Shiv­a­nee Ram­lochan

Vi­su­al artists are not typ­i­cal­ly known as the best au­to­bi­og­ra­phers. We trust them to awe us with the majesty they work on the can­vas, yes. On the writ­ten page, how­ev­er, their in­ward re­flec­tions on their lives can turn vague, or ram­ble on, in­co­her­ent. Not so with Jack­ie Hink­son's re­cent­ly pub­lished mem­oir, which seeks to hold up in hon­est, clear terms the sub­ject of his life's work: His art.

Re­gard­ed as one of the pre­mier wa­ter­colour and oil artists of Trinidad and To­ba­go and the re­gion, Hink­son was born in Port-of-Spain in 1942. In 1961, along with his friend Pe­ter Min­shall, he was one of five young artists to dis­play his work at a Trinidad Art So­ci­ety ex­hib­it. Since that show­ing, Hink­son's art has been ex­hib­it­ed nu­mer­ous times, both home and abroad, to great crit­i­cal ac­claim. At a "Meet the Artist" ses­sion at Soft Box stu­dio, St Clair, in Oc­to­ber, 2012, Na­tion­al Trust Coun­cil mem­ber Jalaludin Khan de­scribed Hink­son as a "sig­na­ture artist" of Trinidad and To­ba­go, one whose lega­cy and crit­i­cal ex­pe­ri­ence en­rich­es our so­ci­ety.

In the be­gin­ning pages of his re­flec­tions, Hink­son con­fess­es, "As a small child, I thought of my­self as both loved and lone­ly," adding, "I lived my life in both the sun­shine and the shad­ow." This ear­ly ten­den­cy to­wards soli­tude, cou­pled with seek­ing out bal­ances (or the lack of bal­ance) in light and dark­ness: these at­trib­ut­es seem to have fol­lowed Hink­son's growth, both as an artist and an in­di­vid­ual. In­deed, the ques­tion must be posed af­ter hav­ing read the mem­oir: is it pos­si­ble to sep­a­rate the artist from the every­day man, or can an artist claim to be "every­day" at all?

Hink­son's nar­ra­tive does not pre­tend to an­swer such ques­tions with fi­nal au­thor­i­ty. In evoca­tive­ly ti­tled chap­ters (in­clud­ing Dream­ing of an Old House, A Boy in Cobo Town, The Plea­sures of Ex­ile, the Call of Home), the artist lays out his life as un­flinch­ing­ly as if com­mit­ting paint to can­vas. There is a sen­si­tiv­i­ty in these retellings that stuns, an un­ex­pect­ed grace and con­sid­er­a­tion for the rhythms of lan­guage. Sev­er­al pas­sages beg to be reread for their beau­ty, as much as for the care­ful, pre­cise ways in which they han­dle de­scrip­tion.

Many of these are to be found in Hink­son's jour­neys away from home, as well as in his rem­i­nis­cences of life in the beloved old fam­i­ly home on 21 Rich­mond Street, Port-of-Spain.

The mem­oir, in­tense­ly per­son­al as it is, al­so gen­er­ous­ly in­cludes a frame­work by which to un­der­stand the Trinidad in which Hink­son grew up, a Trinidad that ar­guably on­ly ex­ists now in frag­ments and glimpses. Hear­ken­ing back to the be­gin­ning of his days at Queen's Roy­al Col­lege, Hink­son notes that the Colo­nial gov­ern­ment gave four is­land schol­ar­ships to boys, and just one to girls.

He goes on to doc­u­ment faith­ful­ly the creep­ing in­flu­ences of glob­al­i­sa­tion and mod­ern changes as they fil­tered in­to T&T, in­clud­ing the ad­vent of Ford car deal­er­ships; his­tor­i­cal hous­es falling to bull­doz­ers; shift­ing con­ven­tions re­gard­ing art and its pro­duc­tion. The read­er with his­tor­i­cal in­cli­na­tions will be fas­ci­nat­ed to see these is­lands change both sub­tly and overt­ly from chap­ter to chap­ter.

Thank­ful­ly, the mem­oir staves off be­com­ing too som­bre, pep­pered as it is with amus­ing anec­dotes from his child­hood and youth. Hu­mour is mixed in with sober con­tem­pla­tion, pathos with gen­tle res­ig­na­tion: the full and fi­nal im­pres­sion of a life lived un­com­pro­mis­ing­ly, bare to the de­mand­ing call of be­ing a lo­cal artist, of be­ing any kind of artist.

High­light­ed with the artist's black and white sketch­es of peo­ple and places, What Things are True is an un­de­ni­ably gor­geous pub­li­ca­tion. Pre­sent­ed in any for­mat, how­ev­er, its con­tent would be the same: one artist's homage to his par­ents; his in­flu­ences; his fam­i­ly; his coun­try and lands far away, every­thing that moulds ex­cep­tion­al tal­ent and gives it its ground­ing. "I hold up small pieces of the world around me to the light," Hink­son mus­es in his mem­oir.

How lucky we are that his fas­ci­na­tion with light and dark­ness con­tin­ues, en­dures in his cre­at­ed work and his cre­ations yet to come.

The ret­ro­spec­tive of Hink­son's most re­cent ex­hib­it, 5 Decades of Art, con­tin­ues un­til the end of Jan­u­ary at the Na­tion­al Mu­se­um and Art Gallery, 117 Fred­er­ick Street, Port-of-Spain, from Tues-Sat at noon-6 pm, and Sun 2-6 pm. In­fo: 623-5941 or mu­se­um@tstt.net.tt