The Natural Mystics by Colin Grant

Author:Colin Grant
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Published: 2011-09-14T16:00:00+00:00

The alignment with Africa and the nostalgia for that continent as the root of one’s being was graphically expressed in the work of the artist who simply went by the name ‘African’. But on the floor of the Jamaican National Gallery where African’s art was exhibited, I fought hard to resist the thought that both his name and the fetishist switch that he clung to were props, that his Africanness was a received emotion. That same sentiment articulated in the sculptures of Woody Joseph appeared more heartfelt, all the more so because he failed to comprehend it himself.

‘It can’t mek dog, so you have to mek a fish out of it.’ Woody Joseph picked up a rough piece of wood from the stream to demonstrate the secret of his art. ‘This is a fish.’ He smiled sweetly, baring seventy-year-old teeth that had lost their battle with sugar cane. Too much saliva and too little dentition rendered his speech almost inaudible, but the admirers at his bush retreat (I include myself) hung on his every word.

The day before, when I had suggested to my guide that I wanted to meet this famed mystical and intuitive artist, she had looked doubtful. Woody Joseph lived deep in the interior, without benefit of electricity or telephone. We would have to send word to him, she said mysteriously. It might take a week before an answer came back. In the event, we travelled the next day and when we pushed on through the bush to the clearing at Woody’s compound, I struggled to contain my disappointment. Given the guide’s account of the extraordinary difficulty that a visit would entail, I was bemused to find several pilgrims had simply stepped off a tour bus to arrive before me.

The intuitive artist was giving a demonstration, working on his next creation. The reflected light, when the sun caught the shine of his machete, flickered across our faces. Joseph worked with impressive speed, slicing through the wood, chipping away at an eye, carving, almost caressing the tail into a curve. Had Joseph heard of Michelangelo, one of the tourists wanted to know. He hadn’t. Yet, like the Old Master, he too believed the sculpture was trapped inside the wood and that he was merely freeing it. As he carved, the ground thickened into a carpet of wood chippings.

Woody Joseph began humming an old mento work song. A few years back it would have eased the toil of digging a ditch or cutting sugar cane. Yellowing cataracts clouded his eyes. He rocked back and forth, working the song into a kind of mantra, and one by one each of us yielded to its beauty.

‘How much for that?’

One of the pilgrims wanted to know the price of the sculpture he was working on. Woody Joseph pretended not to hear. The pilgrim repeated the question.

‘It not finish!’ answered Joseph.

There was a sting in his response. The old man was clearly upset by the impertinence of the question. Almost imperceptibly he turned his back on the small crowd.

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