♪♪ DeCourcey-Dawe: The art of seeing is such an extraordinary sense.

♪♪ As photographers, the pictures we take are expressions of reality.

♪♪ Painting with the light and the shadows.

We have come to re-envision the Caribbean islands.

Barbados is perched on the edge of the vast Atlantic Ocean.

It's here that the artists and image creators alike have been influenced by one of the Caribbean's most prolific libations, rum.

♪♪ ♪♪ The Atlantic Ocean.

For hundreds of years, Europeans crossed this massive body of water in search of new lands and mythical treasures.

And the first island many sailors and explorers may have found is the most eastern island in the Caribbean.

Barbados.

Here, three trending photographers have been tasked to reimagine their homeland by following rum as their creative compass.

This is an island rich in history, reaching as far back as the late 15th century.

Today, it is one of the Caribbean's most striking and beautiful islands.

It's also one of the most friendly.

The Barbados that I know, the neighborhood is a family.

If you grew up in a neighborhood, your neighbor is unofficially your aunt.

You play with everybody.

You run around barefoot, you climb trees.

Barbados, 166 square miles.

The only country -- maybe the only country in the Caribbean that has never changed hands with the French, the Portuguese, nothing else.

And it is diverse inasmuch as its size, its small size.

It is the human aspect of Barbados that makes it quirky.

DeCourcey-Dawe: While Barbados can be called the gateway to the Caribbean, it is best known for something else.

♪♪ I feel like rum and the culture of Barbados have grown together.

You know, it started because we were a sugarcane island and having sugarcane, you know, it naturally progressed to rum being [Laughs] one of the things or one of the outputs from that process.

And I think we've gotten to that point now where rum in itself is huge and very independent of the sugar industry, to be quite honest.

Historically, Barbados has been labeled as the birthplace of rum.

Garrett: Between the end of the 16th century, maybe coming on to even the 17th, early 17th century, Barbados still is the first country in the entire world that has distilled and manufactured rum.

So it is not that we are trying rum.

We have been in the rum industry for over 320 years.

I think rum is everything.

Yeah.

Rum just kind of infuses everything from our history because it's a huge part of it, to culture.

DeCourcey-Dawe: The word rum conjures romantic imagery of clear blue waters and white sand beaches and escaping into island time.

With almost any spirit making, but very particular with rum, time is your friend, so there's never any rush.

And it's kind of also that ties back with a little bit of island lifestyle and Barbados lifestyle.

There's no rush to get things.

You don't need to -- Things will come when they're ready.

DeCourcey-Dawe: For photographers Kristopher Streek, the creative team known as LOUD 87, and Junior Sealy, rum is life.

But how would they capture that in a single frame?

♪♪ Sealy: LOUD 87 consists of Louise and Alyson.

It's weird because we actually work in a very unorthodox way in the sense that my brain's always going like this, but so is Alyson's.

Alyson's brain is on a whole other side of the spectrum.

Alyson has such a brilliant way of capturing what we speak about.

And then while we're working, while she's shooting, I'm looking at the images as well.

So I'm going, "No, maybe we should move this way."

I would say that they are an incredible studio team.

Very, like, clean, crisp commercial photos.

Portraits.

♪♪ So we're actually going to go to Granny's and see how she makes the cake and we'll get to see how beautiful it is.

You can almost smell it through the screen, but it's not the essence of just what it looks like at the end.

It's how it's made.

That's going to go there.

Right.

That's what I was thinking, if we can darken it so it's just... Everything as is photography, visuals.

So the best thing we could think of for rum was to actually capture Granny making a rum cake.

That's what we decided we would do.

And we thought, "This is amazing.

Why not infuse what it means so it actually brings everything from history to culture to everything in that."

So we've been thinking about everything from lighting, how we want to light it and how we want to capture her within the shot itself.

Maybe more, a little just slightly to the left so we still get the window in there.

[ Camera shutter clicks ] And that's everything from, you know, making sure you get natural light in, a bit of warmth, a warmth to the actual light and seeing her mixing ingredients, you know, and you have all of the organic materials and ingredients in her kitchen.

So, you know, we didn't want to go anywhere else but to the space she actually does this in.

This is the space where everyone comes together.

[ Indistinct conversation ] So even in the space, you'll see you have the utensils that she would have been using for ages that are huge and they're big and everything about it tells you more food.

[ Laughs ] You know, it's not like a small fork.

You got a big spoon and that means yes, lots.

And it's constant.

And, you know, she's chopping away in there and making little jokes.

Woman: Wait, that didn't go.

Give me a second.

-That one?

-Yeah.

No.

Ooh!

Ooh.

Sweet.

Holder: The thing with rum cake is, like, I've never seen an actual recipe.

I've never seen her follow a recipe.

It's something that's kind of like, passed on from, like, grandmother to mother to daughter, but not that much of a baker.

But that's not the point.

But it's one of those things that there's no hard and fast way to do it.

Everyone has their slight take on it.

And you're seeing the rum being poured in or, you know, it's just one of those things where you get a sense of her.

[ Camera shutter clicks ] [ Camera shutter clicks ] It's the rawness that's put into it.

It's the love that's put into it.

And well, Granny for me is not -- like I said, it's not my granny, but she is everyone's granny and I've grown up going to her as if she's my granny.

For me, Granny's cake tastes like a piece of heaven, but like a sweet piece of heaven.

So when you bite into it, it's just moist, it's warm, it's flavorful.

You have a fruity taste to it as well.

♪♪ Because when I think of rum cake, I don't think of an individual person.

I think of people, the community coming together for that.

♪♪ DeCourcey-Dawe: The highest terrain can be found on the north side of the island.

Here, the first rum distillery was set up more than three centuries ago, and it is still manufacturing rum to this day.

Geographically, this area was identified as perfect for growing and distilling sugar cane.

Branker: Here at Mount Gay specifically, we do an open fermentation, and that means all of the microbiota that exists in the atmosphere help to ferment that rum and give it its special taste, its special, you know, character.

And these things wouldn't be possible if we weren't here in this spot in Barbados.

DeCourcey-Dawe: The Mount Gay distillery's earliest records date back to 1703.

Today, it is one of the most popular rums on the island as well as around the world.

Branker: In Barbados specifically, it's all about our terrain and the island itself that lends a lot to being -- to the rum that's being produced here being distinct.

DeCourcey-Dawe: Trudiann Branker is Mount Gay's first ever female master blender.

For her, it's not just a job.

Branker: Barbados and rum have been synonymous for centuries.

You know, this is not a new relationship that we have.

It's one that, you know, has stood the test of time.

And for me, that is really where, one, my first passion for rum comes from.

♪♪ We are the only easterly Caribbean island that is not volcanic by inception.

So we have this very unique trait where we are a coral island.

And what does that mean?

It means that all of our water is porously found through the coral.

You know, you find our water in wells and our water has a high calcium content just because of the island and the limestone.

So that in itself, the water, which is a very important part of making rum, makes us unique.

DeCourcey-Dawe: Photographer Kris Streek chooses Mount Gay to tell his story.

Working with Mount Gay is always a good experience.

It's good fun because it kind of puts the history -- like more of the history of Barbados and its heritage in rum into perspective, and walking through, like, the compound, like, the area, like, you kind of get a sense of pride.

All the awards and everything, all the prestige of Mount Gay is, like, you can kind of feel it.

DeCourcey-Dawe: So, Kristopher Streek is a n-- I say new 'cause he's a new photographer, because he's young.

He's put the work in.

So his work kind of speaks for itself, but he sees things from a different angle.

Sealy: Kris is more of the environment, culture, people, capturing moods and energy, spaces.

So even though I don't speak to him often, I can see his personality through the pictures.

♪♪ Trudiann seems like quietly confident.

She doesn't seem like super, like, bold and firm and everything, but she's quietly confident.

I kind of wanted to emphasize that in her photos.

She has a kind of aura about her, where she -- she knows what she's doing and she knows how she wants to contribute to Mount Gay Rum.

♪♪ ♪♪ The Great House, it's rustic in a way.

It's modern and rustic in a sense.

It kind of -- It's looking towards the future, but I can still feel, like, the history of Mount Gay, like, within that -- within those rooms.

♪♪ My idea is to give a feeling of the room wrapping around you.

Like, you can feel the stories that's being told in that room.

So, like, I envision it as a wide shot with Trudiann in the center.

I want a shot with you central with everything.

Everything.

Sure.

She's now a part of Mount Gay's history as she works there as a master blender.

And all of this history is around her.

And now she is in the present kind of taking it in.

It tells a story.

Okay.

[ Camera shutter clicks ] ♪♪ [ Camera shutter clicks ] So moving on to the distillery, I want to portray Trudiann in her element.

This is like her playground.

This is her space.

You standing right here.

And she is -- Well, she is the master blender.

But I want her to be seen as the scientist.

Nice.

[ Camera shutter clicking ] This is her lab, really, and I want to make her appear powerful, you know?

♪♪ When, you know, you go from mixing our water with molasses and then you have that yeast, you know, it's almost as if the fermentation comes alive.

You see the bubbles at the top.

You know, you start to see, you know, the depressions and the rises in the liquid, in the vat.

It really does take on its own life during fermentation.

Streek: So moving on to the barrel barn.

I think that was probably my favorite spot location of the day.

It kind of gives a sense of scale as to what Mount Gay really is doing and what's going on, like, behind the scenes in the production of rum.

So really nature, you know, is our biggest ally when when we start our fermentation process.

And it really, like I said, it really does make it unique in the offering that you can get from Barbados rum.

And I'll use that and take a sample and I can put it in a glass so you can see it.

It's really a process in itself.

You know, each of these steps that we go through to make rum and, you know, it's like sometimes the process lets me come along for the ride.

[ Laughs ] At the end I do choose, you know, which rums and, you know, I get to taste, to understand the aroma.

But quite frankly, there's no speeding it up.

I have to wait until the rum is ready.

So how could you not respect a process that, you know, commands so much [Laughs] of your attention and your ability to just wait and let it happen?

[ Camera shutter clicks ] ♪♪ So when we are finished with Granny, we are going to head over to John Moore's Bar.

It's down in the northern part of the island.

Why I really like this bar is it is so filled with how rum shops used to be.

So when you pull up at this bar and it's still got the old aesthetics to it, it's got the edginess and the roughness to it.

You also have this sense of calm just because it's by the ocean, it's beautiful.

You've got all these different characters there.

♪♪ There's these spots where people get into these little niches, and that rum shop is right there on the water.

So we have our history.

We've got a vibe that we still resonate with, a place that we would still go just to take an afternoon off or take a break.

And it is so -- it's so picturesque.

[ Indistinct conversation ] You don't have to walk in to go out into the sea.

[ Indistinct conversation ] From the time you come off the road, you look through the door and you can see the sea.

The bar becomes part of the view.

So it's so beautiful.

And of course, we're in Barbados.

The sunsets are just gorgeous.

[ Camera shutter clicks ] And these rum shops always have, like, the older communities sitting outside playing dominoes.

Yeah.

There is a constant thing of a guy holding his rum.

♪♪ Just almost any time of the day.

[ Laughs ] Literally.

And when you're going out at night, you're seeing -- and people mix it with coconut water and they mix it with, you know, Coke or Sprite or any of these other products.

But it's something where you tend to find everyone drinking rum and something.

♪♪ [ Indistinct conversation ] ♪♪ Yeah.

You know, rather than just wine or something like that.

It very much is the Caribbean drink.

The Bajan drink.

My hope for when everyone sees these photos is that I translate what I feel for the rum shop directly through it so you get to feel a bit of that too.

[ Camera shutter clicks ] ♪♪ DeCourcey-Dawe: On the southeast part of the island, another rum distillery is garnering attention for how they are pushing rum to the forefront of the alcohol industry.

Seale: Foursquare is part of the Seale family and we've been making rum for or in the rum industry for over 100 years as blenders and then now as distillers.

And we're young in the sense that we only started distilling in 1996 when we refurbished the sugar -- the Foursquare sugar factory.

However, we've been pursuing a level of excellence to really push the boundaries of rum globally to really showcase what rum can be.

Foursquare I look at like a boutique rum.

So even though they're huge and they definitely do a lot of export out and it's curated in a very special way -- so is Mount Gay, but Foursquare has a way that reminds me of a historical place.

We've been really globally recognized for this and we hope to continue to pursue that route to, in a way, try to set a new standard for rum, to elevate all Caribbean rums so that we can be recognized as the Caribbean and in particular Barbados as the birthplace of rum.

DeCourcey-Dawe: Today he is being photographed inside the distillery by one of Barbados' most eclectic photographers.

So, let me tell you about Junior Sealy.

He has been an instrumental part of my career probably since early -- like the early days in the beginning.

He's such a creative and inspiring person to be around.

He sees things through such richness.

Like, all of his images are full of color and full of texture and full of little signifiers of the personality.

They're very true portraits.

He thinks about things artistically in the way that I myself have not, like, grasped his mind of how he thinks.

It's very stylized and he thinks about a lot of small details.

Sealy: I'm natural.

I shoot more fashion, artistic, creative sides.

I like to push things a little bit more.

He puts a little bit of himself into all of his work, and I think that is what makes Junior Junior.

[ Laughs ] ♪♪ So, today I'm at Foursquare shooting two things.

One is a little twist on my general style of shooting.

So I'm shooting a more commercial aspect with Christian, and then I'm going to shoot a more creative aspect with Kimar, which will showcase my artistic side.

♪♪ So, usually I don't shoot commercial.

So the first shot was important to just get him to warm up, to get him to, like, trust me.

♪♪ And he's a real cool dude.

He has the best job.

He just travels around and promotes the rum.

And so we had a good laugh as well because I wish I had his job.

[ Laughter ] To be honest.

Seale: We're hoping to push as well with Foursquare is trying to get a geographical indication so that we can protect that identity so that when you are looking in your local liquor store... you can find Barbados rum and you can trust that the quality of that Barbados rum originates here on the island of Barbados.

♪♪ Sealy: So after that, we stopped at the CO2 conversion part of the factory, which ideally wouldn't be a place he would want to shoot.

But I thought that was special because of the texture.

Also, the light there was really good and there's a special print within the machinery that created a really, really stunning portrait.

[ Camera shutter clicks ] ♪♪ It was really cool going to the pot stills because it was designed by Christian's dad and capturing him there also was special because we get to, like, tie the heritage.

[ Camera shutter clicks ] What separates Barbados rum from the other islands is kind of our technique and style, where we actually blend our pot still and our column still, our coffee column still rums together.

And this is a very uniquely Barbadian style.

It's not typical to find a pure pot still distillate from Barbados.

It's quite rare and this is kind of our unique style of creating a very balanced, easy-to-drink rum.

DeCourcey-Dawe: A photographer's natural inclination is to chase the light, and outside, the lighting is becoming perfect for photographing the next part of Junior's project.

Sealy: So, I'm capturing, like, a really strong portrait of a young black male enjoying cane, like to the fullest, like, that, that full, like, joy and energy.

The happiest, warm, warmest photo that you could think about.

Like, when you feel it, when you see it, you should feel that joy, which then also then goes to everything, the same joy that people get from laying there with their friends.

But I'm starting at the source, really.

♪♪ DeCourcey-Dawe: In the end, it really is all about time.

Seale: Time is your friend.

Things will come when they're ready.

DeCourcey-Dawe: Nothing happens instantly, especially in the world of spirits.

The same goes for art.

Over time, art reveals itself to the eye of the beholder.

In the future, we might see something different in the photos that were created here.

One thing is for sure.

They are unique and can stand the test of time, just like that spirit of Barbados called rum.

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪