'It is with re­gret that the Art So­ci­ety of Trinidad and To­ba­go (ASTT) ex­press­es its sad­ness at the pass­ing of one of Trinidad and To­ba­go's most se­nior artists, Leo Glas­gow, af­ter some years of de­clin­ing health. You will see from the bi­og­ra­phy which fol­lows that Mr Glas­gow's con­nec­tion to the Art So­ci­ety runs deep, as he was the re­cip­i­ent of an award from the ASTT in 1967 for works which he had on dis­play at its an­nu­al ex­hi­bi­tion. His ear­ly work demon­strat­ed his com­mit­ment to the graph­ic id­iom as he por­trayed Trinidad and To­ba­go's rich cul­tur­al her­itage and its ex­po­nents in all its di­ver­si­ty, and tack­led as well, as his ca­reer pro­gressed, scenes of an idyl­lic and unique Trinidad and To­ba­go.

His mes­sage was clear: this is the land of my birth with which I have nev­er fall­en out of love. He did, in his unique way, what all artists (know­ing­ly or not) seek to do, which is, to hold a mir­ror up to our­selves and ask search­ing ques­tions. His phys­i­cal body has left us, but his mag­nif­i­cent body of work will keep ask­ing those ques­tions longer than any of us will be able to. His work will con­tin­ue to con­tribute to the high­est lev­el of hu­man en­deav­our to which we can as­pire–that of us­ing our God-giv­en tal­ents to re­peat to all who will lis­ten, the cen­tral mes­sage...love one an­oth­er, as he loves us.

A short his­to­ry of Mr Glas­gow's life fol­lows....'

Leo Glas­gow was born in Trinidad on Jan­u­ary 31, 1926. Un­til he went to school, he lived with his grand­par­ents. He at­tend­ed Rich­mond Street Boys' School while liv­ing at the time with his moth­er at Ar­gyle Street, East Dry Riv­er. Leav­ing school, he lived with an aunt in St James. At about this time his in­ter­est in de­sign­ing and paint­ing Car­ni­val cos­tumes be­gan, in par­tic­u­lar, fire­man jer­seys and T-shirts. This helped to jump-start his ca­reer in paint­ing. He be­lieves that Car­ni­val has shaped a sense of colour and move­ment in his paint­ings, and the Bap­tist and Shango cer­e­monies he at­tend­ed with his aunt made him more aware of Trinida­di­an life and in­creased his pow­ers of ob­ser­va­tion.

In the 1950s Glas­gow won a schol­ar­ship to train as a pho­to litho artist at one of Trinidad's lead­ing news­pa­pers. From there he moved to ad­ver­tis­ing–first as a se­nior com­mer­cial artist and then as an art di­rec­tor. In 1957 Glas­gow re­ceived the third prize in a paint­ing com­pe­ti­tion spon­sored by Tex­a­co Trinidad Inc. In 1967, Leo Glas­gow won the Trinidad Art So­ci­ety Award for the two finest works on show. Al­so, in that year he was cho­sen by re­searchers at Teach­ers' Col­lege, Co­lum­bia Uni­ver­si­ty, to par­tic­i­pate in the use of art ed­u­ca­tion in drug re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion pro­grammes. An ex­hi­bi­tion in New York in 1969 brought him in­ter­na­tion­al recog­ni­tion, lead­ing to a rep­u­ta­tion as one of the pre­miere con­tem­po­rary painters of the day, and so­lid­i­fy­ing his po­si­tion in the art com­mu­ni­ty to­day.

In 1975 he was pre­sent­ed with the 'Out­stand­ing In­struc­tor' tro­phy for Art Ther­a­py and Teach­ing from the Ad­dic­tion Re­search and Treat­ment Cor­po­ra­tion, where he was em­ployed as an art ther­a­pist. He al­so ex­hib­it­ed at the Trinidad Hol­i­day Inn that year. The next few years were spent cre­at­ing spe­cial com­mis­sions for pub­lic and pri­vate spaces, cul­mi­nat­ing in 1979 with as­sign­ments as art con­sul­tant with the Board of Ed­u­ca­tion in New York. In 1987 he par­tic­i­pat­ed in a group ex­hi­bi­tion at the Hilton Trinidad. From then, un­til his so­lo ex­hi­bi­tion in 1990 at Art Cre­ators in Trinidad, he ex­per­i­ment­ed with tech­nique and form to ex­pand his ex­pres­sion through art. He spent 1991-92 con­duct­ing work­shops for in­di­vid­u­als and groups in the US.

His 'Caribbean Vi­sions' were ex­hib­it­ed at the Kir­by Gallery in Bar­ba­dos in 1998, and he spent the bal­ance of that year of­fer­ing pri­vate view­ings to in­di­vid­u­als and groups at var­i­ous stu­dios in Trinidad. Since 1999 Glas­gow has ex­hib­it­ed reg­u­lar­ly at Hori­zons Art Gallery in Trinidad. He al­so ex­hib­it­ed work in Dakar, Sao Paulo, Cana­da, the Unit­ed States, Bar­ba­dos and Mex­i­co. Glas­gow's cor­po­rate clients in­clud­ed An­gos­tu­ra, Hilton In­ter­na­tion­al, Roy­al Bank, Bermudez, Tex­a­co and Cli­co, among many oth­ers.