Filled with joy and glamour, this substantial group of images captures a wonderful array of carnival gowns in the early years of Trinidadian home rule and independence.
So important was the carnival to Trinidad the newly elected government of Premier Eric Williams took administrative control of it from a myriad of local groups with the creation of the Carnival Development Commission.
The carnival itself dates back to the 1780s, and its origin is generally attributed to the influx of planters, their workers, and free people of colour from Martinique, Guadeloupe and Saint-Domingue who arrived in the wake of the Cédula de Población which allowed for Catholics to immigrate. There are many reasons to think so, not least due to the ongoing resemblance which European carnivals have to Trinidad’s. Furthermore, there was the impact of French settlers on cultural and social life. However, Hollis Urban Liverpool argues that “although the whites and free-coloured were active in their ballroom and dance halls, the Africans took over the city streets and the festive areas of the plantation. Moreover, the main customs and dances that characterized the overall celebrations were African in character and function.”
These images all appear to be from the costume competition which was held each year at Queen’s Park Oval where the Carnival Queen was chosen. (The Calypso King was crowned on the same night at Queen’s Park Savannah.) An increasingly popular event, by 1956 there were more than 300 masqueraders in attendance and ten bands. The years documented here “came to be known as the Golden Age of Masquerade, and masmen [or costume designers] George Bailey, Harold Saldenha and Caryle Change became synonymous with a new Carnival aesthetic that serves as the standard of excellence for future generations of designers” (Green and Scher).
Many prints are notated to their versos with descriptions like “Brad O’Brian’s Band as Chess Men”; “Cherrie Evelyn in her Carnival Costume - Oyster in Shell”; “Queens in Evening Dress”; “Wedgewood Plate which got 1st Prize”; “2nd best evening dress” and more. The imprints of “Chan’s Photo”, which marketed itself as a carnival photographer, and “Pereira Photo Lab” also tell us a little bit about Trinidadian society at the time.
An album devoted entirely to a carnival is very unusual indeed.
Green, G.L. and Scher, P.W. eds, Trinidad Carnival: The Cultural Politics of a Transnational Festival (Indiana University Press, 2007), p.5; Liverpool, H.U., “Origins of Rituals and Customs in the Trinidad Carnival: African or European?” in TDR, Vol. 42, No. 3 Trinidad and Tobago Carnival issue, (Autumn, 1998), p.30.
