Alladin is the first known Indo-Trinidadian visual artist. In Trinidad and Tobago in the first decades after independence, formally trained artists had been educated in Europe, the United States, or Canada, and the accepted form of artistic expression was, in Alladin's view, "Europeanized". As Director of Culture Alladin sought to develop and elevate the "
folk arts" produced by the primarily African- and Indian-descended populations as a way to build national cultural consciousness. Alladin worked for the "liberation of the arts from overseas influences as far as expression, experiences and choice of subject matter went". To mark the independence of
Ghana in 1957, the Government of Trinidad and Tobago commissioned Alladin to create a work, which he called "Back to Africa" as a gift to the people of Ghana. In 1967 he produced another work as a gift to Ghana. Alladin's portrayal of rural Indo-Trinidadian life in his paintings legitimised it as a subject for other Indo-Trinidadian painters who were trained in Western artistic traditions. Alladin's portrayal, according to Boodhoo, "gave a new dignity to this subject". == Legacy ==