Thank You
SERVICES
Sebastian,
Jessica.
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Distinguished Guests,
Boys and Girls,
Ladies and Gentlemen.
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When a second generation emerges from Fierce Grief to hoist the flag they have inherited with such a stellar, inspiring show; they deserve all the support and encouragement we can muster and a truly large hand of applause from those present...Give it Up for Jessica and Sebastian.
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Robert, William, James...
Rebecca, Maria, Louisa...
and the 119 others that toiled on Mount Plenty
198 years ago, when these banners,
this screed,
was written ...
In his 2005 book
Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed
Jared Diamond gives examples —across two thousand years, beginning with Rapa Nui (Easter Island), home of the stunning Moai sculptures — of a society that chose to fail.
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The common theme, as we can see on Rapa Nui, is an example of an upper class living large — consuming all the resources (think trees and natural materials without any cognisance of the detrimental effects upon the other members of their own society) until there simply was nothing left —
resulting in total collapse.
198 years later we have the social capital, right here in this room,
to subvert the course of impending disaster.
YES!
The Designers, the Producers and most importantly our skilled Tradesmen & women, and the Labourerswithout whom Creative Directors could not exist.
Let’s not forget the Artists making strategic alliances.
Let’s not cast shadows on each other.
As Oar for Ba by Facey
and the scintillatingly lofty Red and Blue by Ogden
remind us:
life can be truly inspiring.
We have a choice.
01
We have a choice.
Do we want to be set adrift without a rudder?
Or raise the sails of social uplift as these pieces exhort us to do?
With fair winds and favourable currents we can launch actions.
Launch thoughts.
But when becalmed, we are delivered to a type of drowning,
an inability to swim: murders in the gullies; murders in the hills; checkpoints in MoBay; checkpoints in St Catherine; and the haunting eyes of the young — the children — that have been traumatised by an ongoing war over which they have no dominion.
Collectors in the audience! You might be young.
You may not be able to buy this piece.
Yet.
But buy this piece you must! Come together now and let’s work to place this piece in a prominent place: a Speakers Corner because YES!, downtown the ghettos are articulate, they do reason, and they can find a way out.
Initiate symposia around this piece.
Bust lyrics around this piece.
Film it and broadcast it to the world!!
YES!, the world knows how fast you can run and how well you entertain, but now they will know how well you can REASON! Because reason this craft away from the Rocks of the exploding national deficit we must.
02
03
A vessel such as this can cleave through metaphoric oceans:
Oceans of doubt;
Oceans of emotion.
If we hesitate, we must turn within and ask:
How Deep is Your Hate?
How Deep is Your Prejudice?
How Deep is Your Loyalty?,
to those that stand beside you and shoulder the burden.
Let’s Place This Vessel on a surge of current of our own creation.
A surge of waves.
That will take us to the new reality that Oar for Ba and Red and Blue so clearly lead us to.
Here’s a strategic alliance at work: Derval - otherwise known as Junior - Johnson, a third generation carpenter from Matches Lane - you can’t get more hardcore than that - who “discovered” Fine Art through the auspices of ROKTOWA and continues to release his innate creative genius through the support of those around him.
Junior is going places fast so buy now while you can still afford him...
