French Guiana, Guyana and Suriname

About French Guiana, Guyana and Suriname

The three Guianas share rainforest and rivers but were colonised by the British, Dutch and French. Indigenous peoples such as the Wayana and Kali'na make fine basketry, beadwork and featherwork, and petroglyphs cut into riverside rocks in Guyana are known as timehri. Maroon communities descended from people who escaped plantation slavery, including the Saamaka and Ndyuka, carve paddles, stools and doors with interlacing bands, a tradition sometimes called tembe.

Many of the region's modern artists built careers abroad. The Guyanese painter Aubrey Williams, who moved to London in 1952, drew on pre-Columbian forms in abstract canvases, and Frank Bowling, born in Guyana in 1934, poured and stained paint on large canvases. Stanley Brouwn left Paramaribo for Amsterdam and made conceptual works out of walking and distance. Recently Remy Jungerman has combined Maroon textile patterns with geometric abstraction, and Tabita Rezaire works in Cayenne with video and healing practices.