Minkisi for Margaret Girvan
Inside the box is a black doll, painted white, dressed in Edwardian clothes, blackened again and turned into an African-style Nkisi figure. Margaret Girvan was my grandmother and is also me - my other Christian names are hers. Both of us were put into boats and taken to Australia without any choice. My grandmother's photograph has always been very important to me, because she was the only woman in my family who looked like me, very different from all the others, and I didn't know the secret of my ancestry for most of my life. I am drawn to Minkisi, just as very much earlier I was drawn to African jewellery, fabrics and dye and patterning techniques. since little is known of precise Jamaican origins, I continue to use my intuition in my work.
