By the Caribbean Journal staff
Who is the greatest living artist in the Caribbean?
Every island would have its answer, but for the island of St Martin, there’s en easy choice: Sir Roland Richardson, the Marigot-based legend who has been depicting the beauty of the island for decades.
And now his art gallery, long one of the island’s signature spots before the 2017 hurricane, has completed its comeback.
The Roland Richardson Gallery Museum, set in the heart of the French Caribbean town, had been shuttered since Hurricane Irma in 2017.
The gallery relaunched last month with a show called “A Flotilla on Turquoise,” showcasing a collection of “regatta” paintings spanning the last decade of St Maarten’s Heineken Regatta.
Richardson, who paints his pictures “en plein air,” can often be found painting outdoors across the island.
Known as the “father of Caribbean impressionism,” Richardson’s work has celebrated St Martin’s beauty for more than forty decades.
— CJ