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Last Updated: Feb 6, 2017 - 2:32:04 PM |
Freeport, Grand Bahama -
While the Bahamas is filled with many talented
artists, the emerging talents on one such artist can be attributed to
his early education at the Freeport High School. The Alumni Association
of F(A)HS/BMES is proud to recognize Mr. Anthony Morley.
The excitement begins Friday, August 19 with a
cultural show in Port Lucaya, and everyone is encouraged to attend. The
reunion events have been a year in the making and spearheaded by a dedicated group of
volunteers headed by David Wallace and Petrona Russell.
Versatile Multi-medium Artist Anthony 'Big Mo' Morley Gives Us Bahamas on Canvas
By Diane Phillips
Anthony 'Big Mo' Morley unlocks the metal gates that act as security bars to his studio-come-gallery in Nassau, Bahamas. It's one room, 15 x 25, low ceilings, far from posh in a neighborhood where security bars are a comfort. But once you've found the little hideaway off a perimeter road off an industrial highway and Big Mo has answered the door himself, prepare to be stunned. Every wall explodes with color, with life, with portraits and places, birds and fauna, foliage and flamingos, with the paintings created by the prolific artist who has given us the Bahamas on Canvas. A wall-to-wall and ceiling-to-floor still life reality show of island people and places. Surround-sight breathtaking beauty. Over here, a young boy walking down a narrow unpaved lane. Over there, a flock of flamingos so vivid in color you are mesmerized. On another wall, Morley's famous coconuts, painted in every shade, tone and texture -- subtle colors (the way Europeans like them, he says) to bright yellow in brilliant contrasts, hanging fruit begging to be picked. More than 100 pieces overall. Harbor scenes, hibiscus, an abandoned boat near a neglected house that retains a quiet dignity. And overseeing it all from behind the counter that serves as Morley's narrow workspace, a larger than life painting of the artist's mother, a straightforward, robust woman, flawless brown skin, clear eyes that see all, a tailored red suit, likely her Sunday best.
Mrs. Morley deserves the place of honor.
It was she, along with the artist's father, who taught him about light. Both were professional photographers in Grand Bahama in the northern Bahamas. Morley himself started out in photography. "That's where I learned about light," he explains. "I was trained in photography and learned how to use and paint light." You can see that knowledge in his work, as if a window let just the right amount of light in to illuminate the woman kneading dough or braiding a child's hair. From photography, he developed a fascination with Junkanoo, the cultural festival of The Bahamas. Although Morley has been painting for more than 40 years, if you mention the name Big Mo to most Bahamians, the first thing they're likely to say is 'the Junkanoo costume man." Big Mo is everything Junkanoo in a country that reveres its festival: photographer, author of the book Bahamas Junkanoo Annual, costume designer and builder. One of his creations, Sir Milo, The Champion of the People, was a first-place award-winning behemoth reincarnation of the first Bahamian Governor General. Big Mo designed and built every square inch of that costume -- its patterns, color, rhinestones, every clump of carefully applied papier-mache. When 12-foot wide Champion hit Bay Street, it owned the parade and years later, Junkanooers still talk about it. Big Mo continues to design Junkanoo costumes, but doesn't build them anymore, leaving that work for others. But he designs for groups that can consist of as many as 2000 members. He is what he calls a conceptual artist.
For Anthony 'Big Mo' Morley, the evolution from photographer to Junkanoo costume designer to full-time painter has been driven by an unerringly keen eye and unstoppable creative energy. He paints non-stop. "I have nothing else to do," he says, though you doubt it. But you are confronted with the incredible output. Of all his talents, painting is most likely to be his lasting legacy. Much of his work is like looking at life through a camera lens, even in pieces that are more impressionism than realism, rose petals softened by applying a solvent so wet paint seeps.
It isn't only what he paints but how he paints that sets Morley apart. In the studio, he generally stands at the small counter, working on the flat surface. At home, he lies on the floor, on the carpet to be exact, in his living room, a large pillow over his stomach and chest area. He places a slim plywood piece atop the pillow, and the canvas on top of the plywood. Then he begins with a soft pencil drawing. His eyesight is poor and he feels the drawing as much as sees it, though he relies on photographers' spotlights in the studio and at home. When he is satisfied with the outline, he begins to add color.
"Everything begins with black and everything comes off the black," he says. Once a sideline that complemented everything else he did, painting has become his obsession over the past seven years as his collection grew and his versatility deepened. His work falls into three distinct categories, but the styles are so different it is, at first, hard to believe the same artist painted historic Nassau, nostalgic Bahamas and Bahamas on canvas. He captures people -- expression, mood, posture -- with the same precision that he paints antique cars and street scenes, a crossover talent few artists ever achieve. Four years ago, Sharon Aitken 'discovered' him and asked him to exhibit in a Bahamas National Trust show. He sold out. 100%.
Since then, he's had dozens of commissions. King's Gallery in The Villages of Orlando carries his work. So does Nassau Glass. He has three shows a year in Abaco. On this day, he is working on a commission for a client in Texas. In a climate where the work of several Bahamian artists commands high four and even five figures, Big Mo is still very reasonably priced. The sign outside his door says affordable oil paintings. He has overcome a marital setback. Today, he is focused on art, working endless hours at a speed rarely associated with artists.
At 52, Anthony Big Mo Morley is at the pinnacle of his painting career with no downside in sight -- a kind, generous man whose unconventional style of working and whose unpretentious being is churning out a vast collection of work that stands alone as a vivid portrait of life in these islands, Bahamas on Canvas.
www.bahamasoncanvas.com
© Copyright 2011 by thebahamasweekly.com
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