Sally Price: Drawing on slavery – Maroon art and contested stories of its origin

The Maroons, descendants of Africans who liberated themselves from plantation slavery in the colony of Suriname, are famous throughout the world for their rich arts. The women produce stunning textiles and sinuous engravings on the fruit of the calabash tree and the men carve elegant designs on everything from canoes and housefronts to combs and kitchen utensils. In addition, Maroon men in eastern Suriname and neighboring French Guiana have developed a vibrant, colorful art of painting, and have been producing it successfully for Western customers, both tourists and locals. Although we know that these arts began to be produced only in the nineteenth century, long after the Maroons were living independently in the forested interior, young artists who produce acrylic paintings for sale have constructed a narrative claiming that the arts originated during slavery, as a system communicating secret messages aimed at facilitating escape to freedom. This lecture explores the story of their narrative.