'Sketches of character' explores our heritage

In the preface of his series of publications, Sketches of Character, in illustration of the habits, occupation and costume of the negro population in the island Jamaica, Isaac Mendes Belisario, a Jewish Jamaican artist of Sephardic heritage, said one of his motives was "to hand down faithful delineations of a people whose habits, manners and costume bear the stamp of originality".

Though Belisario stated that his illustrations were "drawn from nature", and were not to be seen as caricatures, there is still a very naïve approach taken in the representations. The representation of the costume has a paper-doll feel rather than that of a three-dimensional object.

Insight in masquerading

The Sketches of Character series provided an insight into the original practice of masquerading by our enslaved ancestors. It has also provided a way for us to place our modern selves into that transitional period after 1834 when the 'legally former' slaves, or, correctly, the apprentices, found themselves still shackled by their inability to achieve respectable status as citizens.

Nevertheless, their great desire to resist and repel these shackles along with a natural characteristic towards expression, led them to, in various ways, generate forms of expression, that displayed how they saw themselves and their colonial superiors.

The masquerade celebration of the blacks was one such form, with different characterisations of the various personalities and idiosyncrasies of the Jamaican plantation era, through costume and role-play. One such characterisation was that of the Actor Boy or Koo Koo.

Actor Boy character

The Actor Boy character is portrayed as a brightly and fantastically dressed masked character. The costume consists of a mask painted or designed to mimic a white, rosy-cheeked face, an old hat that was decorated with various coloured beads, colourful feathery plumes, tinsel, pieces of looking glass etc. and garments made of, or decorated with, muslin, silk, satin and ribbons.

Actor Boy carried a fan which he used to cool his face and a whip which he used to clear his path of intruders, as he majestically made his way along the Christmas procession. His persona seemed to mimic the Shakespearean sensibilities of European role-play and theatrics.

Today, the Actor Boy character is no longer a part of the Jonkanoo Christmas parade, however, the image is still used as an icon for the cultural and theatrical arts in Jamaica.

The Actor Boy Awards, the ceremony that honours the work and contribution of theatre practitioners, is testimony to the historical origins and development of play-acting in our nation. Actor Boy serves as an example of the adaptability and creative drive of our enslaved ancestors in their endeavour to preserve, and perhaps coincidentally, develop their cultural identity in British Jamaica.

-Institute of Jamaica