Winsom Winsom, a child of the universe, is an Ashanti Maroon artist with a prolific artistic career spanning several decades. Born and trained as an artist in Jamaica, Winsom’s art often explores themes of spirituality and identity. Her work is characterized by bold colours, dynamic brushstrokes and themes, and a sense of movement and energy. Entwined with her career as an artist and activist, Winsom also has a longstanding history as an art educator. She influenced the emergence of several Canadian artists, including Pamila Matharu.
My practice is about listening to the universe, understanding what the ancestors want and interpreting what they’re saying because sometimes I understand quite easily, other times it takes many dreams to understand.
The following text is an excerpt from With Opened Mouths: The Podcast. It has been edited for content and clarity.
Qanita: Winsom can you tell me about your practice?
Winsom: My practice belongs to the ancestors. They dream me. They tell me what they want and things that other people may need, what I may need but I don’t know that I do. So, my practice is about listening to the universe, understanding what the ancestors want and interpreting what they’re saying because sometimes I understand quite easily, other times it takes many dreams to understand.
Pamila Matharu: The reason I’m here is because of Winsom, without her labour and care I wouldn’t exist as an artist. She helped me shape my vision as a visual artist, as a social practitioner and as an arts educator. But she also helped me understand the “art world context,” understand the market, understand the lay of the land and the museum culture. As a young artist I went to university, but I didn’t see people like myself in the artworld. I met Winsom after I experienced a program called Fresh Arts. I am a graduate of Fresh Arts where I was under the tutelage of Black feminist cultural producers, thinkers and artists. Fresh Arts was the birthplace of my artistry, and it was not just Winsom but many Black feminist artists who were there at the time. They helped shape my social justice-informed value system in the work I do today.
Qanita: Can you tell me about Fresh Arts?
Winsom: Fresh Arts was first Art Works and then it became Fresh Arts. It came out of the uprising that happened at Yonge Street, Toronto, in May 1992. And from that, a group of women, senior artists: Lillian Allen, Itah Sadhu and Marie Mumford, all got together with the government and talked about doing a program with Black youth in Toronto because they couldn’t get jobs or apprenticeships during the summer months. One of the things people don’t realize is that a lot of the young people that I have worked with—not just through Fresh Arts but youth in prison and many different groups where I would use art and spirituality to work with them. It was about listening to yourself, knowing, figuring out who you are, how you want to be treated and how to treat others.