica collection and comprises four sections: plantation era art, with paintings and prints by George Robertson, J.B. Kidd, James Hakewill and John Eaves; early and twentieth photography by A. Duperly and Sons, Herbert Hood-Daniel and Robin Farquharson; paintings and one sculpture from the nationalist school of the mid-twentieth century by Edna Manley, Albert Huie and Ralph Campbell; and paintings and sculpture from the post-Independence generation, by Barrington Watson, Eugene Hyde, Colin Garland, Michael Lester, Mallica “Kapo” Reynolds, Everald Brown, Hope Brooks and Laura Facey. The exhibition was curated by Dr Veerle Poupeye, Executive Director of the National Gallery, and O’Neil Lawrence, Senior Curator, and is funded by the Tourism Enhancement Fund.

Members of the public are cordially invited to the opening function of Xaymaca: Nature and the Landscape in Jamaican Art which takes place on Friday, May 8 at 7 pm. The exhibition will be on view at National Gallery West until August 8, 2015. An illustrated catalogue of the exhibition will be available for sale.