Pen back on St. Vincent Street

The first artist to participate in the art club was Pen Cayetano. I would take copious notes during those talks and later write about the artists’ works and influences. My first of seven (so far) critiques of Pen’s paintings and music was published in the Reporter newspaper just in time for the Settlement Day festivities, 1989. That critique was the seminal piece published in Belize that dealt with Pen’s paintings content and cultural iconography.

In that era of Pen’s career, Pen (ever the radical) would block off the section of Dangriga’s main drag, St Vincent Street, in front of his art studio- living quarters and have ad hoc music festivals with local musicians (Turtle Shell Band) backing him up in energetic Punta style. Pen is credited with being the first to electrify the traditional Punta rhythms in the late 70s instilling them with some contemporary pizzazz.

Saturday night, November 17 Pen was back at it once more. Eighteen years after I first saw Pen’s impromptu Punta rock performances he was back in Dangriga, again blocking off a section of St Vincent Street for a spontaneous street concert. Once the radical, always the radical.   

In the intervening 18 years Pen hasn’t lost his energetic guitar licks or the tenor of his voice, which is still potent. His hair might be graying, though his sound is just as insolent and sassy as two decades ago. In many, many ways the guy defines the Garifuna culture. His paintings document its history and are testaments to its glory. His music embraces the spark of life- is an ode to Garifuna perseverance and resourcefulness.

Hail Pen- the Punta Rock, Garifuna culture hero.