Leeds West Indian Carnival: New mural unveiled to celebrate history of popular carnival

The project celebrating the annual carnival which has been taking place in the city since the 1960s was a labour of love for Rhian Kempadoo-Millar and also the “most daunting task” of her professional life due to its sheer scale.

Featuring 'Ole Mas' carnival characters Midnight Robbers, fancy Indian masqueraders and bele dancers alongside carnival costumes on 13m by 9 m (42ft by 30 ft) wall, the mural was a considerable gear change for Kempadoo-Millar who previously hadn't painted anything larger than 6m sq.

Many residents and frequent passerbys tend to be taken aback at least for a few seconds to admire this beauty which seems to suddenly have popped out of nowhere.

She was commissioned to create the work after a friend encouraged her to apply..

"I was sent the mural proposal by a friend who suggested I should apply,” Kempadoo-Millar, who has 25 years of experience in designing costumes for the carnival, explains.

"Initially, I was too intimidated to apply due to the scale and machinery involved.

"But a week before the deadline I decided I had nothing to lose and put together a proposal & some sketches.”

The mural also boasts some of the costumes designed by current Leeds designers such as Anonymas, Hughbon Condor, A Team, Unity Arts and RJC Dance.

A launch party to celebrate the official unveiling of the mural after work to create it over summer took place in October.

Despite passing by the wall multiple times, Kempadoo-Millar says she had never really noticed it in its previous guise.

"It was grey and a great spot for a mural.”

While the work was taking place, every morning, she used to reach the site at around 8am and the team of supporting artists; Alan Pergusey, Reggie Challenger and Ky James; would join her at 10am. The team would usually finish around 6pm.

However, when the weather played spoilsport, they were forced to take some days off.

"I used to be the first person to reach the venue. It was nice to have a couple of hours by myself to prepare for the day. The days were long as it took time to set up the area, cherrypicker and paints. We would work on a specific part of the mural.

"There would be two of us on the cherry picker and two on the ground. It took two-and-a-half weeks to paint with some days off due to the rain. The set up could take one-and-a-half hours then it would start to rain and we'd have to pack everything away. It used to be all wet and soggy."

The costume designer emphasised that she lucked out with supporting artists Pergusey and Challenger as they had experience of working on projects of this scale so could advise on which paints to use and how to best deploy them.

James, who also joined them on this project, was a recent art graduate.

"We all have very different styles but I think that complimented the design. Some precision, some illustrative and some loose movement.

"It was amazing to have this knowledge to ask questions and get advice.

"Maybe my style of working is quite free and impulsive so I imagine that could be frustrating. But we had a lot of fun and I tried to let each of us express our creative style," she smiles.

Painting at that height at times is extremely overwhelming besides physically exhausting but "you know it has to be delivered so you just get up, wrap up and get on."

The final day when the rain stopped for the last two hours and sun was coming down and it was reflecting the light as she was left to paint all of the gold and silver highlights.

"We were all tired and wet but it was beautiful."

Kempadoo-Millar says specifically wanted to have a mix of traditional and contemporary carnival emphasizing on the importance to know the heritage and roots of carnival in order to stay connected to the origins.

"It was through her costume designs that Millar had always studied and made reference to Ole Mas - especially with the young people.

"She wanted the mural to have the same idea of roots, vines, development and growth into something new.

"Carnival is in my blood so I think it’s just a language that comes naturally to express different emotions, times or life, experiences positive and negative. The UK carnival has its own identity but we are always connected to the Caribbean.

"Many times I start painting something which is unrelated to carnival such as ‘We Drowning Street’ about the corruption of the government and ‘Partygate’ during the Covid Crisis. And the subjects will stay to take on a carnival character form such as the politicians morphing into suited Blue Devils."

She sees painting as a different form of expression than costume and it allows her to express more personal issues.

After losing her dad to suicide when she was 10, painting has been like therapy and a way to process the trauma.

She painted a piece with the Midnight Robber depicting the loss of childhood under his cloak of death.

"It was cathartic," she explains. She is now also working on a textiles project looking at the hidden histories and the woven collections.

Her advice to aspiring artists and younger generations more generally is to "follow your passions even if they seem disconnected and unrelated”.

She says: “If we stay in our vein of gold it’s amazing how things start to entwine together as time goes by.

"It’s about resilience and just doing your thing your way. Tenacity pays off."