Decolonizing monuments: The Windrush commissions

Public statues and monuments have been in the public’s eye, recently, far more than they usually are because of the critical contentions that surround them. Last year, as part of the Black Lives Matter uprising that spread across the globe, many colonial and other racist monuments were taken down, intervened with (for instance, covered with graffiti), or formally removed – a global episode of iconoclasm not seen before in human history and part of a broader, yet incomplete historical reconning regarding colonialism and racism.

The take-down of the statue of the transatlantic slaver Edward Colston in Bristol, on 7 June 2020, was a landmark event in this context and made an eloquent and timely decolonial statement that was picked up globally by the conventional and social media. Another, here in the Caribbean, was the formal removal by the Barbados government of the Nelson statue in Bridgetown on 16 November 2020, after a long campaign to have this statue removed. There are multiple campaigns for the removal or relocation of other such monuments all over the world that have not yet yielded sufficient support or are resisted by the relevant authorities.

While I do not normally condone the destruction or violent removal of public art, or any art for that matter, there are historical moments and instances where such interventions are warranted and even needed as this brings symbolic closure to a problematic socio-political dispensation – the Colston statue may have been one such. Generally, however, my preference is for the relocation of such statues to a context where a critical and interpretative framework can be added, such as a museum, so that we can acknowledge and learn from their histories.

I am also interested in the symbolic critical potential of what I have coined as “creative iconoclasm”, which usually involves temporary, non-destructive interventions into problematic statues, that highlight their problematic significance. The Colston statue in Bristol had, in fact, been subject to several such interventions prior to its removal. One instance, in 2018, involved the laying out of 100 sculpted bodies in the shape of a slave ship diagram as an installation in front of the statue. Many felt that this should have become a permanent part of the monument, as it poignantly revealed what Colston was really associated with, while being celebrated as a benefactor to the city of Bristol. Whether that would have been feasible, in the long run, or substantially resolved the symbolic violence represented by maintaining the Colston statue in a city with a large, politically active Black population, is of course another matter.

Iconoclasm is the forced removal or destruction of images and statuary, usually for political or religious reasons related to what they represent. The forced removal or destruction of colonial public monuments, for instance, recognizes their lingering and nefarious propagandist power. Many other questions arise from the current situation. One is what to do with the resulting empty plinths (and the statues that were removed) and what statues and monuments should take their place. Another, equally important one is that there is the opportunity and need to rethink what it is public monuments and statues are supposed to do and represent, and what form they can take.

Public monuments are rarely interesting, artistically, and in the Caribbean, even the more recent, postcolonial public statues and monuments tend to be very conservative in concept and form. There are persistent views that a statue necessarily needs to be figurative and scrupulously representational but idealized, typically consisting of a conventionally posed figure or a bust. And, of course, “proper statues” must be made from bronze or marble and installed on a pedestal or in an alcove. Even though the subject may be different, such statues inadvertently replicate the very same colonial mode of representation they seek to replace, and they often disappear into the background of the urban environment after the drama of the commission and unveiling, ignored and taken for granted by most.

Ironically, however, the public is often resistant to any departures from the established norm when it comes to public monuments. This is illustrated by some of the controversies that have occurred in independent Jamaica. Other factors however also play a role, such as the obviously significant differences of opinion between the public and art world decision-makers about how matters of great collective interest, such as Emancipation, ought to be represented, and how and by whom such decisions should be made.

It is instructive, in this context, to look at the recent Windrush monument commissions in the United Kingdom. The commissions came about as a response to the so-called Windrush Scandal, as well as to the related mounting demands in the UK for symbolic justice with regard to public monuments, statues, and other public tributes such as street and place names, which often celebrate problematic colonial figures. The Windrush scandal, readers will remember, culminated in 2018, when hundreds of elderly persons who were born in the Caribbean but who had grown up in the United Kingdom, and for various reasons beyond their control had not acquired the right papers, were threatened with deportation to the Caribbean, and, in some instances, actually deported, and deprived of access to certain public services such as NHS health care. A Commission of Inquiry was appointed and in 2020 recommended several restorative justice initiatives.

The scandal also raised questions about the need for greater recognition for the so-called Windrush Generation and their descendants. The term Windrush Generation describes those Caribbean migrants who helped to rebuild the UK after World War II, arriving between 1948 and 1971 and often facing deep racism and exclusion in the process, and who helped to transform the country’s culture and society in the UK in the process. The need for greater recognition for artists of Caribbean descent is part of that process, as is evident not only in the Windrush commissions but also in exhibitions such as Life Between Islands, a major exhibition which will open at the Tate Britain on 1 December 2021, and which explores the work of artists of Caribbean descent in the UK, from the 1950s to the present. That two artists of Caribbean descent, Sonia Boyce and Alberta Whittle, will represent England and Scotland, respectively, in the upcoming Venice Biennial can be viewed in the same general context.

The first Windrush commission was unveiled in Hackney, London, just a few weeks ago, and consists of a sculptural installation by Veronica Ryan OBE, who was born in the island of Montserrat but migrated to the UK as a child. The installation consists of three giant-sized Caribbean fruits, a breadfruit, soursop and sweetsop, executed in oxidized bronze and, for the sweetsop, marble, that have been installed at street level near St Augustine’s Tower. The commission is part of the Hackney Council’s wider Windrush Engagement Programme which started in 2018. A second commission by the Thomas J Price, who is of part-Jamaican descent will be unveiled next year.

Last week, news broke that the Atlanta-based Jamaican artist Basil Watson had been selected to create the National Windrush Monument that is scheduled to be unveiled on Windrush Day, 22 June 2022. Watson’s winning proposal depicts a couple, male and female, and a female child, standing on a mountain of suitcases, and represents the hopes, memories, culture, and aspirations of The Arrivants, to borrow Kamau Brathwaite’s phrase. This monument is a project of the Windrush Commemorations Committee and will stand at Waterloo Station in London. Watson was one of four short-listed artists for the commission. The others were: Valda Jackson, a Jamaican-born artist and writer; Jeannette Ehlers, a Danish-Trinidadian artist; and Thomas J Price.

Next week, in part 2 of this article, we will take a closer look at the commissions, how they are reimagining public monuments, and who they are being received.

Dr Veerle Poupeye is an art historian specialized in art from the Caribbean. She lectures at the Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts in Kingston, Jamaica, and works as an independent curator, writer, researcher, and cultural consultant. Her personal blog can be found at veerlepoupeye.com.