Black people have lived in the country we now know as Wales for millennia. Their archaeological remains date back to at least the Roman era. More recent history illustrates that Black communities have been established in Wales for at least 500 years, from the earliest times of Welsh involvement in Britain’s colonial expansion from the 16th century onwards – Welsh people participated in the transatlantic slave trade and the country’s copper, iron and wool provided the resources to keep the trade going. This participation in Atlantic slavery led to Wales’s rapid industrial and economic development and contributed to a massive growth in maritime activity as the country’s natural resources were exported to support Britain’s expanding empire. In turn, international shipping brought Black people from all over the world, following the trade routes, to seek out new lives in Wales.

The port towns of South Wales, such as Cardiff, Swansea and Newport, and, later, the industrial centres of Port Talbot and Merthyr Tydfil became homes to growing numbers of African and African Caribbean communities. People came to settle and raise their families in Wales from countries such as Somalia, Sierra Leone, Nigeria, Jamaica, Barbados and Trinidad, with Butetown in Cardiff (known colloquially for many years as Tiger Bay) becoming one of the most ethnically diverse areas in the whole of the UK. In recent years, Black people have moved further afield and are represented in nearly every part of Wales, drawn by economic and educational opportunities offered by the country’s hospitals and universities.

People of African and African Caribbean descent have made significant contributions to Wales. Singer Dame Shirley Bassey, athlete Colin Jackson and footballer Ryan Giggs are among those who have attained world recognition for their achievements. However, Black communities can all too frequently be underrepresented in the cultural life in Wales, with proportionately lower participation rates than white communities (i). Black History Wales seeks to redress this imbalance with this strategy.

African and African Caribbean communities have produced some of the most vibrant art on the planet. With cultural traditions to draw from around 2,000 ethnic groups spread over fifty-four African countries, around thirty Caribbean countries and a wider international diaspora, their output is expressed through a wide range of traditional and contemporary media.

While some artists of African heritage are keen to convey in their work social and cultural meanings that have come down through generations, others prefer to challenge the notion that African art is tribal and timeless.

African and African Caribbean art has influenced some of the most popular artists of the modern era in the Western world. Gauguin, Picasso and Matisse were all inspired by the concepts of nature, emotion, pattern and colour strikingly evident in African art. In Wales, painter Ceri Richards, poet Dylan Thomas and ceramicist Michael Cardew all acknowledge African influence in their work.

Wales itself has a strong indigenous artistic tradition, in literature, painting, music and more, influenced over the generations not least by the country’s landscape, religion and industry. Not only does Wales support a large number of artists across a wide range of artistic disciplines but the vast majority of the country’s population engage with, and support, the arts. A survey undertaken by Arts Council Wales indicates that 86% of the people of Wales (adults and children) attend arts events at least once a year (ii). Galleries across Wales, such as the Glynn Vivian in Swansea and the Mostyn in Llandudno, present the work of Welsh artists and smaller arts collectives and individual artists can be found all over the country.

References:

i https://orca.cf.ac.uk/18365/1/2290-wales-migration-cohesion.pdf, p. 10, 15/12/2016.
ii https://www.arts.wales/102391.file.dld. 20/02/2017.