Oil on canvas board, 1974. 203x254 mm; 8x10 inches. Signed and dated in oil, lower right.
Provenance: private collection, New York.
This portrait is by Boscoe Holder who, like his younger brother Goeffrey, was an extremely talented dancer, musician and visual artist. Born in Port of Spain, Trinidad, Holder, by the late nineteen-thirties, had formed a group of dancers and was producing shows depicting the music, songs and dances of Trinidad. At the same time, he presented several solo art exhibitions, and became a founder and life member of the Trinidad Art Society.
In 1947, Holder visited the US, where he taught dancing at the Katherine Dunham School and exhibited his paintings at a gallery in Greenwich Village. On his return to Trinidad, in 1948, he married Sheila Clarke, his leading dancer. In April 1950, Holder with his wife and son went to live in London, which became their home for the next two decades and where he pursued a career in dance and performance, both on the stage and on television. During these years Holder continued to paint and his work was exhibited at various UK galleries.
In 1970, Holder returned to Trinidad and quickly re-established himself as a painter, with an unbroken record of annual shows from 1979 onwards. In 2006, the Art Society of Trinidad and Tobago and Gallery 101 exhibited a survey of works by Holder from 1991 to 2002.
