A.I.R.T.S. (December 2024) is the 6th in our series of exhibitions which began during the 2020 pandemic. The first exhibition emerged out of necessity from a group of artists who felt the need to gather art together in the spirit of community, learning and healing. Although the pandemic has passed, the necessity for this exhibition persists not only because of the lack of structured gallery systems to curate and share art locally, but also because there seems to be lingering tensions in the world with increasing wars, climate disasters, soaring crime rates, migratory crises, food security issues and financial challenges, all of which seems to occur offshore, but which do in fact affect small islands like Jamaica. There is a lot to distil from our social realm and we continue, through this exhibition, to give artists the space to share their thoughts and find moments of reflection and peace through the varied media being utilised. Our aim with these exhibitions has also been to highlight artists from varied points in their career – from recent graduates of the Edna Manley College, artists who are self-taught, mid-career and more established artists. We hope that this exhibition will be a space for us all to continue to process. And we leave the viewer with a reminder of the initial driving point of “…and I resumed the struggle”:

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“As artists we are aware that our profession has survived these sort of moments in history and it has become ever more important to present the issues we have gleaned from it. I invite the viewer to look to this exhibition not only as mere presentation of our various concerns but simply for the fact that we carried on, the work was done. The title “…and I resumed the struggle.’, a quote from Samuel Beckett’s seminal tragicomedy Waiting for Godot, is a poignant one in this regard. Locked within this notion of carrying on is the sort of will, determination and character that will be needed to see ourselves through a most uncertain and incomprehensible time.” ​--- excerpt from our 2020 essay.

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View e-catalogue HERE.