Œuvre d'art public
Canboulay
Artwork creator(s):
Mollineaux, Melinda
Text author(s):
Mollineaux, Melinda
Installation year:
1992
Remarks on location:
L’œuvre est installée dans le présentoir de dépliants touristiques sur les traversiers de la Colombie-Britannique, au centre d’information touristique de Vancouver et d'autres endroits.
Description:
Dépliants placés dans divers présentoirs
Text of the artwork:
[recto]
can·bou·lay
(kan-boo’lă) n. [Patois<Fr.cannes brulées.]
1.Orig. a celebration of freedom from slavery.
2. A traditional nighttime procession with
Costumes, drumming&music to announce the
Beginning of Carribbean Carnival Masquerade.
Var. Mardi Gras, Caribana, Caripeg, Carifest,
Cariwest.
---
At the time carnival flourished the
elite of society was masked or
disguised. The favorite costume of
the ladies was the graceful and costly
'mulatress' of the period, while
gentlemen adopted that of the garden
Negro, in Creole, negue jardin, or
black field slave. At carnival time
our mothers and grandmothers have
even danced the belair to the African
drum whose sound did not offend
their dainty ears, and our fathers and
grandfathers danced the bamboula,
the ghouba and the calinda…Sometimes
also the negue jardin united in bands would
proceed on evenings to the cannes brulees.
Their splendid march with torches through
the town streets imitated what actually took
place on the estates when a plantation was
on fire. In such cases labourers on the
neighbouring estates were conducted there
alternately, day and night, to assist in
grinding the burned canes before they went
sour, thus the cannes brulees.
---
Paris · Orleans · Santo Domingo · Port-Au-Prince
· Pointe-à-Pitre · Soufrière · Roseau · Fort-de-France
Castries · Kingstown · Bridgetown · Scarborough
Port-of-Spain · Kingston · Havana · Rio de Janiero
New Orleans · London · New York · Toronto
Winnipeg · Calgary · Edmonton · Vancouver
[verso]
Canboulay : We dance to the drum whose sound does not offend our dainty ears. Melinda Mollineaux, 1992.
OUT OF
PLACE
A project with the Vancouver Association for Non Commercial Culture.
Thanks to Harry and to Bill Boutin at Key Colour Photo Lab Ltd.
Text theme:
Définition étymologique de Canboulay, rendu encyclopédique ou anthropologique de Canboulay; destinations touristiques d’ici et d’ailleurs
Artwork theme:
Hybridité entre l’exotique et le domestique et entre le familier et l’autre; ethnocentrisme, passivité et commercialisation du tourisme et du loisir
History:
Exposition Out of Place, organisée par l’Association for Noncommercial Culture
Event date(s):
1992 Dimensions:
Height:
0.22m
Width:
0.1m Note(s):
Dans le texte, certains caractères spéciaux, présents dans l’œuvre en la forme de carte postale, sont omis, en l’occurrence des précisions phonétiques sur la première lettre «a» et sur les deux «o» dans «(kan-boo’lă)» (second récit du texte).
Artist's biography:
Mollineaux, Melinda Document(s):
Syndicate
