Guy Beckles


THE KINETIC ARTIST
Guy Beckles lives in Trinidad and Tobago. He was born on September 5th, 1953 and received his high school education at Queen's Royal College, from 1965-1973.

He later went to Dartmouth College, New Hampshire, U.S.A. and graduated with Honours in June 1977, with a B. A. in Visual Studies - (Senior Art Project graded A-). He studied Spanish at the University of Granada, Spain, under a Dartmouth language study programme and travelled throughout Europe to France, Italy, Austria, Switzerland and England and in later years throughout Northern India and Western China.

From 1977 to December 2003, Mr. Beckles was employed with the Ministry of Education at Mucurapo Senior Comprehensive School as a teacher of Forms 4 and 5 in the field of Art. He has since retired from teaching to concentrate on creating.

Beckles' Kinetic Art works should carve smiles back into the world
"It is not often that one encounters someone with an innate passion that has significant impact on others. The passion I speak about is felt in the intricacies of Kinetic Art by the artist, Guy Beckles. His Art defies definition but tantalizes your senses visually, intellectually and emotionally. It transcends us to another place and time. Our childhood reflections and adult realizations become reality as one gazes at his artwork. Kinetic Art is alive, vivid, moving images that a still picture cannot capture. If this peaks your interest, then I have succeeded in my mission. It is now up to you to seek out his artwork in a live exhibit and to initiate a chance meeting with the genius behind this unique art form - Kinetic Art."
Diane Bosworth

Artist’s Statement

I hope that the pleasure, fulfillment and the peace I received in the creation in this body of work, would somehow be experienced by those who view it. My works are almost seductive in their appeal, generating a soft clarion call to enter and partake. The work cries out for contemplation, so as to fully absorb emotions of one kind or another, which inevitably occur.  A cursory glance may only get you a superficial view of objects strung together moving.

To me, the explorative journey of creating each of these works, was like living and experiencing life itself. The jigsaw pieces must not only fit together, but move rhythmically and in harmony with a higher ordination. When I get it to “work”, there is instant gratification! When one’s life works in rhythmic harmony with the universe, isn’t there an extraordinary delight in being alive? Our desire is to continuously re-create the exact formula to maintain this feeling of bliss. In my work, I try to frame a moment of eternal bliss within these arty motions. Meditating on the movement, the colour, the idea, the light, the shadows, the viewer must experience a celestial moment, and allow it to permanently saturate the mind thereafter.

We are in an age where computer technology penetrates outer-space; information moves speedily and can be stored and relayed …… yet incurable diseases still exist; wars are raging, and famine seems a rather convenient excuse for mega cultures to control the minds of others. The seriousness of the times has been etched on the faces of the people; understandably so because of the anger, pain and sickness which embody this era.

It is my hope that this body of work will carve smiles back into the world; to satisfy our inherent need to laugh and have fun. Today, these emotions are too often absent from most people’s lives. My art escorts both adults and children into this uplifting dimension; to propel the mind to wonder about life ……… to take oneself lightly ………… to include play, fun and games, into one’s everyday existence.

It is important to engage the child in us, in order to appreciate the simplicity, the playfulness, the joyfulness, the innocence, the colour in the motion, or the light that emanates because of the motion.

What Kinetic Art should teach us, is that ideas do have motion ….. do have life. We have the ability, skill and accessibility to information. The Creator, like the Kinetic artist generates the ideas, and then inspires us to mobilize these thoughts into action.

While my Kinetic sculpture has appealed to a wide cross-section of people, my God-given inventiveness, the restless searching kind that it is, has led me to a vision of taking the work into the community. I see it developing into larger-than-life pieces that affect public spaces ----- where people can interact with the work physically, intellectually and emotionally.

No man ever creates anything. He simply re-arranges what is already there.



Contact:
Guy K.E. Beckles
6 Sanora Park
Point Cumana, Carenage
Trinidad and Tobago, W.I. 		Tel.: (868) 637 4814
Fax: (868) 623 5539
e-mail: gkebeck@yahoo.com

 

The Silent Revolution  

Windmills of Colour
Windmills of Hope
Strands - Differently positioned
Differently Coloured,
Yet coming from the same Source
And going - ending the same,
Same circle,
Same trip, same ship!  

Nature mimics our passions
Our movement, our pressures
She turns these into
Positive energy
The windmill shows this
In silent, constant revolution
The power of the wheel  

Colours remind us
Of our differences
Then blend in a blur of
Oneness
To demonstrate
Our common need
A need for each other  

This is the Centrepiece
About which everything revolves
This - the silent Revolution




Pan is Mine- 36" x 36" x 84"

This work depicts the golden age of pan, an indigenous instrument of Trinidad and Tobago and an integral part of our local celebrations.
It stands seven feet at its highest point and is mounted on a base three feet in diameter.
The Tottering motion of the piece symbolises the uncertainty experienced by the pioneers of the steelband movement. The change in colour from deep red to golden yellow reflects the wide acclaim the steel pan now receives internationally.
Affirming the birthplace of the steel pan, the Trinidad and Tobago flag is integrated to support the instrument which pivots around it. This suggests the synergistic relationship between the nation and the steel pan.
The flames at the base signify both the struggle of the pan man and the process of pan tuning.

The sound of the steel pan emanates from the base of this work.

 

Get something and wave- 24" x18" x 44"

Each wave celebrates as it rushes, roaring to the shore. And each dies away so soon, recognizing that its glory is only "reflected". None is just like the one before but they are so, so similar. And they all give praise. Whether three-foot or ten feet, they all die the same death, at a gentle shore. Each does its best in the moment that it has.

"...there is a tide in the affairs of men, which taken at the flood, leads on to fame and fortune... " Each of us has a duty to do the same, to enjoy, to give thanks and praise, to seize the moment.

This work speaks of harmonious celebration. It speaks of jumping in a carnival band in Trinidad and Tobago.
It speaks of the "Mexican Wave " at a football match.
It speaks of the light hearted celebration of fun in unison. It speaks of "joie de vivre". It speaks of symmetry, equality, and one's best.



"Dem Belly Full" - 3" x 16" x 21"  

Dem Belly full but dem Hungry  

This piece reeks of authenticity as it is made from an actual chicken coop.
It also reeks of a disgusting reality of life.  

The two roosters at the forefront are pecking away at a now empty "dish", once full of corn. They are envied by the rooster who remains in the background and more significantly, they are supremely aware of this and bursting with misplaced pride.

This piece speaks to our greed, our spiritual yearning, even though materially fed. It speaks to our conceit and our arrogance, our need to be better than...


"In a Blind World" - 10" x 35" x 37"

"Dans le royaume des aveugles, les borgnes sont rois."

Say it in English, say it in French, people just love to show off. This work shows the grimace of a smile, and the knowing "wink" of the edge.  

But then soon after, it is the turn of the other to wink and smile. Neither is aware that he is being ridiculed, each one is "on top".  

Talk about dramatic irony, when the viewer, through the "third eye" sees clearly the fickleness of competition and comparison.  

Who really wins?  

When will we learn to share our talent for each other's benefit? When do we open our eyes... and see our need to "give" that which we have so freely "received".  

 


"Once a Man" - 46" x 28" x 26"



This is one of the Artist's most complex pieces to date, requiring some eight motors to move
the component parts, which consist of everything from champagne glasses to a hair dryer.
Each component has its peculiar significance and makes a distinct social and philosophical statement.  

A styrofoam ball is blown about by the wind, indicating the whimsical stage of life when we are fodder for fashion and fickle to the influence of friends, fads and fortune.  

Two balls move along parallel tracks to signify the journey of man and woman through life. At the end of each track, each life, there are symbols of death and judgement; the ringing bell, a skeleton unearthed and the fire; then the cycle begins again, representative of reincarnation.  

The central figure is a little man, unceasingly turning a chequered disc. Like the chequered flag at the start and finish. of a car race, so does his disc start the rat race, the human rat race. He represents the blue collar worker grinding through the daily nine-to-five and behind him are the symbols of his reward., the toasting champagne glasses, the festive, the party... to ease his ceaseless grind.

This piece was done concurrently with "Twice a Child" (below) and together they took one and a half years to complete.



"Twice a Child" - 45" x 28" x 22"

Unlike "Once a Man", there is no underlying philosophical or social statement being made here, other than the appeal to children and to the child in each of us. As a result, "Twice a Child" may well be making the most profound statement of all!

The Artist's motivation in developing this piece is perhaps the greatest testimony to the joy, the colour and the unbridled fun that it brings.

When the Artist's first-born twin boys had to be hospitalised for a simple procedure, he was moved by the pain and loneliness experienced by children with more serious ailments and by the gargantuan task faced by the inadequate number of nurses who were called upon to mother, tend and care for these young people in pain. The Artist noted that there was nothing to relieve that starkness of the ward. There were no toys. The walls were bare; not a picture, no smiling faces other than those of the overburdened nurses.
Thus was "Twice a Child" born; out of a collection of broken and discarded (and... shh! stolen) toys which belonged to his twins. It is an amusement park in miniature! The Artist has since had the joy of seeing eagerness, happiness and interest in the faces of some children who have had the opportunity of seeing this piece displayed at a Children's Hospital Ward.