When Christopher Columbus stepped ashore on the Lucayan island of Guanahaní,
the people greeted him with gifts of parrots and cotton. They gave all they had.
Columbus later told Queen Isabella of Spain that these gentle, peaceful islanders
seemed poor in everything but blessed with an abundance of love. Within fifteen
years, the Spanish conquerors killed or enslaved everyone, depopulating the Lucayan
Islands. The same fate awaited untold millions of indigenous peoples in the
Caribbean Islands and Central and South America. The Lucayan Taíno: First People
of the Bahamas is told from their perspective prior to European contact. It is a story
in words and paintings, told by Sandra Riley and Alton Lowe, about their culture and
connection to their natural and spiritual worlds. It is a story created by filmmaker
Travis Neff in his docudrama Full Circle: a Taíno Story. It is a story told in bronze by
James Mastin as a memorial to the Taíno. These works of art will endure as reminders
of the goodness and generosity of spirit that Columbus recognized from the moment
he first met the island people.
