352 Dr Seuss Friday - The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins (Croak & Crow's 38th Dr. Seuss book choice
Channel: Croak and Crow
Date: 2022-10-28

Born: March 20, 1928, Latrobe, PA
Died: February 27, 2003, Pittsburgh, PA

Mister Rogers was a vegetarian, Spencer Cartier is not.
Spencer Cartier is half Trinidadian, Fred Rodgers was not.

the 'Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing TUBE MAN' was invented by a Trinidadian 🌴

Fun to Know about Trinidad and Tobago 

A TUBE MAN, also known as a skydancer, air dancer, inflatable man and originally called the Tall Boy, is an inflatable stick figure comprising sections of fabric tubing attached to a fan. As the fan blows air through it, the tubing moves in a dynamic dancing or flailing motion. Tube men are typically used to advertise retail business premises to passing motorists.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tube_man

Peter Minshall, an artist from Trinidad and Tobago, came up with the concept for the 1996 Summer Olympics. Minshall originally called his invention the "Tall Boy". 

Peter Minshall (born 16 July 1941) is a Trinidadian Carnival artist (described colloquially in Trinidad and Tobago as a "mas-man").

Minshall moved to Trinidad as a small child and growing up in the capital, Port of Spain, he was exposed to Carnival from a young age. He made his first costume at the age of 13. He attended Queen's Royal College, in Trinidad, then went on to study Theatre Design at the Central School of Art and Design in London.

Peter Minshall designed Carnival costumes for various relatives and family friends, even before he left school. At art school, he wrote a thesis on the bat (a traditional Carnival character) and his first major theatrical commission, for a production at Sadler's Wells, came after a director saw a portfolio of his Carnival designs.

When Minshall's mother asked him to create a Carnival costume in 1974, it was the pivotal event in Minshall's Carnival career. The costume he created was called "From the Land of the Hummingbird". According to him, it took five weeks, 12 people, 104 feathers, each one made of 150 different pieces of fabric. The costume was designed to allow its wearer total mobility and was an immediate sensation. It also became a major icon of Trinidad Carnival.

The following year, Minshall designed a band for London's Notting Hill Carnival, and in 1976 he was asked by veteran bandleaders Stephen and Elsie Lee Heung to design a full-size band for Trinidad Carnival. Minshall chose the theme Paradise Lost, which was inspired by Milton's epic poem. The band was conceived in four "movements", like a symphony, and introduced a form of winged costume based on Minshall's study of traditional Carnival characters, which he would continue to develop over the course of his career. As Paradise Lost paraded through the streets of the city, a grand narrative unfolded, astounding onlookers. One observer, the photographer Roy Boyke, remarked: "It is doubtful that the work of any single individual has had so searing an impact on the consciousness of an entire country."

He produced no bands in 2004 and 2005, but in 2006 Minshall returned to Carnival with The Sacred Heart, an army of "urban samurai cowboys and -girls" marching against hate, selfishness, disease, and prejudice. The band was partly sponsored by the National AIDS Coordinating Committee of Trinidad and Tobago and had an explicit HIV/AIDS awareness message.

Minshall's costumes have sometimes been called "dancing mobiles." "Mas" as he conceives it is performance art that combines the qualities of sculpture with those of movement. Each costume is designed with the motion of the performer in mind, so that performer and costume are one. "I provide the means for the human body to express its energy," he says. His bands are never merely costumed parades, but exercises in total theatre, using music, drama, dance, and visual spectacle to communicate a metaphor-rich narrative.

Minshall claims that mas—"living art that we make fresh every year"—is the truest artistic expression of Trinidad. "Our aesthetic is performance, the living now." A major aim of his life's work has been to prove that mas can be "high" art, as capable of the sublime or the universal as any other artform.

Minshall has worked on a variety of performance projects. In 1985, he led Adoration of Hiroshima, a nuclear protest mas', in Washington, D.C. He helped design the opening ceremonies for the 1987 Pan American Games in Indianapolis, the Barcelona 1992 Summer Olympics, the Atlanta 1996 Summer Olympics, the 1994 Football World Cup and the Salt Lake 2002 Winter Olympics. He also collaborated with Jean Michel Jarre, once in 1990 on Paris la Defense, and again in 1995 on the Concert For Tolerance. Minshall's creations have also been on display and took place at the opening ceremony of the ICC Cricket World Cup 2007.

The Holy Spirit guides us and the Holy Spirit guides people to us.
#croakandcrow #spencercartier #the500hatsofbartholomewcubbins
In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen

croak and crow is sound
acorns pelting at the ground
broken branches crowd