King and Queen Showcase

Description

The King and Queen show has traditionally kicked off the Toronto Caribbean Carnival every year. The event is a spectacular display of creativity and pageantry featuring over fifty elaborate, enormous costumes centred on different themes. The leaders of Toronto Carnival Mas Bands perform in front of judges and an enthusiastic crowd. Male and female competitors are judged on the details of their costumes and how that costume represents the respective themes of the Mas Bands. At the end of the night, the King and Queen are crowned. 

We would like to acknowledge funding support from the Ontario Arts Council, an agency of the Government of Ontario. Special thank you to the Design Fabrication Zone (DFZ) at Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU) for support with fabrication, design and research. 

BEHOLD (King) 

by the SugaCayne Collective: Candice Dixon | Abiola Idowu | Chantel Goring | Rhenice Bowman-Miller 

As described in the best-selling novel Roots by Alex Haley, the character Omoro holds his infant son Kunta up to a starry sky and announces: "Kunta Kinte, behold the only thing greater than yourself!" 

Kunta Kinte kept his connection to his ROOTS by continuing the family ritual of presenting his newborn baby to ALLAH... no matter where you are in the world, we all look up at the same sky 

Colours: 

• Blue, red, purple and silver accents 

Design Concept: 

• Large mask of Omoro holding up the Adinkra symbol for FREEDOM 

• Stars and constellations in the background

STRANGE FRUIT (QUEEN) 

by the SugaCayne Collective: Candice Dixon Abiola Idowu | Chantel Goring | Rhenice Bowman-Miller | Tiffany Joy Villahermosa 

Our QUEEN; STRANGE FRUIT is a tormented figure trying to grapple with the atrocities that have been bestowed upon her people. 

Colours: 

• Shades of rose gold (to give the feeling of a bronzed structure, stuck in time) 

Design Concept: 

• Large Tree that is fashioned to resemble ropes that have been cut at both ends. The roots and the branches 

represent the freedom of fraying rope, and the ultimate freedom of the people 

• Lyrics from the 1939 Billie Holiday song have been laser cut into fruit pods hanging from the limbs of the tree 

Southern trees bear a strange fruit Blood on the leaves and blood at the root Black bodies swingin' in the Southern breeze 

Strange fruit hangin' from the poplar trees