Celebration

Ghana-born, Caribbean filmmaker Yao Ramesar was honoured as the Caribbean’s first Laureate in Arts and Letters, at the inaugural Anthony Norman Sabga Caribbean Awards for Excellence (ANSCAFE) in 2006. The awards recognize that “Ramesar’s most significant contribution is that he has taken Caribbean cinema to the world under the rubric… Caribbeing®”.
Ramesar’s film Haiti Bride, one of six features that Ramesar has directed since 2006, screened at FESPACO 2015 in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, Africa’s largest and oldest film festival: the first ever African diaspora film to be in selection in the feature film competition; the film also screened in The Ghetto Biennale, Port au Prince, Haiti in December 2015 where Ramesar was the only filmmaker present at this edition of the Biennale. Haiti Bride also screened in the town of Jacmel where some of the motion picture was filmed.
His feature film Sistagod® remains the sole Trinidad and Tobago feature film to gain official selection at a major international festival, world-premiering in 2006 at the Toronto International Film Festival, the major North American and hemispheric festival. It has continued garnering awards, copping the Grand Prix for Best Feature in 2014 at ArtoDocs International Film Festival in St Petersburg, Russia.
Ramesar’s Caribbeing® theories on filmmaking have been featured in numerous publications including his paper “Caribbeing: Cultural Imperatives and the Technology of Motion Picture Production” (Caribbean Quarterly Vol. 42, No 4 (1996)); and “Caribbean Culture and in the Digital Domain”, presented at Carifesta Symposia in St. Kitts/Nevis (2000).
Collaborating with Nobel Laureate Derek Walcott, Ramesar directed “The Sadhu of Couva” and “The Coral”, the first screen adaptations of Walcott’s poetry. He also produced documentaries on Nelson Mandela and Stokely Carmichael during their visits to Trinidad.
Ramesar has created over 120 films on the people, history and culture of Trinidad and Tobago, screening in more than 100 countries.
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