Boscoe Holder; dancer, choreographer & artist (Geoffrey's brother)
Hyfler/Rosner
Dancer, choreographer and artist
The Independent
23 April 2007
Stephen Bourne
On 31 October 2003, when the University of the West Indies
conferred upon Boscoe Holder an honorary DLitt, it couldn't
have gone to a more deserving person. Then in his early
eighties, Holder had led a busy artistic life as a painter,
dancer, costume designer, choreographer, dance instructor at
the University of the West Indies, leader of an
international dance group for nearly 20 years, orchestra
leader and pianist.
Born in Port of Spain, Trinidad, in 1921 to Arthur Holder,
whose family originated from Barbados, and his wife Louise,
of French ancestry, Boscoe (Arthur Aldwyn at birth) was the
oldest of five children. The youngest, Geoffrey, went on to
become an acclaimed dancer and choreographer in the United
States.
Boscoe was just five years old when, self-taught, he began
painting. By the age of seven he was already playing the
piano. He credited his mother with most of his success.
Strong and artistic, she gave him the confidence to live his
dreams: "She was a consummate woman," he said. "She could do
everything!"
Educated at the Methodist Tranquillity School, Holder was
fascinated by his island's culture. He researched and
learned the local dances and songs of Trinidad, and by the
late 1930s he was producing shows depicting the music, songs
and dances of Trinidad. At the same time his artwork was
exhibited, and in 1943 he became a founder and life member
of the Trinidad Art Society.
In his dances he used traditional African Caribbean
interpretations - shango, bongo and bélé - and he often used
his dancers as models for his paintings. When American
military bases were installed in Trinidad during the Second
World War, Holder presented his own programme on the US
Armed Forces Radio Station, WVDI. The show aired every
Sunday afternoon.
His dance company also made regular appearances at various
officers' clubs, and Holder was commissioned by scores of
servicemen to paint their portraits so that they could send
them home to their families in America.
In 1946, after visiting Martinique for the first time,
Holder included the dances, songs and costumes of the French
West Indies in his shows. The following year he travelled
for the first time to New York, teaching Caribbean dance at
the Katherine Dunham School, and exhibiting paintings at the
Eighth Street Galleries. In 1948 Holder married a member of
his dance company, a black Englishwoman called Sheila
Clarke, and two years later, having had a son, Christian,
they settled in London, which became their home for the next
20 years.
Holder was befriended by Oliver Messel, an interior and
stage designer, who introduced him to his Mayfair friends,
including Noël Coward. Boscoe Holder and his Caribbean
Dancers, with Sheila Clarke as the lead dancer, had their
own show on BBC television in 1950, Bal Creole. Holder and
his dancers appeared in 1951 on BBC television again in
Caribbean Cabaret with two fellow Trinidadians, the folk
singer Edric Connor and the calypsonian Lord Kitchener.
Throughout the 1950s and 1960s Holder, who is credited with
introducing limbo dancing and the first steel band to
Britain, made many appearances in cabarets, theatre clubs,
television shows and films. His dance company, representing
the West Indies, performed before the Queen at her
coronation in 1953. They danced on a barge, part of the
Royal Flotilla, on the Thames.
The company also toured the Continent, appearing in Finland,
Sweden, Belgium, France, Spain, Czechoslovakia, Italy,
Monaco and Egypt.
For British television, in 1958 Holder choreographed an
Armchair Theatre production of Eugene O'Neill's The Emperor
Jones. He later appeared in episodes of such series as The
Saint (1965) and Danger Man (1965). In 1959 he danced in the
night-club sequence of the film Sapphire and he
choreographed the calypso dancers in Tiger Bay starring
Hayley Mills.
Although his dancing was given priority, Holder continued to
paint, using his dancers as models. In Britain he exhibited
at the Trafford Gallery, the Redfern Gallery and the
Commonwealth Institute in London, and at the Castle Museum,
Nottingham.
Returning to Trinidad in 1970, Holder decided to concentrate
mainly on his paintings:
I love painting Caribbean people, especially the women,
because they are so decorative. I capture all of the
Caribbean in my work, the poverty, the strong black theme,
the nature and the beauty. Looking at a painting is like
taking a trip. When I look at each of my paintings, I can
remember the sight, the taste, the smell, every detail of my
life on the day it was painted. I would say it's more like
déjà vu.
In recognition of his contribution to the arts, the
Government of Trinidad and Tobago awarded Holder the Humming
Bird Medal (Gold) and named a street after him in 1973.
A retrospective of his paintings, "Beauty in the Eye of the
B Holder", was held in 1988, hosted by the Venezuelan
Embassy in Port of Spain. From the late 1990s Holder held
annual exhibitions at 101 Art Gallery in Port of Spain.
In 2002 Boscoe Holder was interviewed in Andrzej Krakowski's
documentary Geoffrey Holder: the unknown side . . . In
December 2004, Trinidad and Tobago issued a series of
postage stamps featuring six of Holder's paintings.
Stephen Bourne
Arthur Aldwyn Holder (Boscoe Holder), dancer, choreographer
and artist: born Port of Spain, Trinidad 16 July 1921;
married 1948 Sheila Clarke (one son); died Newtown, Trinidad
21 April 2007.