ARTISTS’ COALITION OF TRINIDAD & TOBAGO (A.C.T.T.) 5 Gulf View Drive, La Horquette Extension Road, Glencoe 1-868-797-0949 artistscoalitiontt@gmail.com www.artistscoalition.wordpress.com

AN OVERVIEW OF THE WORK OF 2014

ACTT President Rubadiri Victor account for his time spent in the Ministry of Arts and Multiculturalism (June 2013 to present) with the mission of getting adopted the Sector's Progressive Agenda.

2014 might be the most important year of Cultural Activism because it was the first time that we have been able to get a glimpse of the inner workings of the Ministry of Arts and government as a whole to see who, what, when, why, and how the Progressive Agendas have been blocked.

o Rubadiri has mapped 5 levels of resistance to any progressive agenda. 3 at Public Service leveland 2 at Cabinet level.

o The only way for any Progressive Agenda to be implemented and implemented with Integrityis for their to be a committed Sector Representative inside the Ministry of Arts to champion the agenda 24/7 365 days through the bureaucratic systems and to navigate past the 5 levels of resistance.

o That individual must be clever as many attempts will be made to shut them down, sabotage the initiatives, corrupt them, dumb them down, or to postpone the implementation. The representative must be able to always have their guard up and to be present at all meetings leastthat one day they have their guard down and they lapse that the programme is removed or sabotaged.

o That person must report to the Sector regularly.

o That person should set aside a minimum of a year and a half to see these things through. Juneis a good place tp start as it is Budget preparation time. That means the person can advocate to get programmes into the Budget for October. That rep must then walk the programme into implementation which will take them at least until March/April of the next year.

o I would suggest that people not stay inside and that we keep a constant stream of individuals operating as Sector reps to keep the energies flowing.

The 4 main things won by Rubadiri are: 1. the Creation of a National Arts Council based on the British and Canadian Best Practice,

2. the Creation of Genius Grants ala the MacArthur Foundation Grants

3. the commissioning of 44 (24 in the first year 20 in the 2nd) Memoirs and Histories of aspects and personages from local Culture eg the History of Dance, the History of Ramleela, etc as well as biographies of Sparrow, Kitch, Sundar, etc, and

4. the regularization of the Land Tenure of all Panyards in the country.

We need the Sector's solidarity in making these things roll out with Integrity and swiftness

1

1. ACTT board members account for other programmes run by ACTT in 2014: o PROJECT MEMORY: Memoir-length interviews recorded of 40+ Elders; 100s of exceptional

photographic portraits commissioned and shot of Elders; histories for T&T’s 29 artistic traditions; numerous photographic and other archives rescued and uncovered; ad campaign shot; architectural grid, concept, content, floor-plan, and technical layout of full exhibition done; project did not get the balance of funding from Ministry of People so cannot output as yet. International and local resource partners: COMMONWEALTH FOUNDATION; INTER-AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT BANK; BPTT; AGING DIVISION OF THE MINISTRY OF THE PEOPLE ; GISD; CNMG;

SUBJECTS WHO HAVE BEEN RECORDED:

1. Mr Ruben Blades 106- founder of the OWTU (since deceased)2. Lennox Bobby Mohammed- steelband pioneer3. Freddie Kissoon- theatre pioneer, founder Strolling Players4. Joey Lewis- master band leader5. Holly Betaudier- the Arima kid, fountain of folk knowledge, TV pioneer6. Majorie Boothman-matriarch of one of the largest First families of T&T (since deceased)7. Jomo Wahtuse- Steelband inventor8. Junior Telfer- cultural maven, club owner in England of the seminal club that facilitated T&T’s GoldenAge and UK’s Jazz Age9. Justice Ulric Cross- renaissance man- decorated WWII veteran pilot, winner of multiple international awards, judge (since deceased)10. Patricia Roe- Caribbean School of Dance principal11. Senor Gomez- master carnival artisan12. Valentino- master traditional calypsonian13. Black Stalin- master traditional calypsonian14. Shadow- master traditional calypsonian15. Yanketeshu- Traditional East Indian tent singing (since deceased)16. Charles Harrington- last Master of Midnight Robber costuming17. Esau Millington- the last of the first generation Midnight Robbers 93 yrs18. Ralph Dyette- King Sailor dancer and storyteller19. Felix Edingborough- the last Pierrot Grenade20. Ravi Ji- Hindu and folk activist21. John Agitation- comedic veteran22. Jason Griffith- Sailor Mas pioneer

2

23. Killer Whale- epic stick-fighter champion24. Sohan Girdharie- East Indian Master musician25. Clive Zanda- co-creator of Kaiso-Jazz fusion;26. Errol Ince- one of our greatest brass band arrangers27. Ivy Ramdeen- East Indian Paper Cutting master28. Terry Evelyn- one of the greatest carnival costume designers of all time.29. James Lee Wah- genius theatre director and institution maker30. Robert Munroe Mater cuatro-ista31. William Munroe- promoter32. Ralph Dayette- champion King sailor33. Pearl Eintou Springer- pioneer librarian, writer, theatrician, advocate34. Khafra Kambon- Black Power advocate35. Benedict Morgan- master Devil Mas36. Cetewayo- master Rapso artist (since deceased)37. Errol Ince- master Soca band leader and trumpeter38. Bertie Marshall- master steelband inventor/tuner (since deceased)39. Anthony Williams- master steelband inventor/tuner40. Winsford Devine- master calypso song-writer41. Allrounder- calypsonian42. Bomber- calypsonian43. Rudy Piggot- historian, mentor44. Tony Hall- playwright, theprist45. Sprangalang- comedian, commentator46. Raffique Shah- journalist, multineer47. Vivian London Parris-driver For Trinidad's Governor Generals & First Presidents48. Clive Nunez- trade union and people’s advocate49. Aunty Thea- master storyteller50. Robert Montano- co-founder Point L:isas experiment, WWII veteran51. Baba Erinfulami- Orisha Elder, Pan and community historian52. David Abdullah- trade union leader, liberation movement pioneer53. Ivan Laughlin- master planner54. Peter Cecil Bacchus- WWII veteran55. Aldwyn Chow Lin On- master mas artisan - (since deceased)

• INDIGENOUS: Launched a revolutionary programme on 91.1 Talk City every Thursday 8- 10pm now on Power 102 2 days of the week. The show plays 100% non-festival local music and has the nation’s first full-spectrum Top 12 Chart. The chart is now carried in the Sunday Mix in the Sunday Express. The show has playedover 700 songs with over 550 of these being new releases! Sheldon Manoo manages this. A series of compilation albums and events are planned. Local resource partners: SOLOMON MUSIC; BMOBILE; CNMG

• ACTT WEBSITE: Commissioned Nigel Campbell to be ACTT’s webmaster and to create a more interactive dynamic (and cheap) site- especially one where members and the public can access ACTT’s, government’s, and other policy and other documents. Also it serves as a blog-space for the president’s articles.

• GUILD OF MASTERS: Held exhibition in Museum from January to October 2014. Thousands of visitors. First Guild of many. Minister of Tertiary Education made commitment to set up the Guild of Masters at UTT. Re-built a 33ft Cedros Hosay Tadjah passing on the tradition from an Elder Master Artisan to younger Master

3

Apprentices; recorded over 40 hours of the process of conception, construction, etc; codified the process with architectural plans, schematics, materials lists, real-life and sophisticated virtual models; etc. His Excellency the President is Patron of the Guild and the Mayor of Port of Spain has crafted a declaration and is an ally. Local resource partners: FIRST CITIZENS BANK; OWTU; TGN MEDIA; THE KENDRA

THE ROLE OF CULTURE

Working with the Caribbean Association of Local Government Associations, Rubadiri has run workshop training local government agencies in Culture and the Creative industries. He also helped co-develop a manual to train trainers to promote - among secondary school students (15-19 yrs), NGOs, and local governments - local culture, respectful of cultural and ethnic diversity . Pilot project with reps from the Caribbean taking back the work-book for students in The Bahamas, Guyana, St Lucia and Trinidad & Tobago.

2. The State of the Sector here and in the diaspora and global trends. Attendees should read this article to familiarize themselves with the data and the possibilities- https://www.facebook.com/notes/rubadiri-victor/at-this-moment/10152982689817697

4

• Theatre

• Dance

• Music (Calypso, Soca, Chutney, Parang, Folk musics, Classical musics, Non-Festival Musics)

• Film & TV

• Visual Arts

• Literature and Oral Traditions

• Industrial Arts

• Design & Applied Arts

• Apps and New Media Arts

• Mas and Festival Arts

• Culinary

• Architecture

3. The state of the local music 'industry': Due to certain international movements by Bunji, Machel, KMC and our big players in the diaspora- Nicki Minaj, Heather Headley, Theophilus London, Jillionaire etc., T&T music has certain opportunities. At the same time the age-old impediments remain the same at home- or worse. This isthe context:

• Government is not interested in the non-Festival musics in T&T

• Government does not understand the global industry- how it works and how to graduate our local cohort into it. They will instead create all kinds of crap programmes and fund those before they resource any international Best Practice common sense initiative.

• They are not interested in getting artists to foreign music expos which is the primary way to graduate artists into the global industry.

• Our national touring cohort is about .05% when it should be 35%. This means our artists are landlocked and trapped in an unsupportive local environment.

AFTER A YEAR IN THE MINISTRY AND GOVERNMENT I HAVE TO SAY THAT THEY WILL NEVER SUPPORT THE FOUNDATIONAL MOVEMENTS NECESSARY FOR THE SECTOR UNDER THE PRESENT PUBLIC SERVICE AND POLITICAL SET-UPS.

This means it is imperative that WE strategise to take the necessary steps ourselves. This will take extraordinary financial and administrative resources but they can be mobilized. We must do this quickly and immediately before this generation of musicians and bands disband and collapse and the moment of mini-Golden Age music that has been created in the last decade be lost. WE HAVE TO DO THIS WORK!!!

The strategies we must as a Sector embark on for the next year are:

• A networking mechanism must be set up with our diaspora gate openers.

• We must ensure that the best musicians and music are recorded to their best possible levels- musically, engineering, and mixing and mastering wise. Only if bands have credible recorded products do we have the excuse to even be at the international bargaining table. At the end

5

of 2015 we must have produced about 36 albums of exceptional quality which represent the best of our best

• This means setting up networks of session musicians and technicians assigned to studios and to especially see after the production of the top possible gate opening artists’ albums and material. We must make use of the fact that we have alive 4 generations of excellent musicians. They must be converted into brilliant ‘session musicians’. Our best musical artifacts must reflect this moment of time

• We must prepare our top gate-opening acts for matched Niche Expos with a brand T&T presence at these expos. We must attend: MIDEM; SXSW; WOMEX; The College Circuit expo; and 2 others

• We must make use of cross-fertilised gatherings such as ART BASEL in Miami to leverage brand recognition, industry buzz and contacts, and global cache. We should create a contingent for 2015

• We have to understand that we are creating an aspirational pathway. The best will go first and open doors for others to follow. Only the best can open those doors. We must allow them to do their work.

4. ACTT will also be mobilizing to bring Local Content Legislation to the Parliament for Debate by April 2015. We need Sector Solidarity in this! The campaign is for 50% Local Content in radio and TV with stipulations for 85% at prime time hours- etc. We will also be pushing for local short films to be shown before every foreign feature and a minimum of 3 local features to be shown in cinemas per year. We will be putting together a team to walk these things through.

Commitments to Local Content by 7 Ministers. Local Content Chamber has been formed- ACTT is auxiliary member due up for full membership. We Co-hosted the inaugural historic conference last month. Minister of Tertiary Education made commitment to set up a Local Content curriculum at

UTT All the Chambers of Commerce now support our claim to Local Content as well as a national

policy on Local Content. Local Content ONLINE petition has over 1246 signatures- this initiative needs to be re-

dynamised. The target is 5,000 signatures. The aim is to have the legislation in parliament by April so that the change is in effect by

Independence 2015.

5. The Film Sector is in crisis because of shenanigans over at Creative TT and issues withthe new TTFilm board. There have been resignations and a freezing of a lot of work in progress. A stakeholder will present the issues.

6. There are also issues in NDATT at a time when their attentions needed to be focused on:

1. the creation of a National Theatre Company which has been created and staffed under their noses without their input and

6

2. the appearance of a renaissance in local theatre precisely at a time when there is no Cacique Awards when having a Cacique awards would have made the most sense!

7. We will be calling on Sector reps to give very short accounts of the last year for their organisations,

8. Some of our current board have professional and family commitments that now make them unable to function as they once did. Because of this they would like to resign their posts. At this meeting we will set a date for elections for interim board members and prospective candidates should announce their candidacy. I would like to suggest the Janine Charles Farray, Nigel Campbell, Theodora Ulerie, and Errol Fabien put their hats in the ring.

9. ACTT must also expand its admin to include a Board of Trustees . We should get nominations for such, and finally

10. ACTT also needs to consolidate administrative matters. This requires cooperation and participation by the membership.

7