Born 1989 | Lives and works in Hamilton, Ontario, CA, USA
A first-generation Canadian with Trinidadian heritage, Kareem-Anthony Ferreira (b. 1989) explores conditions of diaspora, displacement, and identity in large-scale paintings that feature candid scenes drawn from the artist’s life. “In an effort to shift the overly simplified perceptions that my two disparate familial communities hold toward the other, I offer visual re-creations of both identities, personal family traits, and events,” the artist explains. Working in dialogue with the traditions of Black portraiture, he paints mundane and celebratory happenings alike— birthday parties, sports games, naps, picnics, haircuts, beach trips, take-out dining, babysitting. Ferreira captures his subjects with a delicate sensuousness that is emphasized by his careful rendering of light; the effect conveys the artist’s reverence for moments of community and family coming together.
To create his paintings, Ferreira assembles vernacular photographs from various contexts into a composite image. He crops and frames his source material — which is often related to his family trips to Trinidad, or his Trinidadian family’s visits to Hamilton, Ontario, where Ferreira was raised and still lives — to emphasize a sense of intimacy. This quality is heightened by the unguarded and spontaneous activities of the artist’s subjects, who are often depicted mid- gesture. The people pictured enact a gaze that is unselfconscious and sincere, directed toward a close family member, rather than a photographer with an objectifying agenda. Working with acrylic, graphite, wax crayon, cloth, and paper collage on unstretched canvas, Ferreira populates his compositions with textile patterns, objects, and commodities that are easily identifiable to Caribbeans. In particular, he centers on non-indigenous patterns—repetitive flora and fauna motifs seen in “Hawaiian shirts”—that are commercialized and mass-produced; patterns that signal idealized notions of “island life” to non-Caribbean people. He is interested in drawing attention to and deconstructing the way the Caribbean functions in the North American imaginary, as an escapist fantasy where tourists are served and entertained. In the series of paintings and sculptures Table, Manors (2022), he explores the impact of colonialism on dining customs in the Caribbean. Across his work, Ferreira finds joy in scenarios that juxtapose, intersect, or challenge stereotypes around the various aspects of his multivalent identity.
