Reporter
matthew.chin@guardian.co.tt
Barataria native Roberta Nicolls is honouring the lives of her brother and mother through augmented art. Now based in Georgetown, Guyana, after having moved from Trinidad, Nicolls shared that the origins of her art exhibition, Blank Canvases, began when a void was dug into her life following the loss of family.
Although in her childhood she was transfixed by art, identifying herself as having been “born with talent,” it was after her education that she decided to enter the corporate world to survive.
Nicolls’ third exhibition, Blank Canvases: The Art of Collaboration, Exhibition of Art Forms begins and ends on July 7 from 3 pm to 7 pm at the Black Magenta, Georgetown.
“For the most part, I don’t think that art is as much respected in the Caribbean. Unfortunately, most artists who try to survive on their art, they’re hungry. But you never truly leave something that you love. I would always dabble in it,” Nicolls said.
Her passion for art and technology led to cooperation, in part, because of her history in entertainment and hospitality as well as the technological field of telematics, where she worked for nine years.
This bond, she said, led her to augment her second and third exhibitions with the help of a young man by the name of Ackeem Thomas.
“He is basically my photographer and videographer for anything that I have to do in the corporate world. And for my first art exhibition here, he came and took out the photographs. He came to me afterwards and asked, ‘Roberta, are you going to do this every year?’ I said, yes. He then said, ‘So next year let’s do augmented art,’”
Her second exhibition was the first time she tried augmented art. She described the feedback from the show as a hit. Nicolls uses acrylic paint, but for this year’s exhibition, she will incorporate plaster to provide texture to her paintings.
Looking back in time, the death of her mother, Daphne Nicolls, which happened on May 7, 2021, occurred while Nicolls had been preparing to move to Guyana the same year for work.
Currently, Nicolls works as a business development manager in Georgetown. “My mother passed away in church, praising God, exactly how she wanted to die,” Nicolls said. On the anniversary of her mother’s death, Nicolls debuted her first solo art exhibition on May 7, 2022. “I did this because the way I started healing from her death was through my paintings, and before I knew it, my apartment was overrun with 38 paintings that year. By the grace of God, all were sold. And it was something my mom always wanted me to do–an art exhibition–and unfortunately, she never lived to see it, but I still did it in her memory,” Nicolls said.
What started as honouring the life of her mother who had encouraged her to pursue art, her decision to equip virtual reality with Blank Canvases came about after her only sibling, her brother, Robert Raymond Nicolls, died by suicide in November 2022, a year after the death of their mother.
“Of course, the emotions at that time were different because though my mom passed unexpectedly, (my brother’s death) evoked totally different emotions, and that’s why I think the augmentation fit in so well there. His death gave both my art and myself a different dimension,” Nicolls confessed.
On May 7, 2023, she held her second exhibition in honour of her brother. Although he hadn’t left any indication of why he chose to end his life, Nicolls believes that he probably had depression following their mother’s passing, suffering alone.
“In general, I don’t think we treat our men with enough respect for their emotions. I think in the Caribbean, for the most part, men have been taught that having emotions makes them soft, one way or the other, so they’re made to hide everything that they feel until it’s passed.
“And the one thing that I’ve learnt through my years of pain is that nothing passes; it’s like an open wound. An open wound does not pass. If you do not treat it with respect, it can fester and cause severe problems,” Nicolls said.
She began the paintings for this year’s show in March, only doing 12 pieces to allow space for young professionals to try their hand in the augmented art world.
This year she is opening her exhibition to young business owners as she claims many young people in Guyana do not get opportunities “to do things for free.”
“I’m going to pay for the venue, and decor, and have them come out and really exhibit their talents. And give them that type of floor and open them up to a different type of clientele,” Nicolls said.
People from Trinidad will be travelling to Guyana to take part.
