Clermont Mapp: Try Everything
Born in February 1951. An interesting man, mustering more energy and bluster than a man of far lesser years, he has lived an interesting life both in Barbados, and the United States. His art career is similarly interesting and well documented, and through this one can see the changes that has occurred in him over the years, both physically and mentally, producing the man known as Clermont Mapp today.
Clermont Mapp and his mentor Fielding Babb
Mr Mapp explained, like most artists, he always was inspired by art, particularly painting which was his first medium. Growing up he painted often, with the support of his parents which was, and still is (to an extent) a rarity for children in the 1960s. This interest with the addition of chance introduced him to his mentor Fielding Babb himself an influential artist and an important figure in the growth of Fine Arts in the country alongside Karl Broodhagen. Clermont Mapp recounted meeting Mr Babb when he was 18, as he was heading to the shop to buy something on his mother’s orders, it was on this journey he saw Fielding Babb painting with a palette knife, a technique he had never seen before. As they talked, Fielding Babb gave him his own palette knife and took him under his wing where he would learn a lot as well as open exhibits together.
Painting of a St George Secondary School student
Glasgow, Akini. Clermont Mapp Painting. Painting. The Standpipe. March 7, 2022
His 18th year was quite eventful. No sooner had he met Fielding Babb, he entered the army, something he has come to regard as one of the things that made him the man he is today, instilling discipline and fortitude. However he left the army in 1975 and began teaching art at the St George Secondary School. Indeed, his house is full of memorabilia from this time, including paintings that he had done of the students as well as photographs. He found teaching an enjoyable endeavour explaining that the children were eager to create as well as offer themselves up as muses. He then moved unto St Leonard’s Boys School where he found the teaching a bit more difficult, however he found a way to deal with these boys. Mr Mapp elucidates that the key to this was treating them as his little siblings, he achieved this by always being there to listen to them as well as talk to them if they got into trouble. This respect he gave them allowed him to build a rapport with his students as he taught them art, batik, leathercraft, pottery and aided in the Decorated Cart Parade (parade held during Cropover where donkey carts would be decorated and judged) which they often won.
Clermont Mapp showing his painting ‘Best in Show’ (2017)
Glasgow, Akini. Clermont Mapp Painting ‘Best In Show’. The Standpipe. March 7, 2022
During his teaching career he still managed to exhibit regularly, earning him the moniker ‘The Touring Teacher’ as he exhibited in Cuba, Barbados, St Lucia, Jamaica, Antigua, England, Canada and the United States and Italy over the period of 1976-1992. He has opened exhibits with artists such as Fielding Babb, David Scott Leibowitz, Adrian Compton and his sons Israel and Joshua. His art style is varied, extensively so from the aforementioned styles he taught in school to wood sculptures, palette knife, ink block carving or more fringe techniques such as sawdust. His work draws from nature, Caribbean society and chattel houses, but also the abstract. He explains that he must try everything and never stop and that his best advice would be to keep trying. Mr Mapp expounded that often people do not try whether that be new things, or keeping at things they have already started and that prevents them from creating the best art they can, or creating anything at all. And as his house is literally filled to the brim with art pieces, piles upon piles of art, it is advice he himself has taken to heart.
Clermont Mapp in his living room filled with art
Glasgow, Akini. Clermont Mapp Painting. Photograph. The Standpipe. March 7, 2022
It was the calling of his mother that retired him from teaching, as she had asked and provided the means for him to move to the USA in 1992. He explains that he learned a lot in America, meeting up with many artists and learning their techniques. He expresses that often he would simply pick a place on a map and drive there, this being one of the reasons he ended up in Alabama where he bought a small house to serve as his studio.
Clermont Mapp and his two eldest sons Israel (right) and Joshua (left) at their exhibit in the USA. He has two younger sons named Zachary and Zavier as well.
N.A. Clermont Mapp and His Sons. Photograph. (n.d.)
This house which he painted beautifully served as one of his main sources of income, as individuals attracted to it would come and talk to him and eventually buy or commission work. Of course, in order to make a living through art, particularly as the responsibility of fatherhood had called him at the age of 26, he adopted a businessman’s mentality, choosing at times to make pieces that will sell well as well as being time efficient such as watercolours, t-shirts and ink carvings.
This thinking is often the catalyst that makes an artist unrecognizable, however as one journalist puts it in their article on him in 1984, ‘that clean down to earth, creative spirit is still alive and thrusting in Clermont Mapp’ this is as true today as it was 38 years ago. Mr Clermont Mapp has remained as passionate as ever leaving us with an element of his resolve, ‘if the time comes when I cannot paint LET ME DIE’
Bibliography
Clermont Mapp, interview by Akini Glasgow (Barbados, March 7, 2022)
Benjamin , Edward. “The 'Touring' Art Teacher.” Daily Nation. December 19, 1983.
“Businessman Who Lives by His 'Craft'.” Weekend Nation . November 23, 1984.
Clermont Mapp Art
https://artgallerycaribbean.com/portfolio.php?artistId=211162