Covid-19, lack of funding and other unforeseen circumstances have led young and ambitious but struggling, upcoming artist, Demion Mack, 22, of Rewa Village in the North Rupununi to postpone completing studies at the Burrowes School of Art. Now working and saving he hopes he can restart his studies in January 2024 and finally earn his certificate in fine arts.
“I’m not a school drop-out,” he avowed. “I was going through some difficult times. I have every intention of completing this part of the programme. My life is art. My dream is to make it and to represent my village, to represent Rupununi and my country in my works. I want the art world to see my work. I want my work to evoke feelings of the love of my country. I would like to see where my work takes me. There is so much I would like to do with a personal collection.”
When Stabroek Weekend caught up with Mack for this interview, he was preparing to go to the Amerindian Heritage Village where he was doing face painting to boost his earnings.
“Drawing and painting, let’s say art was always a part of me even as a child. It is now my passion. As a little boy in primary school, I tried drawing any and everything in my immediate environment and you could have found drawings of animals or a boat and an outboard engine on the back of all my school books. In art, I got scores of ten out of ten or nine out of ten… and that encouraged me to continue drawing and doing better,” he stated.
Mack was born in the scenic village of Rewa found at the confluence of the Rupununi and Rewa rivers in Region Nine – Upper Essequibo/Upper Takutu. He has three brothers and three sisters. Of Makushi origin, he said, “Our family is the only Mack family in Rewa Village.”
Rewa is a rapidly growing village, with a population of about 500. Eco-tourism is one of its main economic thrusts.
Mack’s childhood was like that of any other in the remote hinterland communities. Apart from attending Rewa Primary and then Annai Secondary schools, his early life revolved around helping his parents with their farm and enjoying fishing on his own, with his siblings or other relatives and friends. Sometimes he went hunting with his father. These experiences were invaluable to him as they helped him to bond with nature and the environment.
After writing the then Secondary School’s Entrance Examinations at Rewa Primary, Mack was given a place at Annai Secondary.
Football
At Annai Secondary he lived in the dormitory. “Living away from home at first was very challenging but then I started to cope after making friends and becoming involved in school life. I loved playing football and interacting with my school friends,” he recalled.
In 2017, Mack was a member of the Annai Secondary football team in the Digicel Schools’ Football tournament. “We made it to the finals but lost to Chase’s Academy.”
He also represented Annai Secondary twice in the KFC Schools’ Football Tournament and he played in the team against Shiva Boys College from Trinidad and Tobago; Annai Secondary lost to the TT team in the finals.
While still at Annai Secondary, Mack joined the Moving Circle of Artists because many artists from across the country were part of it and they shared their ideas. “I joined the group before I came to the art school. That was when the late artist George Simon was the leader of the group… He was an inspiration to me and an Indigenous artist I saw as a role model. Since he passed away and Covid-19 struck, the group hadn’t been functioning as it should. However, it has restarted a number of activities. I learned a lot from the artists in the group,” Mack related.
Studies on hold
At Annai Secondary School Mack’s art teacher Godfrey Alexander motivated him to make art his career after telling his class that visual art “is big and it can take you places and carry you far in life.”
When Mack was in Grade Nine, Alexander left. In Grades Nine and Ten he had no special art teacher. There were times he felt lost.
“Sir Godfrey returned when I entered Grade Eleven. I was happy. He pushed me and some other students to complete our school-based assessments for the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate examinations. I wrote art as one of my subjects at CSEC and got a Grade II. Sir Godfrey must have seen some talent in some of us and he encouraged us to apply for entry to Burrowes School of Art for the September school year in 2018 to pursue the three-year certificate programme in fine arts.”
After gaining entry to the art school, Mack also received a hinterland scholarship. Adjusting in Georgetown as a hinterland scholar was not so difficult because he had already lived in Annai away from home. “Unfortunately, I didn’t finish Burrowes School of Art.”
He completed his first year from 2018 to 2019 with A and B grades, which pleased him. During the middle of the second term in 2020, Covid-19 forced school closures and he returned home to Rewa.
“The village was on lockdown. I couldn’t leave. The school started to offer online classes. We have internet at Rewa but it is real slow so I couldn’t get into the classes or I was cut off during classes. It was frustrating. When classes restarted at Burrowes, Rewa Village was still in lockdown. So for the rest of 2020 and 2021 I couldn’t get to school. Then last September 2022 when I came back, I was far behind in the courses and those who started with me were about to graduate. By this time my scholarship had ended and I couldn’t get it extended. My parents or no one was there to support my schooling. I tried to support myself but it was difficult.”
With the help of Ransford Simon and Nigel Butler, both Indigenous artists from the Rupununi and themselves graduates of Burrowes School of Art, Mack obtained work. He worked with them and they also introduced him to potential clients. “They helped me to build my clientele and to become independent. I’m grateful to them, especially Ransford. It was tough.” The more experienced Simon is also from Rewa.
Mack has assisted Simon in his mural paintings. “Just the other day I helped Ransford with some murals on a building at Eugene Correia International Airport at Ogle. Now he is painting for ExxonMobil and I am only assisting him. Those are his contracts. I’m learning on the job at the same time. However, my aim right now is to complete my programme at Burrowes. I cannot afford to drink and socialize because I have to support myself. I have to save for food and rent and pay bills and so forth,” he related.
Mack recalled when he returned to classes at Burrowes School of Art, he thought he could have worked and studied. “Trying to focus on work to pay a rent and to feed himself and to pay other bills, started messing up my mind. I couldn’t focus on school and I couldn’t focus on the work I was doing for people. It was like starting all over again. I was getting C grades. I didn’t feel good about that. It didn’t look good on my file.”
He continued, “I had to support myself in an environment I was not used to. It was real pressure on me coming from the hinterland. It was a whole process of adjustments. I had to adjust to the social-economic situation I found myself in. I had to pay rent. I had to buy food. When I am in the interior I don’t have to pay rent. We grow our own crops so we don’t have to buy provisions and staples like cassava bread and farine which we prepare ourselves. We hunt and fish for meat. We don’t buy those things. Out here every single thing is money, everything, transportation, food, snacks have costs attached. Even water that we get for free in the interior we have to pay for in town. My parents, my family cannot support me.”
The distance and transportation from Rewa to Georgetown also makes it difficult for his family to send him any supplies. “Once in a while they might send me some things if they get a good person to bring stuff for me. I’m living in Cummings Lodge where I’m renting an apartment from earlier this year.”
Last December he decided to take a year’s break from studies. “I decided to restart in January 2024 and complete the programme. I am trying to earn and save so I can finish it. I know it is going to be tough because I won’t be working. I was hoping to complete the programme in 2023 but I didn’t have the financial support. I explained to the tutors what was going on with me and they understand. It has been real rough for me. I was doing really good before Covid-19. When I went home, for almost two years, I didn’t get to paint or draw anything. I was out of art supplies and practice.”
Mack noted that many people are encouraging him to finish the programme. “It is not that I don’t want to. My objective is to finish this programme. Then later on I can continue to study other programmes. I did not just drop out. My major is painting and while I would want to complete the entire programme I might have to do the part time and focus only on painting instead of the complete programme if I cannot meet my commitments financially.”
Two weeks ago, he said, one of his tutors was “very encouraging. She noted that I have already completed several courses. She advised me to complete the three-year programme or alternatively to complete the part-time only painting in order to be certified. I would like to complete the three-year, full-time programme in fine arts and not only in painting. When I start back to school I wouldn’t be able to work as I do now.”
Painting is his major study area. His works are on landscapes, such as Guyana’s rivers, forests and mountains. He loves painting forest animals such as the jaguar and eagles. A number of his paintings are of Rewa Village and the Rupununi.
“I love highlighting certain parts of Guyana. I do mostly portrait drawings. Every time I complete a non-commissioned work I post it on my page on Facebook. My friends share it and people reach out to me to ask about prices. That’s how I started marketing myself. Sometimes people reach out to me to ask if I have available work. Most of my customers are people from overseas and people from the private sector.”
