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A R T F R O M B E L I Z E
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'Dugu' Healing Ceremony
Benjamin Nicholas (Dangriga, Belize)
Oil on Canvas (24 x 30), c.1985
SOLD
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Benjamin Nicholas is one of Belize's leading artists and the one-man chronicler of the history and culture of the Garifuna Indians. The Garifuna are an Afro-Caribbean people descended from African slaves who were shipwrecked on the island of St. Vincent and inter-married with the indigenous Carib Indians. Defeated by the British in 1797, they were deported to the islands and coast of Nicaragua, Honduras and Belize. The son of a banana farmer, Benjamin Nicholas was born in 1930 in the southern coastal village of Barranco. He began to draw while attending primary school, and as a young man studied both commercial and fine art in Guatemala. Returning to Belize, he gained the notice of an American collector who sponsored his study of art at the University of Minnesota for three years. Nicholas' paintings depict both the history and the daily life and culture of the Garifuna people around him - from fishing and farming to healing ceremonies and mourning rites. Nicholas' reputation has steadily grown in Belize and abroad. He has received many awards and mural commissions in public buildings.
Note: Benjamin Nicholas is a fine artist and a charming man. He was very hospitable to us on our visit in 1999. Unfortunately he has been dishonest in his dealings with us. We advanced him payment for five paintings in 1999, but none were ever sent to us. He has ignored all our letters inquiring about the paintings. Because of our website we have been contacted by at least three other people who visited him and ordered paintings from him, but were similarly stiffed by him. We obviously have given up on getting any more work from him. If you visit Mr. Nicholas in Belize take the work with you. Do not under any circumstances pay in advance for work.
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Benjamin Nicholas (Dangriga, Belize) 1999
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Back to Camp
Benjamin Nicholas (Dangriga, Belize)
Oil on Canvas (20 x 23 1/2) 1998
$525 (framed) SOLD 12/03 |
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Michael Gordon is a self-taught street artist, who was until recently homeless on the streets of Belize City. Born in 1966 in a poor neighborhood of Belize City, he has spent much of his life living on the street, interrupted by interludes in jail or mental institutions. He began drawing and painting only in the last six years. His first works were drawings in pencil on scraps of cardboard - odd portraits of people he saw on the street. Most of his early subjects were fellow Rastafarians. As his work began to find a market, he has experimented with other materials - colored pencil, oil and acrylic paint, cloth, canvas, board and even broken glass. Gordon's subject matter has expanded to include the classic subjects - nudes, celebrities, religious images, and the landscape of his daily life, his memory and his imagination.
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Michael Gordon (Belize City, Belize) 1999
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Two Rastas
Michael Gordon (Belize City, Belize)
Acrylic on Board w/ broken glass (18 x 24) 1998
$450 (framed)
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All photographs and text Copyright Indigo Arts Gallery, Inc., 1998-2006. Use without permission prohibited.
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