Cultural Maps, Networks and Flows: The History and Impact of the Havana Biennale 1984
to the present
by
Miguel Leonardo Rojas-Sotelo
MFA, Universidad de los Andes, 1995
MA, University of Pittsburgh, 2004
Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of
History of Art and Architecture in partial fulfillment
of the requirements for the degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
University of Pittsburgh
2009
UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH
History of Art and Architecture
This dissertation was presented
by
Miguel Leonardo Rojas-Sotelo
It was defended on
January 23, 2009
and approved by
Barbara McCloskey, Faculty, History of Art and Architecture
Hermann Herlinghaus, Faculty, Hispanic Languages and Literatures
Kirk Savage, Chair, History of Art and Architecture
Advisor
Terry Smith, Andrew Mellon Professor
Contemporary Art and Theory, History of Art and Architecture
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Copyright © by Miguel Rojas-Sotelo
2009
Special thanks
Okwui Enwezor, Academic Director, San Francisco Art Institute
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Cultural Maps, Networks and Flows: The History and Impact of the Havana Biennale
1984 to the present
Miguel l. Rojas-Sotelo, PhD
University of Pittsburgh, 2009
Since 1984 the Havana Biennale has been known as “the Tri-continental art event,”
presenting artists from Latin America, Africa, and Asia. It also has intensely debated the nature
of recent and contemporary art from a Third World or Global South perspective. The Biennale is
a product of Cuba’s fruition since the Revolution of 1959. The Wifredo Lam Center, created in
1983, has organized the Biennial since its inception.
This dissertation proposes that at the heart of the Biennale has been an alternative
cosmopolitanism (that became an existential internationalism during the “contemporary”
moment) embraced by a group of local cultural agents, critics, philosophers, art historians, and
also supported by a network of peers around the world. It examines the role Armando Hart
Dávalos, Minister of Culture of Cuba (1976-1997), who played a key figure in the development
of a solid cultural policy, one which produced the Havana Biennale as a cultural project based on
an explicit “Third World” consciousness. It explores the role of critics and curators Gerardo
Mosquera and Nelson Herrera Ysla, key members of the founding group of the Biennale.
Subsequently, it examines how the work of Llilian Llanes, director of the Lam Center and of the
Biennale (1983-1999), shaped the event in structural and conceptual terms. Finally, it examines
the most recent developments and projections for the future.
Using primary material, interviews, and field work research, the study focuses on the
conceptual, contextual, and historical structure that supports the Biennale. It presents from
several optics the views and world-view of the agents involved from the inside (curators and
collaborators), as well as, from an art-world perspective through an account of the nine editions.
Using the Havana Biennale as case study this work goes to disentangle and reveal the sociopolitical and intellectual debates taking place in the conformation of what is call today global art.
In addition, recognizes the potentiality of alternative thinking and cultural subjectivity in the
Global South.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
PREFACE............................................................................................................................... XVII
INTRODUCTION.................................................................................................................... XIX
PART ONE .................................................................................................................................... 1
1.0
ANOTHER STORY..................................................................................................... 2
1.1
THE HAVANA CONNECTION........................................................................ 2
1.2
ON THIRD WORLD CULTURE ...................................................................... 8
1.3
WRITING ANOTHER STORY....................................................................... 12
1.4
ON THE CUBAN SITUATION ....................................................................... 15
1.5
CONCLUSION .................................................................................................. 26
2.0
SITUATING THE HAVANA BIENNALE ............................................................. 29
2.1
IN THE HAZE OF THE SIXTIES .................................................................. 29
2.2
ON THE CONSTITUTION OF A DE-(POST) COLONIAL DISCOURSE
IN THE MIDST OF A POSTMODERN ONE IN CUBA (1889-1983).......................... 33
2.3
2.2.1
Visual Arts and De/Postcolonial Discourse ................................................. 38
2.2.2
A New Face..................................................................................................... 45
2.2.3
A New Body.................................................................................................... 46
2.2.4
Out of the Cage (the Cuban response)......................................................... 51
IN CULTURAL TERMS .................................................................................. 54
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2.3.1
Fluid Thought: Cultural criticism in Cuba at the time.............................. 55
2.3.2
Fluid Action: art exhibitions influence and impact.................................... 61
2.4
THE FIRST HAVANA BIENNALE................................................................ 66
2.5
CONCLUSION .................................................................................................. 71
PART TWO................................................................................................................................. 73
3.0
PORT/PIER – MAPS – ROUTES – NETWORKS................................................. 74
3.1
THE WIFREDO LAM CENTER .................................................................... 75
3.1.1
The Lam Center Organizational Model ...................................................... 78
3.2
TIME CAPSULES............................................................................................. 83
3.3
A PERSONAL ARCHEOLOGY OF THE LAM CENTER ......................... 84
3.3.1.1 Training and background .................................................................. 86
3.3.1.2 Organizational model and team-work .............................................. 91
3.4
THE WORK MODEL CURATOR-INVESTIGATOR-TRAVELER ......... 95
3.4.1
The Work Model and the Spirit of the Biennale....................................... 101
3.4.1.1 <1989> Rethinking models ............................................................... 102
3.4.1.2 The Fourth Biennale, a breaking point........................................... 110
3.4.1.3 Research Journeys, “the world in us”............................................. 114
3.4.1.4 The Fifth Biennale, special period and maturity ........................... 119
3.4.1.5 New challenges and crisis, revision and regression........................ 124
3.4.1.6 New Generations and Proxy Wars .................................................. 125
3.5
4.0
UNPACKING THE BIENNALE HISTORY................................................ 129
ON
THE
CONCEPT
OF
(THIRD
WORLD
/
GLOBAL
SOUTH)
CONTEMPORARY ART: THE HAVANA PERSPECTIVE.............................................. 137
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4.1.1
4.2
Third World Collapse, Third World Art Victory. The Global South. ... 143
ON THIRD WORLD CURATORS ............................................................... 147
4.2.1.1 The Cuban Curator .......................................................................... 150
4.3
THE ROLE OF THE ACADEMY: ART CRITICISM, THEORY, AND
THE ARTIST.................................................................................................................... 157
4.3.1.1 Artistic practice and cultural theory ............................................... 161
4.4
A GENDER DIMENSION?............................................................................ 167
4.5
ON NETWORKING ....................................................................................... 173
4.5.1
The Question of Solidarity .......................................................................... 176
4.6
THE BIENNALE AND CULTURAL TOURISM........................................ 182
4.7
ON CUBAN ARTISTS AND CUBAN ART.................................................. 199
PART THREE........................................................................................................................... 205
5.0
MAPPING THE WORLD....................................................................................... 206
5.1
THIRD WORLD ART .................................................................................... 211
5.2
ON CARIBBEAN ART................................................................................... 224
5.3
ON MODERNITY, TRADITION, AND CONTEMPORARY ART.......... 237
5.4
COLONIALISM AND NEO-COLONIALISM ............................................ 259
5.5
MULTIPLE REALITIES ............................................................................... 273
5.5.1
5.6
ON MEMORY AND RUINS .......................................................................... 294
5.6.1
5.7
Exodus, Boats, and Boat-People (balsas and balseros) ............................. 281
Cuban Presence and Alternative Inner-worlds ........................................ 308
OPEN CONTEMPORARY ART AND THE POST-PRODUCTION
DEVIATION: COMMUNITY, TECHNOLOGY, COMMUNICATION .................. 315
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5.8
ART WITHIN LIFE........................................................................................ 337
5.9
URBAN COLLAPSE, PANTHOM BIENNALE.......................................... 357
6.0
CONCLUSION......................................................................................................... 383
6.1
LAST WORD. TENTH HAVANA BIENNALE........................................... 392
APPENDIX................................................................................................................................ 400
LIST OF ARTISTS HAVANA BIENNALE 1984 – 2006 ..................................................... 403
BIBLIOGRAPHY ..................................................................................................................... 464
NOTES ....................................................................................................................................... 487
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LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1. Havana City in the World map........................................................................................ 6
Figure 2. Havana city map .............................................................................................................. 6
Figure 3. Inserted in Tricontinental. ICAIC (tenth anniversary), poster by Alfredo Rostgaard,
1969............................................................................................................................................... 20
Figure 4. 1st OSPAAL conference, Havana January 16, 1966...................................................... 20
Figure 5. Cover and content page for the Magazine Pensamiento Crítico (No. 42, Jun. 1970)... 22
Figure 6. Cover page and article page of magazine Pensamiento Crítico (No. 32, Jun. 1969).... 38
Figure 7. Organization of American States OAS (at its rear, El Museo de las Americas),
Washington D.C............................................................................................................................ 48
Figure 8. El Caimán Barbudo & Revolución y Cultura................................................................ 55
Figure 9. Cover of Déjame que te Cuente. Antología de la crítica en los 80s (2002).................. 57
Figure 10. Cover catalog (depicting the Cuban Pavilion), 1st Havana Biennale .......................... 67
Figure 11. Arnold Belkin, “Betrayal and Death of Zapata.” Portable Mural (detail), 1982......... 70
Figure 12. The Wifredo Lam Center. (left to right) Cathedral Plaza, external view, courtyard... 75
Figure 13. The Cuban Ministry of Culture structure .................................................................... 77
Figure 14. List of “attributions and functions” of the Wifredo Lam Center at its creation .......... 79
Figure 15. Wifredo Lam Center Structure .................................................................................... 82
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Figure 16. Wifredo Lam Center's curatorial team ....................................................................... 90
Figure 17. Centro Juán Marinello, Old Havana. Cuba ................................................................. 93
Figure 18. Gerardo Mosquera (August, 2006).............................................................................. 99
Figure 19. The DUPP collective in 1997 and 1998 .................................................................... 100
Figure 20. Logo for the 3rd Havana Biennale ............................................................................. 104
Figure 21. Paolo Gasparini, “El Cuerpo del Che” (fragment). 1994 .......................................... 107
Figure 22. Rogelio Polesello, "Trama diagonal -lupalente- prisma" (from the series iconabstraction), 1975........................................................................................................................ 109
Figure 23. The Lam Center featured in Bohemia, November 11, 1993. The Lam Center today 112
Figure 24. Division of research areas, Havana Biennale ............................................................ 113
Figure 25. Magda Elián González and Eugenio Valdés Figueroa. Bohemia, 1993.................... 118
Figure 26. Kcho, “La Regata.” Installation, 1994 (El País, Madrid, p.35, SPAIN, May 15, 1994)
..................................................................................................................................................... 120
Figure 27. Work sheet for the parallel events, 5th Havana Biennale (1994).............................. 122
Figure 28. Fernando Arias, “Seropositivo.” Installation, 1994................................................... 124
Figure 29. Llilian Llanes by Antonio Zaya in 1993.................................................................... 129
Figure 30. Opening of the Second Biennale in the Cuban Pavilion, 1986 ................................ 130
Figure 31. Cover of Nelson Herrera Ysla's book Coordinates of Contemporary Art, 2004 ...... 139
Figure 32. Covers of the magazine Albur (late 1980s - early 1990s) ......................................... 160
Figure 33. Covers magazine of Arte Cubano (2004-2006)......................................................... 161
Figure 34. Theoretical base......................................................................................................... 167
Figure 35. Two Basic Tasks: Production and Defense, 1973 ..................................................... 169
Figure 36. Gender participation in the Havana Biennale............................................................ 172
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Figure 37. Network of Institutional and individual nodes (1984-2007) ..................................... 179
Figure 38. Network of Institutional and individual nodes (with map) ....................................... 180
Figure 39. The Network of Institutional and individual nodes,.................................................. 181
Figure 40. Abel Prieto, Cuban Minister of Culture .................................................................... 183
Figure 41. Distribution of Art Biennials by World Areas .......................................................... 190
Figure 42. Current Biennials....................................................................................................... 193
Figure 43. Cultural Tourism in Havana ...................................................................................... 194
Figure 44. Rubén del Valle Lantarón.......................................................................................... 197
Figure 45. The Tenth Havana Biennale. An espectacle.............................................................. 199
Figure 46. The Havana Biennale, general information and symposia........................................ 207
Figure 47. The Havana Biennale, curatorial projects, topics, and participants .......................... 208
Figure 48. Total countries participating, 1984 - 2006 ................................................................ 209
Figure 49. Havana Biennale exhibition venues (map)................................................................ 210
Figure 50. Logo 1st Havana Biennale, media and visitors in the Cuban Pavilion, 1984 .......... 213
Figure 51. Omar Rayo, “Idea fija 1.” Intaglio, 1975 .................................................................. 214
Figure 52. Branca de Oliveira, “Agora e na hora de nossa morte amén.” Etching, 1982........... 215
Figure 53. Arnold Belkin, “Traición y muerte de Zapata.” Painting, 1981................................ 216
Figure 54. Art in America, December 1984................................................................................ 218
Figure 55. Participation by world areas in the first Havana Biennale, 1984 .............................. 222
Figure 56. Participation by countries in the first Havana Biennale ............................................ 223
Figure 57. The Caribbean ........................................................................................................... 226
Figure 58. Nja Mahdaoui, "Composition." Ink on paper, 1982.................................................. 227
Figure 59. Llilian Llanes (center) during one of the openings ................................................... 228
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Figure 60. Cover catalog 2nd Havana Biennale, 1986 ............................................................... 230
Figure 61. John Povey, “Segunda Bienal de la Habana” African Arts, Vol. 20, No. 3 (May,
1987) p. 83 .................................................................................................................................. 234
Figure 62. Participation world areas at the 2nd and 3rd Havana biennales................................ 236
Figure 63. Cover catalog 3rd Havana Biennale, 1989 ................................................................ 238
Figure 64. Juan Acha's chart, 3rd Havana Biennale. 1989 .......................................................... 242
Figure 65. Juan Acha's chart (my translation) ........................................................................... 243
Figure 66. Bolivar's wooden carvings (Venezuela). 1989 .......................................................... 249
Figure 67. Miguel Rio Blanco, “Monalisa.” 1974 and Sebastián Salgado, “Gold Mine Workers.”
1988............................................................................................................................................. 251
Figure 68. Juraci Dorea, “Earth Project.” Photo documentation, 1980 ...................................... 253
Figure 69. Eduardo Ramírez Villamizar, “Construcción en rojo” (1969) and “Caracol rojo”
(1978).......................................................................................................................................... 256
Figure 70. Cover of Art in America visualizing the new global order (July 1989) ................... 258
Figure 71. Cover of Third Text, No. 20 (autumn 1992).............................................................. 262
Figure 72. Eugenio Dittborn, Para vestir (aeropostal painting. No. 56) .................................... 270
Figure 73. Enrique Jaramillo, “Si no mueren no juego.” Installation, 1989-1991 ..................... 272
Figure 74. Participation world areas 4th and 5th Havana Biennale........................................... 272
Figure 75. Cover catalog 5th Havana Biennale, 1994 ................................................................ 275
Figure 76. Michael Z. Wise, "Tweaking the Beard of the Maximum Leader." New York Times
(Sunday) June 12, 1994, Section H, p. 35-36 ............................................................................. 281
Figure 77. Sandra Ramos, Untitled, 1994 (From the series Migraciones / Migrations)............. 285
Figure 78. Alexis Leyva (Kcho), “La Regata.” Installation, 1994 ............................................. 286
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Figure 79. Manuel Piña, From the series "Waters of the Waste Land", 1992-1994................... 286
Figure 80. Cover magazine Arte en Colombia (Art Nexus, No. 22 Oct. – Dec. 1994) on the 5th
Havana Biennale ......................................................................................................................... 288
Figure 81. Luis Camnitzer's article on the 5th Havana Biennale................................................ 291
Figure 82. Coverage 5th Havana Biennale (Germany)............................................................... 291
Figure 83. Atlántica and Heterogenésis' magazines on the 5th Biennale ................................... 293
Figure 84. Private (illegal) taxi drivers, common in Havana during the 1990s.......................... 295
Figure 85. Cover catalog, Sixth Havana Biennale, 1997............................................................ 296
Figure 86. Some photo installations in the Cabaña galleries, 1997 ............................................ 298
Figure 87. Visitors navigating the Sixth Biennale ...................................................................... 298
Figure 88. Venues 6th Havana Biennale..................................................................................... 299
Figure 89. The Plaza Vieja (three venues).................................................................................. 299
Figure 90. Kcho, “In My Mind.” Installation, 1997 ................................................................... 302
Figure 91. Las Yeguas del Apocalipsis (Francisco Casas y Pedro Lemebel). Video-performance,
1994............................................................................................................................................. 303
Figure 92. Tania Bruguera, "El peso de la culpa" (The Burden of Guilt). Performance, 1997 .. 304
Figure 93. Tokihiro Sato, from the series “Photo Respiration.” Large exposure photos, 1997 . 306
Figure 94. Romuald Hazoumé (Benin) & Owusu Ankomah (Ghana) installations, 1997 ......... 307
Figure 95. Moshekwa Langa, “The Permanent Unfixed Image.” In-situ installation, 1997 ...... 307
Figure 96. San Carlos de la Cabaña Fortress. General view...................................................... 309
Figure 97. The San Carlos de la Cabaña Fortress (1774), a military compound becomes a gallery
..................................................................................................................................................... 309
Figure 98. "Zona Vedada" exhibition. Entrance of los Carpinteros gallery. 1997 ..................... 310
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Figure 99. Eduardo Tokeshi, “El Cuarto del Rescate.” Installation, 1996 ................................. 313
Figure 100. Participation world areas Sixth and Seventh Havana Biennales ............................. 314
Figure 101. Cover catalog 7th Havana Biennale, 2000 .............................................................. 317
Figure 102. The Three Kings of the Morro Castle (1610), and Nadin Ospina's "El paseante." Soft
sculpture, 2000............................................................................................................................ 319
Figure 103. Havana's Cityscape.................................................................................................. 321
Figure 104. Los Carpinteros, “Transportable City.” Installation, 2000...................................... 324
Figure 105. William Kentridge, "Shadow Procession." Animation, 2000 ................................. 325
Figure 106. Galería DUPP, "1,2,3 probando." Installation, 2000............................................... 327
Figure 107. Esterio Segura, "Donde el Silencio Produce Tornados." Installation, 2000............ 328
Figure 108. Jennifer Allora & Guillermo Calzadilla, from the series “Seeing Otherwise." 2000
..................................................................................................................................................... 330
Figure 109. José Alejandro Restrepo, “Iconophilia” (from the series Iconomía 1998-2000). Video
installation, 2000......................................................................................................................... 331
Figure 110. Vicenta Borja's house, a place for alternative art .................................................... 334
Figure 111. Olu Oguibe, “Women of Substance. A Canon in Progress,” Installation, 2000 ..... 336
Figure 112. Cover catalog 8th Havana Biennale, 2003 .............................................................. 339
Figure 113. Martin Sastre, "The Iberoamerican Legend." Video, 2002 ..................................... 342
Figure 114. Mauricio Dias & Walter Riedweg, "Devotionalia." Installation, 1995-2003.......... 342
Figure 115. Otobong Nkanga, “Sustain Suture.” Performance - installation, 2003 ................... 343
Figure 116. Ivan Capote, “Dyslexia.” Mechanical sculpture, 2003............................................ 344
Figure 117. Tania Brugera, "Autobiography." Installation, sound track, and publication, 2003 345
Figure 118. RAIN in the Cuban pavilion (Vedado).................................................................... 346
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Figure 119. Departamento de Intervenciones Públicas DIP, “30 days of intervention.” Brochure,
2003............................................................................................................................................. 348
Figure 120. Nelson Ramirez & Liudmila Velazco, “Absolut Revolution.” Installation, 2003 .. 349
Figure 121. Roi Vara (Finland), "Espiral." Performance in the Cuban Pavilion, 2003.............. 351
Figure 122. Wilfredo Prieto, “Apolítico.” Installation, 2003 ..................................................... 352
Figure 123. Kaarina Kaikkonen, "Way." Installation, 2000- 2003............................................. 353
Figure 124. Navjot Altaf, "Between Memory and History." Video, sound, installation. 2001 2003............................................................................................................................................. 354
Figure 125. Alejandro Díaz, "I Cuba." Installation, 2003........................................................... 355
Figure 126. Propaganda war in the Havana's Malecon............................................................... 359
Figure 127. Cover catalog 9th Havana Biennale, 2006 .............................................................. 361
Figure 128. Agua-Waser. Collective project in Mexico City (2003). Model and map, 2006 .... 362
Figure 129. Alvaro Ricardo Herrera, “Mecánico de Bicicletas.” Participatory Project, 2006. .. 363
Figure 130. Berlin Beam Boys and Cubabrasil, Urban Projections. 2006. ................................ 364
Figure 131. Black Hole Factory, “Taking Walls.” 2006............................................................. 364
Figure 132. OMNI-Zona Franca, series of actions and screenings in Alamar. 2006 ................. 366
Figure 133. Margarita Pineda, “Mental Maps.” Participatory project, 2006.............................. 367
Figure 134. René Francisco Rodríguez, “La Casa de Rosa” & “El Patio de Nin." Videoprojection at Romerillo’s neighborhood, 2006 ........................................................................... 369
Figure 135. Eduardo Srur, “Attack.” Action-documentation, 2004-6........................................ 370
Figure 136. Michel Najjar, "Netropolis" (Shanghai, Tokio, Berlin). Composite image, 2006 .. 371
Figure 137. Wilfredo Prieto, "Grease, Soap, Banana." Minimal installation, 2006 ................... 375
Figure 138. Roberto Stephenson, Untitled. Digital print, 2006. ................................................. 377
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Figure 139. The North Front Street Project (collective). Photos by Richard Holder, Installation,
2006............................................................................................................................................. 377
Figure 140. Alejandro González, "1:47 a.m., 25 de junio del 2005, Vedado", etc. Lambda print,
2005-06 ....................................................................................................................................... 377
Figure 141. Oscar Bonilla, "Puntos de Fuga." Photographs, 2006 ............................................. 378
Figure 142. Fashion workshops and related events in the Cuban Pavilion ................................ 381
Figure 143. Participation by World areas Havana Biennale 1997 – 2006.................................. 382
Figure 144. Pascale Marthine Tayou (Cameroon). In-situ installations, 6th and 9th Havana
Biennale, 1997 - 2006 ................................................................................................................. 387
Figure 145. Las Cartujas convent, site for the BIACS2 (Seville, Spain). Discussion about the
biennial in 2006 (Enwezor at the center of the table) ................................................................. 391
Figure 146. March 30th, 2009. Center Wifredo Lam, Performance by Tania Brugera, from her
series "El susurro de Tatlin". (Bottom: Rachel Weiss and Gerardo Mosquera)......................... 394
Figure 147. Malecon in Havana City.......................................................................................... 396
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PREFACE
When I traveled to Cuba for the first time I realized that an alternative culture was possible. I
briefly experienced the burdens of el periódo especial, and at the same time I saw the
determination of the people of Cuba. I am grateful for that experience because it showed me that
with few resources it is possible to do great things. After the years, I have been traveling to Cuba
and witnessing the changes, from the alucinogenous slenderness of eating rice and beans of the
Habaneros, who riding their Chinese bikes moved across the city, to the rhythm of the walk of
the volatile jineteras, the secrecy of a paladar where I enjoyed a full meal (in times of shortage),
to the extravagance of tourist culture where hotels feed tourist like pigs and plazas are full of
stereotypical Caribbean subjects, and objects, for the sake of travelers and the state that fills its
mouth saying that in Cuba nothing happens. But beyond that, I am grateful to the group that have
worked for years (against all storms and droughts) to keep the Biennale alive. Whenever they
are, in their research trips, in the exhibition venues, in classrooms, restaurants, forums, or as new
exiles, they take pride in saying that they are part of the Biennale. For offering support, but more
important a smile and their time and knowledge every time I saw them to, Ibis, Hilda, Margarita,
Nelson, José Manuel, and Dannys I am grateful. Magali Espinoza and Llilian Llanes had become
supporters of our efforts in Colombia to create ties and networks of work and solidarity, to them
and to Ruben del Valle for being supportive and graceful during my visits to the Island, thanks.
My good Cuban-American-Mexican intellectual and artist friend Raúl Ferrera Balanquet has also
xvii
informed me, from a marielito (an exile of the 1980s) point of view the insights of a culture that
looked so promising in the 1960s and how during the 1970s could reproduce the worst of a
totalitarian rule in a tropical island. To the Cuban and Caribbean people, my gratitude.
I am indebted to the work of scholars whose interests resides in Cuban art and third world
art, in especial I am thankful to Luis Camnitzer for his energy and openness for sharing his
thoughts and insightful comments about the Biennale; to Rachel Weiss for her passion and
sustained work to promote (from a critical stand) the virtues and failures of the enterprise; to the
editorial team of Universes of Universe for their restless work informing about the visual arts
outside the mainstream (now part of it); to Gerardo Mosquera for his clarity, honesty, and
impressive capacity of looking at art and artists as agent(s) of history.
For his patience and immeasurable help and assistance in the conception, writing and
editing of this text I thank Terry Smith, advisor and friend in trips around the world of art. To
Barbara McCloskey, Hermann Herlinghaus, and Okwui Enwezor my gratitude for showing me
ways to think outside the boundaries, to discover what was behind the apparent, and to reaffirm
my convictions as to the social, aesthetic, and political dimension of our work. On the same list I
have to name John Beverly, Shalini Puri, Gissepina Mechia, and Elizabeth Monasterios for their
constant support in my side adventures and work during the years in Pittsburgh. To John
Frecione (and the people at CLAS) for their support and kindness towards my thoughts and
actions and to Martha Mantilla an accomplice in the communication journeys through the
Americas and the local level my appreciation.
For her endless optimism, support, and love; for being the light out of the tunnel, the air
in the cave, and the guide in the journey; for her unrestricted compassion and sharp intelligence,
I am grateful and madly in love to my companion and wife, Dalia Patino Echeverri.
xviii
INTRODUCTION
“The Havana Biennale is a collective curatorial project in which it is difficult to subtract ourselves from the context
where we operate locally and globally…We are neither preoccupied with the issues that are in fashion in Europe, Japan, or the
United States, nor privilege the practice of installation, post-conceptual, or minimal art in their many variations.
We are interested in searching for ways to give more public accessibility and more clarity in the purpose of an
exhibition, and to bestow an open reflection over our past and present, as ways to counteract the illness that our memory and
history comprise. We want to be part of the contemporary intellectual space, to locate ourselves in the universe of artistic
practice, and join the venture of others who are contributing to the understanding of what we are.”
Nelson Herrera Ysla 1
“Cultural Maps, Networks, and Flows” explores the history, structure, methods, and
practices of the group of critics, curators, and artists, who develop the Havana Biennale (19832008). The Biennale is one of a group of cultural mega-events that has projected Cuba’s interest
in being at the center of world affairs. The purpose is to explore the debates taking place around
the issue of alternative cosmopolitan modernisms prior to and after the Second World War in the
South (Latin America and Cuba in particular), to answer the question of whether these debates
and practices have contributed to a redefinition of the network of “global art” today.
This work is not about contemporary Cuban Art, which several scholars have addressed
in their research and discussions over the past decade. For example, on the international front,
the ground breaking work of Luis Camnitzer brought attention to Cuban artists and materialized
the utopian island in the book New Art of Cuba (1994). The work of Kevin Power and Rachel
Weiss, among others, through their reporting on the Havana Biennale and new Cuban art, is
highly regarded also as relevant and insightful. 2 New anthologies of writings coming from Cuba
have gained momentum recently. 3
Despite these scholarly works, there has not been a study that explores the contextual,
philosophical, and historical issues surrounding the creation and development of the Havana
Biennale, its functioning and impact in global terms. This work addresses the methodological
approach of the Havana Biennale towards the larger picture of “global art,” its interaction with
xix
the art world, and its discussions on artistic and cultural subjectivity in the Third World. It is also
a work on the possibilities of cultural policy in the Third World; as Angela McRobbie argues,
“Cultural policy is the missing agenda of cultural studies” given that it offers a program for
social change. 4 It seeks to highlight an event that has never received the recognition it deserves
from main stream history, major art publications, and the art media. Although there have been
some reports in the major art magazines, they have been intermittent and superficial when
compared to the coverage of other art Biennials closer to their geo-political and economic
interests. 5 For example, in recent discussions of the global significance of art events in 1989,
Havana is not mentioned, despite the fact that it had proportionately more artists coming from
elsewhere (250 from 54 countries) than any other event at the time, even more, comparatively,
than much discussed Magiciens de la Terre (100 artists from 50 Countries.) 6
This work is an initial exploration that attempts to fill that gap. More broadly, it seeks to
promote and make visible what is (was) called Third World Art. However, this is not a fully
comparative study; it does not explore how other events function or how international biennials
and world art exhibitions came into being. It situates Havana within a timeframe in which a
number of international art biennials have emerged and takes into account the fact that many of
these events have reacted to particular historical, political, cultural, and economic agendas. Most
art biennials respond to the national question as it relates to their specific international and global
interests. They try to position local production and to promote local and regional (as well as
international) cultural markets. The official, political, and economic dimensions of these events
are unquestionable, and must be acknowledged.
As suggested by Stuart Cunningham, “many people trained in cultural studies would see
their primary role as being critical of the dominant political, economic and social order. When
xx
cultural theorists do turn to questions of policy, our command metaphors of resistance and
opposition predispose us to view the policy making process as inevitably compromised,
incomplete and inadequate.” 7 This work follows George Yudice’s assertion of finding a “Third
Way;” this work attempts to sidestep the relationship of art to state and market domination. 8
The Havana Biennale uses the international circuit of exhibitions model, heir of the
model of the 19th century World Exhibition, and hopes to be part of the expanded and
fragmented (postmodern and postcolonial) main-stream artworld that looks at contemporary art
as a planetary phenomena. It has become a place of negotiation between disputing stylistic and
theoretical adversaries. Individual artists, as well as collective and group efforts, are visible in
the ephemera of its mise en scène and, as any prototypical modern place; it is a site of conflict, a
contact-zone.
This work is organized in three parts and six chapters, as follows.
Chapters 1 and 2 explore the Cuban historical experience of producing a singular cultural
policy. By the early 20th century, Cuba went from being a Spanish colony to becoming a U.S.controlled territory. The 1898 independence campaign was a fiasco and the call for an
independent and proud mestizo nation, embodied in José Marti’s “Nuestra America,” was
postponed for more than half a century. What the Cuban revolution of 1959 brought to Cuba was
not only the possibility of being truly independent but also the possibility of harvesting the
intellectual and cultural seeds planted by the anti-imperialist feelings of the previous two
generations. For a region that faced colonization, internal-colonization, and the neocolonialism
fostered by the Creole-elites that assumed the foundation of the new nation as a private
enterprise, the Cuban Revolution was a utopian dream come true.
xxi
However, for Cuba, independence did not come easily. Alliances formed between the
elite exiles and some factions of the U.S. government produced a counter-revolution that obliged
the new nation to enlist itself within the tutelage of the Second World. The tiny island ended up
playing a key role in the Cold War and placed Cuba within the scope of area studies, born out of
the communist threat in the West. Western scholars, from a post-Marxist perspective, in what
Patrick Diggins calls the “nihilistic ego-face of the new left,” have been caught up in nostalgic
interpretations. 9 Recently, even film makers such as Oliver Stone had been interested again in
the figure of Fidel Castro. 10 The cultural policy founded on Castro’s 1961 speech (Palabras a los
intelectuales / A Word to the Intellectuals) transformed the cultural production of the Island, and
the work of Armando Hart Dávalos became fundamental to the advance of a cultural system in
Cuba. By 1976, a new Cuban constitution created the current cultural system and a Ministry of
Culture arose to promote, guide, and control the multiple manifestations of the arts and culture in
the island nation (with Hart Dávalos as head). Cuba, as a Western nation had the firm purpose of
being part of the concert of nations that promoted Western values as universal (but also as
ideology). 11 Paradoxically, today a shallow understanding of culture and tourism are two of the
axes that support the nation after the fall of the Soviets.
Cuba’s double character, that of being a port and a platform from which many ideas have
been launched after being appropriated, digested, reshaped, and endorsed by its intellectuals,
scientists, and artists, has made of Cuba a quintessential place for understanding postmodernism
and post-colonialism in Latin America. Its Caribbean position, within the flows of the white and
black Atlantic, had produced a vastness of cultural and artistic transformations where trade and
cultural exchange exists. 12 This double condition was more clearly evident during the Revolution
when Cuba became the spiritual and, in some cases, the material leader for other radical
xxii
movements in the region (in Latin America and also in Africa and South East Asia), giving the
Cubans the identity of being pioneers. This “big brother” syndrome is clearly evident in Cuba’s
participation in the early stages of the Bandung Conference and the consecutive actions taken by
the “non-aligned” nations to establish a Third World consciousness and culture that could
participate throughout institutions, such as the United Nations, in the international arena. Cuban
scholars, writers, and artists have been trained and exposed to a harsh but also nurturing
environment that has made them, to a degree, the meta-intellectuals of the Third World. At the
same time, however, the influence of Soviet ideologies and practices was considerable. 13 Such a
double standard of being independent and non-aligned while at the same time being dependant
on a new imperial force shows also the duality and contradictory nature of the Revolutionary
regime and its institutions. 14 The visual arts were also caught up in such waters; they shaped the
New Cuban art generation of the 1980s. The Havana Biennale was born out this conundrum.
Today, Cuban identity is still trapped in a double standard, and also has to deal with the
changing environment of the global order (or disorder). Cubans on the island, and in the
Diaspora, work to solve the puzzle. 15
Chapters 3 and 4 (part two) of this work, present the voices of the Wifredo Lam Center
specialists and some Havana Biennale collaborators, in order to study the emergence of the
Cuban curator as agent in the global art circuit. 16 In a form of a chronotope the text breaks the
story and introduces the voices of agents involved in the development of the Biennale. It
explores how they locate and map local, regional, and international production for the Biennale,
and their conception of Third World Art, through their practice and the conditions that made
their work possible. The critical and theoretical production of these agents is related to the
creative environment of other individuals and groups that they discover through research trips, or
xxiii
that arise during the exchange of ideas that take place in the Biennale itself. In the case of
Havana, much attention has been paid to Cuban artists, and to try to map a country that adjusts
itself to match the changing global conditions through the work of individual artists. Most of the
intellectual production in reports, notes, and essays presents a singular view of a global
phenomenon. While criticism coming from the outside (mostly the Anglo Press) are based on
suspicions of corruption and mismanagement by the official institutions that, like the Wifredo
Lam Center (under the governance of the Ministry of Culture), organize these events. On the
other hand, the local press is mostly informative and celebratory. 17
Chapter 4 evaluates the Lam Center and the Havana Biennale performance in factual
terms, and looks at the structure behind the spectacle that supports it. This task is particularly
challenging since the Biennale is part of a larger cultural and political project embedded in the
revolutionary ideals that support modern Cuba. In addition, it became part of the larger circuit of
what defined the contemporary in artistic production in the aftermath of the postmodern debate.
Today, the Havana Biennial is (still) a singular event in the midst of dozens like it. As a megaevent, it does not, however, reflect to the structure of others. With limited resources, it has been
organized by a small group of people who are the product of the first generation of the Cuban
revolution. What is central about its role in shaping what we know as contemporary art today is
the fact that they have recognized the vacuum with respect to the artistic production of the socalled “Third Word” at a moment in time at which in the centers of the art world, New York and
Paris, the same debate was taking place. 18
Part three resumes the historical approach. Chapter 5 reviews the nine editions of the
Havana Biennale, presenting the most representative debates, exhibitions, and developments.
xxiv
Founded in late 1983, the Center –named after Wifredo Lam – established a vision of an
art event. The first edition of the Biennale, organized by the office of Visual Arts and Design of
the Ministry of Culture in 1984, brought close to 800 artists from 37 countries, mostly from Latin
America, but also from Eastern Europe, the Caribbean, the U.S., and Asia. The Biennale
responded to the necessity of establishing a space of encounter and celebration of, first, Latin
American art, to open later the space for the Third World. It followed the model of cultural
institutions such as Casa de las Americas and the ICAIC (Cuban Institute for the Industry of
Cinematographic Arts), that had been successful since the early 1960s. The theoretical event was
based on a revision of the scholarly work around the figure of Wifredo Lam, bringing panelists
from Latin America, Europe, and the United States. That year, the Venice Biennale, the Biennial
of São Paulo, and the controversial Primitivism in 20th Century Art: Affinity of the Tribal and the
Modern exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, also took place.
With the second Havana Biennale in 1986, the fully operational Lam Center took over
the event and invited more than 700 artists from 54 countries. Opening up a space of visibility
for the art produced in the South and calling for special attention to the Caribbean the Biennale
promoted the region’s intellectual and artistic achievements. The solo exhibitions, curated shows,
theoretical events, workshops, and forums organized around the Biennale set a tone for future
editions. Cuba was also facing the inevitable collapse of the Second World and the financial
crisis was envisaged by the organization. The Lam Center went on to establish a path illustrated
in Gerardo Mosquera’s article “El Tercer Mundo hará la cultura occidental” (The Third World
will Make Western Culture) published in the Magazine Cultura en Revolution in a special
number for the 1986 Biennale. 19
xxv
From that point on, the Havana Biennale would focus not only on constituting itself as a
place of encounter, a port, bringing hundreds of artists and scholars, but also as a platform from
which a third way of visual experience (and thinking) would be possible. This platform was one
that challenged the two poles of intellectual production at the time, and introduced a series of
debates underlining what contemporary should be, or at least what it could do to allow others to
be recognized by the institutional system. Nonetheless, Havana has always been contradictory.
At first, the Biennale tried to survey the South in a sort of self-archaeology, very much in the
fashion of the West. Later on, it understood that surveys imply the creation of new taxonomies,
not exempt of hierarchies, a phantom which they have been fighting ever since. This, perhaps,
makes clear the fact that Cuba is not free from its colonial past, it is in an unfinished process of
decolonization and adjusting to the ever changing conditions.
The question that emerged was: How were the theses on modernity, modernism,
postmodernity, postmodernism, and the postcolonial to be used by Third World artists and
intellectuals in the constitution of a new space of practices and visibility?
During the third Biennale, held in 1989, and in the context of the fall of the Berlin Wall
and the upcoming global turn in the economic and political model, Havana addressed the topic of
“Tradition versus Contemporaneity.” The Biennale sparked many of the debates of the moment
in the art world. Cuban curator and co-founder of the Biennale, Gerardo Mosquera took a leading
role in the international discussions on anthropology and otherness in the art world, while Nelson
Herrera (also co-founder) pushed for the inclusion of architecture and popular arts in a more
horizontal view of art. Both were supported by Llilian Llanes (director of the Lam Center and the
Biennale for ten years) who, from a more orthodox view, understood the intensity of the
positions that the art world was facing at the time, and wanted to produce an event that
xxvi
contributed to the function of art in society. With the decline of the formalist agenda and during a
post-conceptual turn towards relational and site-specific aesthetics, the materialization of the
installation as accepted art-form occurred; photography and performance art became highly
relevant expressions for contemporary art production.
The year 1989 is also a time marker: the fall of the Soviet empire and the emergence of
what was came to be called “globalization.” It is also when the concept of the curator-as-explorer
emerged in the contemporary art world, registering what James Clifford had observed and Hal
Foster was soon to label as the “artist-as-ethnographer” paradigm. 20 Havana’s initial intuition
would become a rule, a path, and later a formula applied by the nascent curatorial team (another
of the innovations of the Havana Biennale). The third Biennale worked around this conceptual
and political problem to select the artists in the exhibitions and the theoretical events parallel to
it. It countered with artists from fifty four countries and two academic debates addressing not
only the visual arts but also architecture and environment in the Third World.
The 1990s were for many members of the now globalized world a moment of triumph
and celebration; for many others, mostly in the outskirts of the global circuit of mega cities, and
for most of the so-called Third Word (now renamed the Global South), it was the arrival of a
new menace: economic and cultural globalization. For Cuba it was the time of the periódo
especial (especial period) in which the economy collapsed, producing an energy, food, and
public services crisis. It was the decade of the balseros; hundreds of thousands fled the famine
and the economic catastrophe (paralleling the flocks of people moving East-West and NorthSouth for similar of diverse reasons). Yet the island survived, and the Havana Biennale has
endured, reinventing itself continuously.
xxvii
The theses (on modernity, postmodernity, and the postcolonial) were finally addressed
directly in 1991, applying the concept of syncretism. 21 It was used to stress Western features that
were at the same time integrated by the communities of the new world under colonial policies.
Here we find the real root of the Havana Biennale, one that recognizes its polysemic and mimetic
character, but, always, under circumstances of uneven power relations. That was clear in the
fourth edition when organized under the topic “The Challenge to Colonialism”. If Magiciens de
la Terre responded as an antithesis of the L’Exposition Coloniale of 1931, the 1991 Havana
Biennale responded to the 1989 French exhibition. The participation of countries from Africa
and the Middle East (and Asia) increased, and cultural critics from those regions also actively
participated. In recognizing a new trend of colonial power, Havana celebrated the five hundred
years of Columbus’ arrival to the Americas. However, the first Gulf War shadowed the events of
the 500th anniversary. In Havana severe criticism of Magiciens de la Terre as occidentalist on the
part of panelists in the Biennale was echoed in the reports published in magazines around the
globe. 22 Since then Havana has become a peregrination site to see the upcoming of Third World
Art and its agents.
The Biennale was aware of the problems inherited in establishing merely ethnographic
approaches; they emulated the work of some Brazilian anthropologists and by adopting a noncolonialist approach, one that went beyond the academic (institutional) to reach an ethnic-real
base for working with cultural manifestations. 23 Ethnologists emerging from candomblë are
called “observant participants.” The term, which inverts the classical concept of critical distance
and, instead, produces a sense of proximity, became part of the Havana work model. 24
After Mosquera’s departure in 1991, the observant-participant approach was taken to the
extreme by the curatorial team, notably in 1994. The fifth Havana Biennale was based on an
xxviii
open-ended series of conceptual cores proposed by the young team of curators resulting from
research journeys and a scholarly debate that took place during the previous years. The
exhibition “Art, Society, and Reflection” consisted of five curatorial projects addressing: power
and marginalization, migration, hybridization, the environment, and the individual. In the middle
of the worst economic crisis Cuba had faced, the Biennale put a show of more than 300 artists
from 54 countries that for the first time came from all over the world, making the Biennale an
event of real global scope. The definition of Third World Art was at stake and the realignment of
the social conditions during globalization was recognized by the curators and participants in the
event. The fifth Havana Biennale also opened up the event to a real international audience;
tourism followed the new economic policies established by the Cuban government in 1994 to
counterbalance the burdens of the special period and the restrictions of the economic embargo,
and made of Havana one of the favorite destinations for increasing numbers of cultural tourists
coming from the globalized world. 25
Simultaneously, 1994 marks the time of the creation of many of the new international
biennials that started populating the network of cosmopolitan cities in the 1990s.
The sixth (1997) and seventh (2000) editions were developed under the same structure.
The possibility of having international sponsorship, and participation of nonprofit global
agencies (the Ludwig Forum, UNESCO which offered an international prize in 1997, and the
Prince Claus Fund, among others) motivated the organization to include artists from the
developed world, a fact that has been openly criticized in the South. The Lam Center expressed
its conviction that in times of globalization the Third World inhabits in the First one – and viceversa. Nonetheless, the Biennale has been struggling to cope with the new self-financing model,
which has made its schedule and its selection process more irregular. “The Individual and
xxix
Memory,” in 1997, functioned as theme producing a nostalgic tour de force across the unfinished
project of modernity at the end of the century.
With a new director (after the legendary Llilian Llanes resigned in 1999), the 2000
Biennale worked under the theme of communication, “Closer to Each Other.” Increasing
production problems rendered the Biennale not as compelling when compared to the many hightech and well financed exhibitions happening around the globe. Nonetheless, the high profile of
Cuban art on the market, a parallel exhibition devoted to the renaissance of cities (starting with
Havana’s own renovation project), and the return of a solid international theoretical event, were
helpful in sustaining the event.
The new century has brought new challenges to the organization. The burgeoning bi- and
tri-ennial landscape took away the past fascination with Havana’s exceptionality. The aftermath
of 9-11 has also affected Cuba’s relationship with the U.S. and the European Union. The
inclusion of Cuba in the “axis of evil” list by the Bush administration in the U.S., and some of
the measures taken by the Cuban government, lead to a withdrawal of economic support by
international agencies, making the financial burden even more pressing. The eighth Havana
Biennale (“Art Together with Life,” 2003), and the ninth edition (“Dynamics of Urban Culture,”
2006) were affected by such problems. 26 Nonetheless, the Wifredo Lam Center has continued its
efforts in promoting the work of artists living in dire conditions and has renewed the theoretical
discussions in well organized events called forums, which take place in Havana at each
Biennale. 27 The tenth edition celebrated twenty-five years of the Biennale and intended to reengage the event to its spiritual core and origin; art, politics, and the South.
The conclusion of this dissertation explores how today the inclusion of the arts coming
from the margins of the art world (in geographical, theoretical, and artistic terms) is by no means
xxx
fundamental to the understanding of the art of the 21st century. After Documenta11 of 2002,
which recognized the artistic production of the “postcolonial constellation” (in words of Okwui
Enwezor), some critics have argued that there is little that Havana can do for the art of the socalled Global South. 28 Nonetheless, the global reach of Documenta cannot be compared with the
humble, but nevertheless extraordinary effort made by Havana over the decades since 1984.
The 3,300 visual artists (and more than ten thousand art works), from more than eighty
countries (not including the especial projects, community-based workshops, artistic laboratories,
forums, etc.) who have participated in the ten editions of the Havana Biennale are the best
evidence of its incommensurability. The discussions and the always stimulating (and critical)
debates taking place in Havana attest to its singularity, and remind us of the distortions and
narrow views we, as outsiders, have of the world. Havana is still a work in progress, as the
Cuban nation is (with inevitable echoes in today’s Latin American culture and politics), not a
model for proven truths but for creating an open field for knowledge and a collective form of
experience.
xxxi
PART ONE
1
1.0
ANOTHER STORY
“I'm a writer obsessed with remembering, with remembering the past of America above all and above all that of Latin America,
intimate land condemned to amnesia.” Eduardo Galeano
This chapter summarizes the contextual, social, historical, and artistic environment in
Havana city, from 1959 -1984, prior to the creation of the Havana Biennale. It focuses on how
the revolutionary government developed a set of cultural policies that shaped artistic production
thus consolidating an art system by the 1980s. It addresses the work of Cold War Cuban
intellectuals that was at the base of the new internationalism of Cuba, the crisis they faced, and
the emergence of a new culture imperative during the late 1970s and 1980s. The chapter
explores, also, some of the theories on Third-Worldism produced during this period, especially
those that introduce notions on alternative histories. A general history chart and a timeline of
major events related to the cultural dimension of Cuba can be found in the appendix.
1.1
THE HAVANA CONNECTION
Before the revolution Cuba was a playground for wealthy European and American
travelers in search of tropical luxury and glamour. In part because of its geographical and
historical position the island had created a unique visual style that combined elements of
European art nouveau, art deco, and modernism, then later on Las Vegas style kitsch, with a
distinctly Caribbean sensibility. On gaining its independence from Spain in 1898, Cuba emerged
out of the Spanish-American War, as a vast business opportunity for American entrepreneurs.
2
The U.S. occupation lasted only few years (1899-1902), and nominal independence was granted
on May 20, 1902. However, Cuba remained under American influence for the first half of the
20th century. It became a haven for revelers avoiding U.S. prohibitions against alcohol,
horseback racing, gambling, boxing, etc; Cuba was a free port, and personified the opportunity
for uncensored leisure. By the second decade of the twentieth century tourism had became one of
the main industries (after tobacco and sugar) on the island. The visual imagery created for such
purposes was characterized by a Caribbean sensibility: “tropical colors, jovial patterns, and other
graphic traits…as art deco. This international decorative style of the 1920 and 1930s was typified
by sunburst, pastel hues, and stark geometry.” 29 The presence of Cuba not only in advertisements
for tourism (that paradoxically used the motto “Free Cuba”), but also from the 1930s in movies,
music, and literature made Cuba look as interesting as it was exotic. A large bourgeoisie with ties
to Europe and the U.S. emerged. Jazz bars in Havana had the same image as the Jazz bars in
New York, book shops and libraries were full of English bestsellers, and cafes became
multilingual. These years brought to Cuba the most famous members of the new popular culture
(film makers, writers, musicians, film stars, and politicians) in search of luxury vacations and
sometimes work. Their presence was inscribed in the architecture of hotels and mansions around
the new districts of Havana and Varadero. 30 During the 1940s and 1950s Havana was visited by
a number of architects, for instance Harrison & Abramowitz, Richard Neutra, Mies van der
Rohe, Walter Gropius, Joseph Albers, Welton Beckett, José Luis Sert, and Paul Lester Winer.
They gave lectures and contributed to some urban and architectural projects in the city, for
example, the American Embassy (Harrison & Abramowitz, 1952), the Bacardí Building in
Santiago de Cuba (Mies van der Rohe, 1957), The Schulthess House (Richard Neutra, 1958), and
the Plan Director de la Habana (Sert, Wiener, and Schulz, 1955-58). 31 By the late 1940s the
3
increasing use of English in everyday life produced a considerable reaction not only among
academics, writers, and scholars. Desires for a distinctive Cuban identity gathered strength
among the population. Combined with increasing opposition to the country’s president,
Fulgencio Batista, whose corrupt regime was strongly supported by the United States, Cubans set
out on a mission of political and cultural transformation that would bring the radical
Cubanization of the island after the revolution. It would transform everyday life and establish a
new cultural dynamic.
In an interview conducted in Havana on April 2006, Nelson Herrera Ysla (architect,
curator and art critic) comments on the post-revolutionary years in the city:
Havana was a magnificent place, it felt like the center of the world during those years, the
1960s. Here we had all the progressive ideas, all the left parties together. The humanists and
more advanced intellectuals visited Havana. The city became a meeting point. Besides, it
brought together the spirit of the internationalism of the 1950s with the utopian flavor of the
recent revolution. We lived in that limbo between an oppressive (but luxurious) past and a
future that looked extraordinary to the peoples of the South; besides, a radical Tercermundismo
(Third-worldism) infected everything. A rare mix between Celia Cruz, Roland Barthes, H.M.
Enzensberger, Frantz Fanon, and Che Guevara flowed in the air… During those years José
Lezama Lima, Alejo Carpentier, Wifredo Lam, and Fernando Ortíz were alive. In fact, most of
the Cuban intelligentsia, artists, writers, play writers, film makers, were alive and producing.
People like Alejo Carpentier used to talk with such wisdom about anything, Cuban music,
architecture, etc., that is unforgettable. With exception of some such as Wifredo Lam who was
living in Paris, all of them were in Cuba. At the same time here existed some sort of
intellectual darkness in some spheres of Cuban culture; in drama José Triana and Virgilio
Piñera; and Cabrera Infante’s film notes and critiques, and indeed his book Tres Tristes Tigres
that became a movie in 1968 produced by Raúl Ruíz. The whole city was impregnated with
this aroma; you were able to find those people in any corner… Later the emergence of the
Nueva Trova Cubana and the Nuevo Cine Latinoamericano brought new rhythms, lyrics, and
images to the revolutionary imaginary for the entire continent. Films such as Memorias del
Subdesarrollo (Tomas Gutierrez Alea, 1968), Lucia (Humberto Solas, 1968) La Primera carga
del Machete (Manuel Octavio Gómez, 1969) emphasized this. The world as a whole was
presented to us through the now famous documentaries of Santiago Álvarez and the TV news
reels produced by the ICAIC that established an ethical and aesthetic relationship with the
world. 32
Several international events took place after the consolidation of the Republic. In 1963
the 7th Congress of the International Union of Architects brought the most important architects
4
to the city. The debates were about the revalidation of the international style (since the topic was
Architecture in Underdeveloped Countries), and raised a special interest in Japanese “brutalism”.
With the advent of the revolution, the jet-set of Cuban architects had left the country and
the mode of commissioning of architectural business had changed. A new generation of
architects was born out of this: Fernando Salinas, Raúl González Romero, Juan Tosca, Ricardo
Porro, Andrés Garrudo, Antonio Quintana, Mario Girona, and Hugo Dacosta, Vicente Lanz,
among others, initiated a new constructive style. In 1963 Cuba received, for the very first time,
important economic support by the Soviet Union because of hurricane Flora, which had
devastated several towns in the Western provinces.
33
The Soviets established a prefabrication
plant that was able to produce up to 1,700 house-units per year. It was installed in Santiago de
Cuba, becoming the first revolutionary urban complex following Soviet rules of servicepopulation; Distrito José Martí was built for seventy-two thousand people. 34 Fernando Salinas,
Enrique De Jongh, Julio Dean, Edmundo Azze, Orlando Cárdenas, and other Cuban architects
projected new uses, designs, and models out of the plant to fit the realities of the tropical climate.
Transparencies and sections were developed and informed in part by the International Style.
They become the signature of the new Cuban architecture, in part functioning against the
monumentality of the Soviet architecture brought and supported by Jruschov during the initial
years of the revolution. A symbolic piece of architecture made for the 7th Congress of the IUA
was the Cuban Pavilion (Juan Campos, 1962-3). It, and the later Copelia building, would become
the axis of the new cultural order in the City, changing the center from Habana Vieja to the
Vedado sector.
5
Figure 1. Havana City in the World map
Figure 2. Havana city map
6
The presence of people from many areas and disciplines made of Havana a port and
platform of interchange, a node in the network of cities entering the global era. The 1967 Mai
Salon in Havana organized by Wifredo Lam and the 1968 UNESCO International Congress of
Culture, among other events, were part of this international and cosmopolitan dimension of
Havana. Ysla comments:
In 1967 the Paris May Salon would be exhibited in the Cuban Pavilion in Vedado. It
was a weird thing to bring the entire exhibition more than 8.2000 kilometers away, a national
symbol of France -as the Salon was- to Havana. That represented a lot, not only for Cuban
artists but also for Cuban culture. In 1968 the International Congress of Culture took place in
Havana, it brought the most radical and progressive of the liberal and leftist thought to the city.
Those initial years, I believe, were fundamental. The diversity of positions coming from
different cultural sectors made us ‘citizens of the world’. It was like living in the center of the
universe. 35
The busy cultural agenda included the Festival on New Latin American Cinema that
started in late 1970s; the Latin American Theater festival that started in 1980; the Literary Fairs
and Meetings (that would be the predecessor to the Book Fairs of the 1990s); the Cultura and
Desarrollo Symposiums (heirs of the World Congress of Culture of 68), etc. Havana was by this
time an alternative center of cultural life working against the economic blockade established by
the US in 1962 as a result of the missile crisis. The Cuban Revolution was greatly admired in
some countries of the old world, in Latin America, Africa, and the Far East. In France for
example, the revolution was highly regarded. André Breton and later Jean Paul Sartre visited the
island (in the 1950s and 60s) and published their observations. Sartre wrote a long essay which
gave accounts of the changes taking place not only in urban, but also in rural, Cuba. Sartre was
by no means critical of what he saw, especially the prospect of the emergence of an authoritarian
regime. During his visit Sartre defined Castro's revolutionary government as a "direct and
concrete democracy. the revolutionary rulers converse directly with the people, thus establishing
a direct and permanent bond between the will of the great majority of the people and the
7
government minority ..." 36 During the 1960s important political, ideological, and intellectual
figures from Europe visited the Island, seeking a pact of support, a brotherhood broken when
Castro sealed the final alliance with the Soviet Union. By the 1980s, over 25% of the Cuban
Gross National Product came from the Soviet Union. 37 Nevertheless, the good relationship Cuba
maintained with the intellectual worlds of Latin America, Africa, and Asia produced a tricontinental world-view.
1.2
ON THIRD WORLD CULTURE
Before and after the Cuban Revolution, there was a larger debate taking place in terms of
the participation of the so-called “Third World” in global politics, economy and culture. 38 After
the revolution, Cuba was at the center of such debate because of its symbolic leadership in the
region and because its position in the Non-Align Movement (NAM) during the 1970s and 80s. If
some had lamented the failure of the NAM because its lack of regional cohesion after the first
and second Bandung conferences, Cuba became a center, a port, a place to rethink geopolitical
relationships at some distance from the conflicts of the Cold War. Under the leadership of Cuba,
the organization’s purpose, as stated in the Havana Declaration of 1979, was to ensure "the
national independence, sovereignty, territorial integrity and security of non-aligned countries in
their struggle against imperialism, colonialism, neo-colonialism, apartheid, Zionism, racism and
all forms of foreign aggression, occupation, domination, interference or hegemony as well as
against great power and bloc politics". 39 At that moment the NAM countries represented nearly
two-thirds of the United Nation’s members and comprised 55% of the world population. In 1979
Cuba, which had participated since the first non-aligned meeting in Belgrade (1961), fostered a
8
new impetus in the movement. 40 The island and Havana city in particular was at once center,
margin, harbor, and platform. The debates had implications in all levels; Cuban cultural policy
became an example for the Third World. However, it is important to note that the cultural debate
in Cuba has a long tradition; figures such as José Martí, Fernando Ortiz, Alejo Carpentier, José
Lezama-Lima, Nicolás Guillén, José Marinello, Antonio Benítez Rojo, the same Fidel Castro and
Che Guevara, as well as Wifredo Lam, among others, are part of it. The debates were translated
into institutions, plans, and programs, resulting in particular cultural and artistic practices. This
view would later inspire events such as the Havana Biennale.
At the time, there were a number of exiles living in Havana and Santiago de Cuba,
especially those arriving from Chile (after the 1973 coup), Argentina, Venezuela, and Brazil
(because their own political realities) as well as professors, industrial trainers, and some
dissidents from the Soviet block. They found shelter in Havana (in particular settling in the new
urban developments such as Distrito Alamar and Distrito José Martí). Tourism was banned as
elitist and imperialist and Havana became a port for intellectuals, political figures, artists, and
dissenting voices from the West. Nonetheless, it would return, the old infrastructure would be
renewed starting in late 1970s as part of a larger project on cultural tourism and later supported
by UNESCO’s decree naming Habana Vieja (Old Havana) on the list of world patrimony sites in
1982. During the 1990s (the so-called especial period) almost the entire Cuban economy would
be based on tourism again. These people would find in Cuba a place to think their territories in a
different way. The critical distance needed to see their conflicts in an open field of possibility
was in part what the island offered to them. For many, Cuba became their homes, for others just
a safe port to rest and establish new networks for action.
9
Young Cuban scholars were also departing and returning from the eastern block (in some
cases from Western Europe and the Middle East), after graduating from technical and humanistic
programs particularly in Moscow, Kiev, Warsaw, and Berlin (some others would travel to
Mexico to get degrees in Latin American issues). Aesthetician and critic Magali Espinoza
undertook a PhD in Marxist Aesthetics in Kiev in 1982. Other scholars like Orlando Suarez
Tajonea, head of the aesthetics department of the ISA, had studied in Moscow years before. “The
fact of being trained in such a tradition and at the same time being completely foreigners helped
us to look for the most heterodox and extreme sources. We used to read Ilyenkov and Kovni, as
well as western authors such as Derrida, and the poststructuralist who were marginalized in
Russia.” 41 The socio-cultural atmosphere and the political structure of the country generated a
series of institutions that revolutionized the way Cubans were educated (among them the system
of art schools). Many critics have argued that such a structure produced a new Cuban subject and
in extension the so-called, New Cuban Art. Margarita Sánchez Prieto, curator of the Lam Center,
remembers the role of the events organized by Casa de la Américas during the period in which
Lesbia Vent Dumois worked as the artistic director.
I remember not only the exhibitions but also the academic events and contests where
artists and critics of Latin America assisted. I meet Argentinean artists León Ferrari, Julio
Gamarra, Julio le Parc, among others. The award for photographic essays and graphics brought
to us people like Ecuadorian photographer Martín Chambí, Mexican Graciela Iturbide, and the
Brazilian members of the cinema novo. In addition Casa increased its art collection
exponentially during those years, giving us a great base of empirical and visual knowledge. 42
Former Minister of Culture of Cuba, Armando Hart Dávalos in late 1980s had argued
that.
We aspire to universality. The bankruptcy of the imperialist and bourgeoisie cultural
project is based on their ignorance. They tried to dominate the rest of the world, denying an
equal integration with the international cultural movement. With dreadful regional and
colonialist criterion it is not possible to represent the cultural being of the peoples of the
West… We are also, geographically and culturally, in the West. But we do not close our
10
borders, on the contrary. We fight our cultural battles on the principles that inspire Western
culture and on its aspirations and vocation of universality. 43
On the issue of universality, the early subjectivity of Third World thinking looked for an
inclusion of the particular histories or people into major narratives where to find niches to affirm
one’s participation in the modern world. Thomas McEvilley makes a reference to the
international art survey exhibitions that were popping up all over the Third World during those
years. He affirms:
Other shows are not merely non-Western geographically but take place within more
distinctly non-Western cultures. Several have begun quite recently--1984 was a pivotal year.
These exhibitions' inaccessibility to the vast majority of Western critics, and the truly daunting
difficulty of getting information about them in the West (some of the biennials I discuss here I
was unable to see, and I write on them from their catalogues, themselves hard to find), are part
of their story, and part of their paradox. 44
McEvilley recognizes that the institution of the international juried show may be a
Western phenomenon, “but the Third World biennials are sprouting with or without Western
attention; clearly they have audiences and cultural functions of their own, quite independently of
their resemblance to Western art practice.” On the other hand, McEvilley notes that many of
those exhibitions, although taking place in countries of the Non-Aligned axis, often were
committed to the project of becoming "modern," or Modernist in a classical sense.
The New Delhi Triennials, the Cairo Biennials, and the Bantu Biennales (usually held
in Libreville, Gabon), for example, largely eschew historical regional styles; there is little that
looks “Egyptian” or “Islamic” in the Cairo shows, little “Indian” in New Delhi. There is an
implication, rather, of a community of taste adjusted to Western tendencies of a couple of
generations ago, when the West's idea of internationalism was still founded on an assumption
of Modernist universals. 45
11
1.3
WRITING ANOTHER STORY
The Executive Committee of the Council of Ministers of 1983, according to the Decree
No. 113 of the same year, stipulated the following:
Because: Wifredo Lam is considered one of the greatest artists of the 20 century and
because he made art work of international projection and reach, endowed with the most
precious aesthetic value, as well as because it constitutes a plastic expression from the
deepest of our culture.
Because: It is convenient to create a Center that holds his name and that would
contribute to the appreciation, signification, and relevance of his legacy and work.
Because: The future Center has to be conceived as an institution in charge also of
organizing activities on the field of visual arts, in the national and international level, in order
to make relevant the value of what identifies in this sphere of the arts the peoples of Asia,
Africa, and Latin America. Finally, the center will help (in junction with the art system) the
development of artistic creation, as well as the aesthetic enjoyment for all strata of our
society.
Because: The Executive Committee of the Council of Ministers in use of its faculty
given by law, decree:
1. To create the Wifredo Lam Center, under the administration of the Ministry of
Culture.
2. The Center will have as attributions and functions:
a. To promote the study and promotion of Lam’s work as a universal expression of
contemporary art.
b. To promote internationally the art work of artists from Asia, Africa, and Latin
America, as well as of artists that struggle for cultural identity and that are related to
those territories.
c. To endorse international activities in the field of visual arts in order to develop and
establish cultural ties.
d. To facilitate the development of the visual arts in Cuba and to promote the
contemporary manifestations of Cuban contemporary artists of most significance.
e. To offer services of specialized information about contemporary art, artists, critics,
and researchers.
f. To enrich the cultural patrimony of the country through the creation of a permanent
collection of visual arts and the systematic exchange of artistic and cultural
documentation.
g. To present periodically national and international events related to visual arts and
to give artistic recognition in form of grants and prizes.
h. To promote a broader interest in the visual arts to the society through didactic and
artistic activities and the use of mass communication.
Signed in March 30, 1983 by: Armando Hart Dávalos (Minister of Culture) Fidel
Castro Ruz (President of the Council of Ministers) and Osmany Cienfuegos Gorriarán
(Secretary of the Council of Ministers) 46
12
This decree clearly set out the goals and scope of the Wifredo Lam Center and planted
the seed for the establishment of the Biennial as the core of its activities. For the nascent Art
Center and for the Havana Biennale, Wifredo Lam became a motif and, because of his mixed
ethnicity, a symbolic figure connecting three cultures (Africa, America, and Asia). 47 But why
was the Center created? Only to honor the life and work of Lam, who had not lived in Cuba since
the late 1940s? How did the political and cultural environment of the island give birth to that
institution? Why did the Council of Ministers take culture so seriously? What were the forces
behind this fact and who were the people supporting the creation of such an institution?
Lam died in Paris on September 11, 1982. His death is central to the creation of such an
institution. The Cuban Minister of Culture Armando Hart Dávalos toured Europe and East
Europe in late 1982. There he inaugurated an exhibition on Cuban Art and Spanish Culture at the
Museo del Prado in Madrid, and a retrospective of Lam’s work, prepared in part by the artist
himself early that year –before his own death. It is possible that pledges were made by members
of the international community during this trip. One of the paintings in the exhibition that most
touched the Cuban Minister was “Tercer Mundo” (Third World), painted by Lam in one of his
visits to the island in 1966. 48 Hart Dávalos might well have seen in Lam an ideal figure for
elevating the cultural status of Cuba in the world. Later the Minister visited France,
Czechoslovakia, Poland, and Russia.
Hart Dávalos (born 1930) studied to be a lawyer at the University of Havana. While
there, he became politically active, becoming member of the communist youth; he would soon
join Fidel Castro and Che Guevara in their fight against Batista, meeting them in the Sierra
Maestra, to found the 26 July Movement. 49 As Castro and Che Guevara were leading the
guerrilla warfare from the country side, Hart Dávalos became one of the main organizers of the
13
movement in the cities. He was captured by Batista’s forces in January 1958 and sent to Los
Pinos, a Prison Island where he spent some time before the triumph of the revolution. Upon the
success of the revolution Hart Dávalos was appointed the first Minister of Education of new
Cuba (1959-1965), and later served as Minister of Culture (1976-1997), as well as a member of
the Politburo of the Communist Party of Cuba. From his position on the Council of Ministers
Hart Dávalos initiated the most remarkable policies in education and culture. As Minister of
Education, he led the now famous Cuban ‘Literacy Campaign’ that lifted the country to the apex
of literacy rates in the world. 50 Anti-Cuban critics, however, describe it as follows: “Castro's
much vaunted anti-illiteracy campaign was used to glorify his regime and to indoctrinate
children, teenagers, and adults with adoration of the state and the ‘cult of personality’ a la
Stalin.” 51
During the initial years of the revolution the official institutionalization of culture stifled
independent cultural production, yet some independent groups had emerged, producing a degree
of cultural debate on the island. Actually, the first twenty years of the revolution saw a complex,
often contradictory series of changes in cultural policy. Who was in charge of defining Cuban
Culture? Was it those big names returning to the Island, such as writer Alejo Carpentier or
intellectual and philosopher Juán Marinello, or the new generation of revolutionary thinkers who
were part of the revolutionary struggle, Hard Dávalos among them?
A number of different emphases were pursued in the quest to find the “real soul” of
Cuban culture. These became the basis for contemporary Cuban culture and for events such as
the Havana Biennale.
14
1.4
ON THE CUBAN SITUATION
It is possible to distinguish five periods of cultural development in Cuba since the 1959
revolution. This section will describe the first three.
For almost a decade after the victory of the Revolution and the subsequent counterrevolutionary struggle, political confusion reigned: celebratory and contradictory cultural
policies occurred side by side. Institutions such as Casa de las Americas, the ICAIC (Instituto
Cubano de Artes e Industrias Cinematográfícas), and the CNC (Consejo Nacional de Cultura),
in addition to other less-official spaces, had to respond to the new challenges caused by the
cessation of private patronage, that, until 1959, was the only one in the country. 52 After the
revolution, Carlos Franqui assembled a group of young and rebellious writers in order to bring
Cuban Culture up-to-date, developing a cultural supplement for the newly newspaper
Revolución, called Lunes de Revolución (among them Cabrera Infante, Severo Sarduy, and
Eugenio Florit). The group was dissolved by internal tensions and the increasingly
democratization and Cubanization of culture in mid 1960s. At that point, the group was attacked
for being elitist and self-referential in an environment of clear socialist radicalization. Many of
his members, who were exiles before 1959, would exile themselves again. 53
Casa de las Américas was established in a modernist building in the Vedado sector of
Havana by the 26 July Movement leader Haydée Santamaría, following Che Guevara’s call for
bridging the cultures of Latin America. Casa opened in April 1959, according to its functions;
“Casa had been concerned with the defense of the unity of the peoples of Latin America, and the
authentic evolution of their true identity. Its activities include the fields of literature, plastic arts,
music, publishing, theatre and other forms of artistic, intellectual, and cultural expression.” 54
What is interesting is that Casa did not have models from which to learn. It became an institution
15
that promoted, from the ground up, Latin American Culture (in an open sense), Cuban
participation as active part of the Region (even beyond its Antillean and Caribbean condition),
and that vehemently defended the use of Spanish as unifier for the region’s cultural identity. 55
Casa’s events and publications have become a path to follow in the diverse aspects of its
cultural enterprise. 56 The Casa Prize, the magazines, the photographic and graphic contests, the
intellectual encounters and symposia, and its collection and related events on Latin American art
are undoubtedly a corner stone of many of the events developed in Cuba. As we will see, it was
to become a key model for the Havana Biennale that had recognized its leading role and ways of
operating.
ICAIC was set up under the Revolutionary Government’s Law of 24 March 1959, “the
first Revolutionary Law on an ideological-cultural activity; in the law it is stipulated that ‘cinema
is an art’.” 57 The functions for the institute were defined in the law as follows: “to enrich and
broaden the field of action of Cuban culture by introducing into it a new medium of artistic
expression; and to form a public more complex and sophisticated, and consequently better able
to judge, more demanding and active, and therefore more revolutionary.” 58 ICAIC was managed
by Alfredo Guevara, a former socialist activist and colleague of Castro. It rapidly became central
and autonomous, enjoyed a good budget because its closeness to the regime. It still publishes a
magazine, the Cuban Film Review, editing 50 issues in the first decade, and 14 books of
theoretical and documentary nature. 59
Among the other institutions created was the CNC (Consejo Nacional de Cultura /
Council on National Culture). Although the Council was the first to promote the unification of
cultural policy it was under tight control by former leaders of the PSP (Partido Socialista
Popular/ Socialist Popular Party), especially by Joaquín Ordoqui and Edith García Buchaca, who
16
were closer to socialist realism. 60 The UNEAC (Unión Nacional de Escritores y Artistas
Cubanos / National Union of Writers and Cuban Artists) emerged to counteract the power of the
CNC, with Nicolas Guillén as president, Lezama Lima and Carpentier as vice-presidents, and
Fernandez Retamar as secretary. Soon it became a parallel institution, active in producing
journals and publications and in some cases challenging Casa and the CNC’s proclaims. For
example; the journal Unión (under Carpentier, Fernandez Retamar, and Guillén) and the Gaceta
de Cuba had helped film makers to challenge dogmatism (of the CNC) in 1965. 61
This first phase of the cultural process would be settled by Fidel himself in his “Palabras
a los Intelectuales” (Words to Intellectuals) pronounced in June 1961 after a series of meetings
discussing artistic freedom and the role of artists and intellectuals in the revolution. This
discourse would taint the cultural policy of the time, in particular these words:
The problem under discussion here, and that we are attacking, is the problem of
freedom of expression for writers and artists… The Revolution has to understand that reality,
and for instance it has to act in order to give artists and intellectuals that are not genuine
revolutionaries, within the Revolution a field to work and to create, and that their creative
spirit, although they are not revolutionary writers and artist, has opportunity and freedom of
expression within the Revolution. That means, that within the Revolution everything; against
the Revolution, nothing. Against it nothing because the Revolution has its rights and the first
right of the Revolution is to exist; therefore, in the face of the Revolution’s right to be and to
exist, no-one. 62
This affirmation, that shows the core inner contradiction of the Cuban cultural policy,
would establish an official tone against any independent, counter-revolutionary proposal as well
as the right of non-revolutionary artists to practice their art. In the discourse Castro, also, talked
about the creation of national art schools and a network of cultural trainers and teachers that, like
the ones in the literacy campaign, would transformed the cultural landscape of Cuba.
La Escuela Nacional de Arte (The National School of Art) opened in 1962. Almost
simultaneously, El Taller Experimental de Gráfica (the Experimental Graphics Workshop) was
17
created to support the film and propaganda machine. It became one of the most advanced places
for visual experimentation during the 1960s and 1970s. In 1979 the Palacio Nacional de Bellas
Artes (National Museum) organized the exhibition “Cartel Cubano de la Revolución” (Cuban
Posters of the Revolution), underlining the importance of graphic design. 63 The National School
started graduating artists in 1967, shaping the future generations. Later it would be converted in
the ISA (Instituto Superior de Arte / Superior Arts Institute). The San Alejandro academy would
survive as the place to train artists in more traditional modes. 64 The national salon of art was
opened to all artists on the island. La Galería Havana was revived to show the most advanced
visual arts of the time. In 1963 it organized the exhibition “Expresión Abstracta” (Abstract
Expression) following the same vanguard interest of the Grupo de los Once (Group of Eleven)
lead by Raúl Martínez and Servando Cabrera. The group was formed before the revolution and
was influenced by Mexican and Soviet monumentality, as well as abstract expressionism. It
edited a publication, Gaceta de Bellas Artes, thanks to the Club Cubano de Bellas Artes. Its
articles and comments stressed the social responsibility of public art. 65
The second period, the so-called “los años Grises” (the ‘Grey Years’), covers most of the
1970s. 66 It was a time of stagnation because of state-control and cultural repression. Cultural
production was reduced to a series of official names composed of the most radical factions of the
communist party and backed up by the institutions. By the mid-1970s the new cultural
institutions had created a system that constituted the revolution’s idea of culture. Publishing was
centralized in 1967 by the Instituto Cubano del Libro. Copyright was abolished in April that
year, in part to challenge capitalism’s control of intellectual freedom and to make Cuban writers
more dependants on the system, but also to publish non-Cuban authors without paying royalties
to international publishing houses. This assisted in spreading knowledge across the new,
18
horizontal education system. It indicated a break of cultural dependency on European and
American models and a rising interest in Eastern European ones (early Soviet in particular).
However, by the early 1970s, this interest shifted. Emerging out of awareness by the cultural and
intellectual community of the increasing Soviet revisionism introduced by the state, a notion of
cultural decolonization (rooted initially in radical nationalism) emerged. It then moved towards a
new internationalism in the form of Third-World militancy. In part, the recent death of Che
Guevara in Bolivia (October 9, 1967) and the reprinting of his texts would stir up his legacy. Che
had promoted a constant experimentation (on-going revolution), regional integration, and counter
colonial struggle (anti-imperialism).
New magazines emerged under this perspective. Apart of the famous Tricontinental, a
magazine produced by OSPAAL (Organization of Solidarity of the People of Asia, Africa, and
Latin America), which in its multilingual edition (Spanish, English, French, sometime in Middle
Eastern Languages) became the forum for the Non Aligned movement and the Cuban voice as
new leading member. From its foundation, during the 1966 Tricontinental Conference,
Tricontinental magazine had produced series of propaganda posters that were folded up and
placed inside each copy. The magazine has a particular connection with the emergence of the
Third Cinema; a manifesto published in 1969 by Tricontinental became the launching text of the
movement. 67
19
Figure 3. Inserted in Tricontinental. ICAIC (tenth anniversary), poster by Alfredo Rostgaard, 1969
Figure 4. 1st OSPAAL conference, Havana January 16, 1966
20
The covers of the magazine and the many posters produced out of it since 1966 attest for
the changing styles of the time. The design and posters were made by offset or silk-screen
techniques creating stylistically a signature that connected the Russian avant-garde, pop art, and
local versions of both. Other magazines and cultural publications were, also, important in the
transferring of information to the cultural realm, among them: El Caimán Barbudo as cultural
supplement of Juventud Revelde (1966); Pensamiento Critico, and Revolución y Cultura (both
1968). These magazines introduced much of the critical thought coming from the Third World.
Experimental (and economic) design accompanied the layout and printing of texts by thinkers
that such as Gramci, Benjamin, Derrida, and members of the new left, with a clear antiimperialist tone, those enlightened the Cuban emergent intellectual world helping to develop a
critical Cuban writing in the arts and culture.
Nevertheless, this period would also be marked by the creation of the UMAP (Unidades
Militares para la Ayuda de Producción /Military Units to Aid Production) infamous camps for
antirevolutionary misfits. 68 They were aimed at integrating into society those regards as “less
productive” members: Afro-Cubans, gay, lesbians, drug addicts, religious practitioners, rockers,
and the culturally divergent. These “rehabilitation centers” mark the darkest point of cultural
development during the entire revolutionary process. 69 In order to control the echo of the May’
68 cultural and political uprising in Europe and elsewhere that indeed had impacted the island, as
well as the increasing impact of American popular culture, a ‘black list’ was created. Initially the
regime had embraced the rebellious spirit, the anti-capitalist and highly critical attitudes, of the
1968 generation. Soon, however, it was regarded as degenerate, imperialist, and as a symbol of
decrepit European and American culture.
21
Figure 5. Cover and content page for the Magazine Pensamiento Crítico (No. 42, Jun. 1970)
22
The same occurred with Jazz. In the first instance it was embraced, even the CNC had
created the Orquesta Cubana de Música Moderna where musicians (Afro-Cubans in particular)
where able to “Cubanize” the genre. All of a sudden, in late 1960 and early 1970s, people were
sent to jail, books, and records were taken out from music shops, bookshelves, and libraries.
Nonetheless, youth culture would find some outlet of expression, a valve within the stagnant
environment. For example, the “Nueva Trova Cubana” (a kind of protest song) would mix pop
rhythms and old décimas or trovas linked to folk music. 70
In the mid-1970s through the late 1980s a third period took shape. It was a time of great
cultural achievement, of the ideological revival of Third-World cultural politics, and the golden
age of Cuban visual arts. With the creation of the Ministry of Culture in 1976 and the
establishment of a new and fresh cultural system, the now mature intellectual world could
participate actively again. 71 Armando Hart Dávalos was selected to lead it. He recognized the
damage done during the past years and took a series of steps to change the highly politicized
cultural sphere.
In order to establish a direct dialog with the artistic community, Hart Dávalos reduced
bureaucratization, centralizing in the Ministry the constitution and application of overall cultural
policy. He rehabilitated the names of those who were affected by the repression. He created the
Centro de Estudios Martianos (Center of José Martí Studies) under the direction of Roberto
Fernandez Retamar and Antonio Benitéz Rojo recovered his post in the Institute of Caribbean
Studies in Casa de las Américas. 72 In 1979 the “black list” ended, many of the intellectuals and
artists in prisons were freed and allowed to leave the country. The cultural system changed and a
complex set of institutions were established, that recognized the diversity and complexity of the
Cuban culture. 73
23
The new cultural system would replicate itself on the local, regional and national levels,
helping to establish microcosms of participation and production in order to constitute their own
idea of what a national-contemporary culture was. The fact that Cuba reached almost full literacy
in the 1960s and that the early network of cultural trainers had worked well fostered recognition
of the diversity of Cuban culture. 74 The system would be founded entirely by the socialist state.
The financing of culture is the crucial factor of any cultural policy. And this financing
in turn depends on economic development; this development determines the objective limit of
the available resources… This means that the financing policy, even in profitable areas of
culture (such as cinema) has been the intrinsic needs of cultural development…. Cuba is
practically the only developing socialist country to have mobilized all available resources financial and others- with a view to achieving the maximum educational and cultural
objective. 75
The consolidation of the “cultural system” under Hart Dávalos would soften the
indignation and suspicion felt by the cultural world about the fixed and repressive state control of
the past decade (see diagram in chapter 4). The intense cultural exchange during those years, the
participation of Cuba in liberation movements in Asia, Africa, and Latin America had produced a
different world view and a southern consciousness would soon bear cultural fruits. Paradoxically,
Cuba was recovering from the hard policies of social control and community building when the
Mariel episode -during which 125,2000 Cubans left the island, mainly in boats- occurred. 76
During the 1980s the new Cuban art scene flourished. Part of the new strategy was the
recognition of Cuba’s leadership in certain issues for the world in development and its role in
international affairs. One of the most important art institutions created was ISA (Instituto
Superior de Arte / Superior Art Institute) in 1976. It has produced the most important artists
since then. 77 A generation of painters and sculptors who had grown up with the revolution came
of age. “In Cuba, the 1980s, after Mariel, have become a myth, an age of renaissance that began
with art and spread to everything else.” 78 In January of 1981, partly organized and fully
24
supported (institutionally and conceptually) by Gerardo Mosquera, a group of artists took
Havana by storm with an exhibition called Volumen Uno. 79 It became a movement that redefined
Cuban visual culture. “For the first time since 1959, art had an existence and a meaning
independent of official discourse. While the media and the schools remained under strict
government control, the visual arts began to provoke, to question the status quo.”
80
This
exhibition would set the new tone for visual arts in the country and would situate the new
protagonists in the arts scene, with a particular intervention of Gerardo Mosquera. 81
A couple of years earlier, Mosquera (a young writer and critic at the service of the new
Ministry of Culture) had worked with Jaime Saruski in the compilation of the new Cuban
cultural policy for the 1978 world Culture conference organized by UNESCO. 82 It would be
Mosquera’s first international work and would situate him not only in relation to the art world
but in a wider sphere, cultural policy, popular culture, and art management. A new generation of
writers, critics, and academics was emerging and using the system, in particular journals and
magazines, to launch new initiatives. Simultaneously, they were embedded in a systematic
revision of Cuban popular (folk and peasant) culture. 83
It was during this period that events such as the Havana Biennial were created. It is
uncertain who envisioned the Biennial in the first place. According to Nelson Herrera Ysla,
founder member and active curator of the Lam Center, “the idea of establishing the Wifredo Lam
Center and the Biennial came forward in a meeting between Lam’s widow and Fidel Castro, in
the presence of Hart Dávalos and other members of the Culture community.” 84 The widow was
in Havana in December 1982, bringing Lam’s ashes home after his death in Paris. A Directorate
of Plastic Arts and Design had been created as part of the Ministry of Culture in 1976, under
Beatriz Aulet’s direction. Gerardo Mosquera, José Veigás, and Nelson Herrera Ysla worked
25
there as specialists. “It seems that during the meeting the idea of the art center and the biennial
was discussed. The Biennial’s character was also defined; a space for ‘third world’ artists, and in
part following the new set of artistic events taking place in Havana”. These included the Latin
American Theater Festival, the already famous Festival del Nuevo Cine Latino Americano (New
Latin American Film Festival), in addition to Casa de la Américas’ international program.
Herrera Ysla remembered: “Immediately, under Aulet’s direction and with support of other
cultural institutions, we started to work for the first Biennial.” 85 Marcia Leiseca, Vice-Minister
of Culture supported the event in its totality. A few months later Llilian Llanes would be called
in from the ISA to structure and form the Wifredo Lam Center and to take over the Havana
Biennale.
Since then, we can discern a fourth and fifth moments, covering the 1980s through the
fall of the Eastern Bloc and the 1990s to today. These subsume the radical changes taking place
not only in political terms, division of the world into new blocs, but also because of the opening
of the economy to the flux of global capitalism during the especial period. A new social and
cultural landscape has emerged out of these two periods that, due to their proximity, are rather
difficult to differentiate completely. Nonetheless, both are characterized by discernible changes
in cultural policy and artistic practice, and are treated in depth in subsequent chapters.
1.5
CONCLUSION
It is clear is that the historical development of the first two and a half decades of the
revolution was the seeding ground for events such as the Havana Biennale. What is a stake here
is the necessity to reveal the conceptual-contextual and historical structure that supports the
26
Biennale (in political and aesthetic dimensions). It is particularly challenging since the biennale
is part of a larger cultural and political project embedded in the revolutionary ideals supporting
modern Cuba. It is one of its institutions (with all their virtues, vices, and problems). In addition,
it became part of a larger question; what defines the limit between the modern and the
contemporary in artistic production during the postmodern debate and the so-called postcolonial
era in these regions of the world? In the case of the Havana Biennale, the challenges have been
not only ideological and conceptual, but also political and material. The 1980s was a moment of
the celebration of difference, working in the terms of the postmodern debate. Paradoxically,
Cuba was recovering from the hard policies of social control and community building (product
of their relationship with Communist Russia) that in part ended in the Mariel episode. The art
education system as well as the organization of the biennale coincides with an interest in
positioning the country in the international sphere –after the support of guerrilla movements, the
pro-Cuba committees of the seventies, and Mariel. The new political strategy lead by the
Ministry of Culture promoted a new internationalism in which art and culture were central. The
generations of Cuban artists participating actively during those years would be the seed of the
new Cuban Art that would be central to the Havana Biennial. In addition, the boom in terms of
market value of Latin American art helped to locate many of them in the international circuit. 86
The art market had reinvented itself after the so-called “cultural wars” when artists
decided not to produce an art to be part of any commercial transaction during and after 1968
(conceptual and minimal artist in particular would end in performance and radical feminist,
queer, and multicultural action-activists as well), besides the world was becoming increasingly
smaller. The emergence of postmodernism, and simultaneously a postcolonial critique would be
attacked by the re-organization of the art market in form of New-Expressionism
27
(transvanguardia in Europe) in major art centers (New York, Paris, Milan, and Berlin). With the
introduction of Russian conceptual artists, Latin American artists, and later African (and more
recently the Far East contingent) ones into this market, they will boost its global reach. In a
sense, the 1980s were the seed for the reconfiguration of the world art system and the
constitution of the first real phase of contemporary art. The fall of the Soviet block and its effects
on the art world, and in particular Cuba, would add to the trend that will be analyzed in the
following chapter.
28
2.0
SITUATING THE HAVANA BIENNALE
This chapter analyzes the role of Havana as center of the debates on Latin Americanism
in the arts and introduces a discussion of the constitution of a Postcolonial consciousness for the
visual arts in Cuba during the 1980s. Additionally, it presents the facts surrounding the creation
of the Havana Biennale, recognizing the work of critics, artists, publications, and institutions. In
this way it will be possible to link Cuban art and thought with the wider spectrum of what was
produced in the region at the time. Finally, it describes how the founding of the Ministry of
Culture and the cultural institutions (art academies and the system of visual arts) lead to a
number of events and exhibitions that made possible the emergence of the Havana Biennale.
2.1
IN THE HAZE OF THE SIXTIES
If we are to move beyond Eurocentric theoretical paradigms and devise one specific to
the topic of this research, we need to relocate the particular relationship between state and stateculture with respect to the cultural industry and the real artistic production resulting from the
revolutionary project.
In Cuba in the 1980s, the revolutionary years of the 1960s became a phantom, and the
older days of glory were diluted by skepticism. The exporting of the Revolution had achieved
certain success in Africa and to a lesser extent Asia. In Latin America, however, it had stalled 29
by early 1980s many of the revolutionary movements had been disbanded (and their members in
exile, incarcerated, or executed) and the countries in the Southern Cone were under military
dictatorships (Argentina, Chile, Paraguay, Bolivia, and Uruguay). The “thaw” period in the
Soviet Bloc deeply affected Cuban economy, starting in early 1980s; the grey years left a deep
scar on the cultural establishment and produced a constant suspicion in some groups in the
region. Finally, in 1978-79, the Sandinistas in Nicaragua brought to light to the revolutionary
ideals initiated in Cuba. 87 Soon they replicated the benefits of the “literacy program” developed
in Cuba. And the creation of a Ministry of Culture in Nicaragua, under Ernesto Cardenal’s
direction, with the conceptual guidance of Brazilian revolutionary educator Paulo Freire, would
change the face of the small Central American country (at least for some time). Cubans felt as
victorious as the Nicaraguans.
Certainly, culture has been an asset for the political and social construction of
revolutionary Cuba. It is clear that the arts have become a primary site for the constitution of
subjectivity and citizenship on the island. The control over TV, radio, and press plus the official
restraints on body-politics, in addition to the economic blockage had displaced the production of
subjectivity mostly to the realm of art. As Sujatha Fernandez puts it: “while the arts may help to
generate new public spaces for debate and dialog, these spaces also constitute an important
means by which the Cuban state redraws the parameters of its hegemonic project.” 88 On the
same lines, David Craven noted that, “the Cuban Revolution, with its interventionist rather than
reflectionist view of culture, affirms the Brechtian belief that art is not a mirror of material
reality, but rather is a hammer with which to help construct this material reality.”
89
And we
should add to his position that the hammer called art is continually in need of ideological
refinement as the number of its user’s increase. In addition, in the 1980s Cuban art played an
30
important role transforming itself in a source of economic income and social status, and its
relationship with cultural tourism and the art market has to be taken into account when studying
contemporary Cuba.
The political decision made by the Revolutionary Cuban government during the 1960s
aimed to erase the gap between classes (and races) and to end the dependence on its economic
venture, pushed it onto another. It would mark the politics of culture during this period. Castro,
in his 1961 speech “Palabras a los Intelectuales” defined the two main characteristics of
revolutionary art: First, it should be produced for the great exploited masses of the people, and
second, artists should have the future in mind while producing for their contemporaries. 90 In the
same order of ideas, it is important to underline why Cuban art was not controlled fully by the
state (excluding during the grey years). Che’s notion of a “new person” created by the
Revolution is the result not only of the transformation of the material conditions, but also occurs
because of the advancement of culture in all regards. 91 His vision of art would illuminate the
ideas of an artistic practice that would not be servant of the state. Che was critical of the
socialist-realist formula, being at the same time aware of the irrelevance of an art based
exclusively on individual concerns. “Che then made an eloquent plea for state policies that
would create neither ‘docile servants of official thought,’ as in the Soviet Union under Stalin, or
artists who ‘merely pursue freedom’ as in the case of the United States and Europe.” 92
This haze of the sixties had, also, built a cultural shell that protected the initial forces that
would form the Cuban cultural policy of the 1980s. They were reinforced by the new Cuban
Constitution of 1977 that had advanced decentralization as a new “democratic” model; based on
the centrality of workplace and in a local-direct democracy that converges with, but is not
reducible to, national decision-making process. In the arts the creation of a national system that
31
replicates itself on the local level established a parallel net of institutions spreading the benefits
of the model. The refusal by the Ministry of Culture to regulate artistic production through any
revolutionary style and the “openness” (although always under scrutiny) to various ideological
tendencies within state institutions, as well as within the party, have proved important for the
health of the cultural universe in the country.
This new approach to culture, fully supported by the state, in financial terms,
presupposed an empowerment on the part of the artists and intellectuals. In addition, the new
internationalism and the awareness of a postcolonial subjectivity in times of postmodernism, in
part generated by the crisis of the Soviet bloc and the release of policies by the U.S. under the
Ford and Carter administrations, would prompt a universalistic approach. It supported Cuban
participation in arts and culture in international venues and in particular strengthening ties, at
first, with Latin America, and later, with the world in development.
But, how do events such as the Havana Biennale, being part of an institutional web,
recognize the centrality of an art produced outside the centers of the Art World? Which were the
markers for such a vision? And how did they assume the challenges, and which problems did
they face?
By the early 1980s, “contemporary Cuban art began to return to cosmopolitan settings
such as the Venice Biennale, and the São Paulo Biennale. Just as consequential in this respect
was the increasingly influential elaboration of a cultural paradigm by artists, critics, and curators
that privilege the peripheries.” 93 The insertion of the Cuban culture into global markets brought
new challenges and contradictions. The packing and repacking of its revolutionary history in
form of old patrimonial objects (with the initial works of renovation of Old Havana), new visual
representations and icons (Che portraits, the red star in a tropical island, the Cuban flag, tobacco
32
with the sickle and the hammer, etc.), and popular culture products (music, graphic design, and
tourism in a retro-fashion) is also the result of such phase (the haze of the sixties) bringing new
challenges and opportunities.
Cuban intellectuals, critics, and artists were interested in understanding and later
exporting the first generation of real Revolutionary Artists. In order to do that, they needed not
only artistic events (such as the Havana Biennale) but also theoretical constructs to support them.
The events would become a battlefield over strategies of visibility, not only for Cuban artists but
also for intellectuals. Luis Camnitzer stated that the Biennale not only “became the undisputed
platform from which the international success of the eighties generation could be launched;” 94
but also a debating call for critics, curators, and artists from other regions of the world. A
theoretical construct would allow building up a discourse that will accompanied the Biennale
from its beginning.
Awareness of theoretical constructs such as poststructuralist and postmodern theories
would led to the introduction and reading of new authors. Internationalism would also help to
establish a third world consciousness that would bring out a postcolonial discourse responding to
the local realities, the embargo and the new conditions of globalization after the Soviet era.
2.2
ON THE CONSTITUTION OF A DE-(POST) COLONIAL DISCOURSE IN THE
MIDST OF A POSTMODERN ONE IN CUBA (1889-1983)
“Our relation with art is one of consumers of what is produced by the metropolis. Therefore, the
cultural dependency forces us to live a deferred appropriation. Our art is the result of what other cultures did, instead of
a production is a reproduction.”
Nestor García Canclini
33
95
Can it be proposed that Cuba lead a postcolonial cultural revolution in the time of postmodernity? If that is the case, how did it happen?
The debates around Postcolonialism started in the 1960s. The founding works are
considered those writings by Gandhi and the African nationalists both in the first half of the
twentieth century. 96 Later writing by Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth (1961); Che
Guevara, Colonialism is Doomed (1964); Albert Memmi, The Colonizer and the Colonized
(1965); Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks (1967); Kwame Nkrumah, Consciencism (1970);
Aimé Cesaire, Discourse on Colonialism (1972); Terry Smith, "The Provincialism Problem"
(1974) and the most famous Eduard Said’s, Orientalism (1978) brought attention to the issue.
Recently cultural critics have been working on the concepts of postmodern and the postcolonial
in Latin America; the contemporary inhabits in the modern. 97 The debate is open since the term
“Postcolonial” has been used, and re-used, to define the cultural practices of the newly
independent territories during, and shortly after, War World II (especially in India, Africa, and
South East Asia).
Because of “the many Latin Americas that exist, there are diverse postmodern,
postcolonial, as well as globalized worlds in Latin America.” 98 Alfonso del Toro has argued how
the term postcoloniality, as well as postmodernity and more recently globalization are
problematic in the Latin American historical and epistemological context. The provenance of the
term postcolonial (which is said to be US-UK born) had to be disentangled of its potentiality of
explanation. What is relevant is its “re-codification inside of a geopolitical context of
application,” which determines its legitimating power, not its birth place. As a matter of fact, del
Toro has demonstrated how for many Latin American thinkers the terms postmodern and the
postcolonial are equated to the term modernity. 99
34
On the other hand, the term globalization (or the global), had its own genealogy in the
region. It is product of the debates of the postmodern and postcolonial which was characterized
by its nomadic and deteritorialized nature, by processes of diffusion and flux.
Nevertheless, since the arrival of the Cuban Revolution intellectuals working on the
consolidation of a theoretical frame for a new Cuban thought have brought forward the notion of
neocolonialism and decolonization as part of the rhetoric of the Revolution to fight internal and
external forces undermining the enterprise.
In the case of the Havana Biennale, an anti-imperialist and counter-colonial discourse has
been present. In 1989 the Havana Biennale worked on the issue of “Tradition versus
Contemporaneity” in the Third World and later in 1991 on “The Challenge to Colonization.”
These two editions of the Biennale will be treated in subsequent chapters. Prior to that it is
essential to set out the historical debates taking place on the island; this will help to locate a
particular postcolonial discourse from Latin America, which we will show to be alternative to the
one taking place in the intellectual centers of the West. 100
In modern Cuba, Fernando Ortiz (following José Martí) established the conceptual base
on which the characteristics of the national question where defined. His works on ethnology,
ethnography, music, history, and sociology called for a dialectical understanding of what he
called “transculturation.” Ortiz defined it as the result of the constant influence and interaction
between two or more cultural components in a social group. These components tend to integrate
a third group, new and independent. Its characteristics could be traced to the preceding cultures;
however, neither one nor the other would be prevalent. That is why in the definition of national
identity, mestizaje (hybridization) and nation (in Latin America and the Caribbean) are
inseparable categories. 101 For example, in his “Contrapunteo Cubano: Tabaco y Azucar” (Cuban
35
Counterpoints: Tobacco and Sugar), Ortiz argued that the modernity of Cuba was based on the
market of desire rather than on reason. Tobacco, a native plant of the Americas, and sugar, since
early in colonial times, became symbols of Cubanidad (Cubaness), and later on transformed into
industrial crops for the popular consumption. Other products in the region such as cocoa, rubber,
banana, petroleum, and more recently marihuana, opium, and cocaine are entangled in the
colonial axis. 102 Sugar was brought to America by Columbus from the Canary Islands, and
connected to plantation practices very early on (due to increasing demand for it in Europe). 103
Tobacco was related to tradition and used as part of rituals, therapy, and social entertainment (it
became highly appreciated in the West later on). Tobacco created an attachment to land, because
the crop takes long time to activate and needs constant work, creating a certain ritual relation
with earth. Sugar needed intense labor during the various parts of the process, leaving therefore
time to create an intra-culture. In a sense, both products are traversed by fetishism and cannot be
treated as mere commodities. These characteristics made of tobacco and sugar the best example
of transculturation; both became internalized, fusing ancient and modern Cuban culture
together. 104
By the mid 1800s most of the region had obtained its independence, only Cuba and
Puerto Rico had not. As argued by Andres Bello in his poem “La agricultura de la zona torrida”
(The Agriculture of the Torrid Zone), agriculture would become not only the wellspring of
cultural independence (for Latin America at large), used to pay the debts of the independence
wars (in the case of Cuba contracted with the United States after 1898), but also as the material
source of economic prosperity. However, this led to the constitution of a “Creole-elite” that
managed the agro-business, denying at the same time technological and political
advancement. 105 The region was constrained to sell its produce in exchange for manufactured
36
goods. To build a new subjectivity from labor-force was impossible, since autonomy was not
likely against the control of the new Creole State. Mary Louis Pratt informs us how class
produced a set of racial limitations “in the aesthetic (as in the political) realm, the unquiet
American multitudes could not be dealt with.” 106 Culture was also under the control of the
Creole-elites who used to look to the centers of Western artistic production as models of
civilization. Pratt calls it the “Euroamerican cultural logic” where the Creole project reinvented
Latin America through people such as Alexander von Humboldt and the Euro-American writers
and intellectuals of the time. 107 The fetishization of nature would become a way to extend the
practices of forced labor (the basis of all capitalism); especially to the peoples of African
descent, in the analysis of García Canclini, the Creole-elites established a model of internal
colonialism and economic dependence lasting for more than a century. 108
In postmodern times, in a Cold War setting, the postcolonial would emerge in the form of
anti-imperialism and a radical Thirdworldism (this is quite distinct from the form it took in India,
Africa, or Asia). In the cultural environment of Cuba of the early 1980s a powerful discourse
would connect a series of events. Cuban isolation after the post missile-crisis led to a revision
involving a furious searching for national identity; they found a series of facts that were
disturbing not only for their own identity, but also for the consolidation of a Latin American one.
During the independence wars in Latin America, Simón Bolivar envisaged the constitution of a
great, unified group of nations “La Gran Colombia.” Seventy years later José Martí would call
for “Nuestra América” (Our America). Today, echoes of this call are being in use by Hugo
Chavez.
For decades, Cuban magazines, such as Pensamiento Crítico, published articles by well
known international socialist thinkers which underlined the same concerns and created a larger
37
understanding of the changing conditions of the time. For example, Pensamiento Crítico
republished Harry Magdoff’s article “The Age of Imperialism” that had appeared initially in the
Monthly Review in September, 1968. 109
Figure 6. Cover page and article page of magazine Pensamiento Crítico (No. 32, Jun. 1969)
2.2.1
Visual Arts and De/Postcolonial Discourse
For sixteen years, Orlando Suarez Suarez, founder of “El Taller Experimental de Gráfica”
(The Experimental Graphics Workshop), and a team of collaborators in the Art Department at
Havana University, and later as part of the research group on aesthetics as professor at the
Instituto Superior de Arte (ISA), worked on a study about neocolonialism and the visual arts in
Latin America. In 1984 he started to put together a book titled La Jaula Invisible:
Neocolonialismo y Plástica Latinoamericana (The Invisible Cage: Neocolonialism and Latin
38
American art), which was published in 1986. The title comes from Che Guevara’s “new man”
metaphor. The Invisible Cage is what Guevara announced the new man had to break to be free.
The book cover presents a photograph of the Rockefeller Center’s Tower in New York
City, in a vertical perspective, framed by Lee Oscar Lawrie’s “Atlas”. 110 The book’s thesis, in a
clear critical tone asks and answers how “Latin American and Caribbean culture have been an
object of manipulation and penetration (by U.S imperialism) in order to surmount them into the
international canon.” 111 In a multidisciplinary undertaking, the author presents historic and
statistical facts covering twentieth century U.S. domination in economics and culture across the
region, emphasizing its effects on art production, circulation, and consumption.
During the late nineteen century, the United States, thanks to the consolidation of its
territory (after the Civil War, the Spanish American, and Mexican American wars) and the
concentration and centralization of production, emerged as the new colonial power in the
region. 112 Tied relationships between the new economic elites and the government would lead to
an expansionist venture. Because of U.S. intervention in the independence process in the
Caribbean (Cuba and Puerto Rico), the region became a laboratory to install new forms of
control, that are not quite colonialist but neocolonialist. The Neocolonial enterprise would use a
local government that, thanks to friendly presidents (or military generals), would assume the
unbearable administrative, political, and military costs of a colony. 113 In order to establish such
a project a supranational entity had to be created. As a result of this strategy, in 1889 a meeting
in Washington D.C gave birth to the first Pan-American Conference, which would become the
organ to expand the new agenda. The Monroe Doctrine became the bases, origin, and essence of
U.S. neocolonialism. 114
39
Pan-Americanism emerged as instrument of neocolonial domination. It was based on the
notion of “manifest destiny,” which Jefferson, Monroe, and Henry Clay conceived in the mid
nineteen century. The Monroe doctrine, written in 1823, was established to create U.S.
hegemony in the Caribbean and South America. 115 It was during the Washington conference, in
October 2, 1889 when James Blaine, Secretary of State during presidents Garfield and Harrison,
created a series of agencies part of the Pan-American conference: the International Union of
American Republics and the Commercial Office of the American Republics, both under control
of the U.S. Secretary of State. Simultaneously, a Monetary Conference took place. José Martí
(living in New York during those days) regarded the conference as “dangerous to the countries
south of the Rio Bravo.” 116 Martí foresaw the hegemonic desires of the U.S., regardless of the
stated good intentions of the organization that based its objectives on geographic proximity, the
equivalence of political models and institutions, economic cooperation and interests, and the
tendency towards democracy and internationalism; the Pan-American Union became an organ of
economic, politic, cultural, and social control in the region. “In Latin America, the rising power
of the Agro-Creole elite, and its liberal greed, established the right conditions to became the
‘petite partner’ of the emergent North American and British imperialism,” pushing the region to
a state of dependence in economic, political, technological, and cultural terms. 117
Simón Bolivar had understood this during the 1820s, and had called for a regional
unity. 118 What united the region (culture, language, history, and a common threat) was more
relevant for Bolivar and Martí than what the Pan-American Union offered as the establishment of
the new power. 119
Paradoxically, in cultural terms the Pan-American Union, from the fifth conference on
(held in Chile in 1923), would place an important weight on education. First, however, it was
40
important to instruct and train those that would take control over the new economic interests in
the region. Second, as a result of the emerging cultural importance of the United States, after
War World I -because of the influx of exiles arriving from Europe, a series of cultural
institutions and a number of subsidies were created, most of them administered by the newly
established American Foundations and by American Embassies in the region.
Secretary of State Elihu Root (under the Theodore Roosevelt administration) toured Latin
America in 1906, and then became president of the Carnegie Foundation for International Peace
in 1908. The Foundation would work on developing educational projects in Latin America. 120 In
1913 the Foundation sent Robert Bacon in a second tour of the region; Bacon was Root’s
substitute as the Secretary of State and the one who completed the business of Panama between
the U.S. and Colombia in 1912. 121
Other cultural and educative institutions created at the time, which have been actively
working in the region since then are the Rockefeller Foundation and the Guggenheim
Foundation. The Rockefeller Foundation was created in 1913 and initially invested resources in
researching a cure for Malaria in Latin America (and later on in Africa) because of their interest
in exploiting oil reserves and their initial involvement in the Panama Canal construction. 122 In
recent decades the foundation has increased its participation in the arts and culture of the region
with a scholarship and grants program. On the other hand, the Guggenheim Foundation, founded
in 1925, early on established a student exchange program with artists and scientists from Latin
America. 123 Through their foundations these corporations introduced similar programs that have
built for themselves a good image as transnational citizens helping to circulate the “American
way of life” in the region. 124 At the same time, the companies that control the foundations have
direct contact with subjects of the countries in which they continue to have economic interests,
41
investments, and active business. In most cases, they have received special treatment by
governments and administrations. The benefits of such exchanges have been important in
developmental issues. However, collateral problems emerged; the constitution of monopolies in
the exploitation and commercialization of natural resources, the massive migration of social
capital, imposition of cultural canons, and the transformation of cultural identity, among other
problems. These organizations would establish contacts with individuals and organizations to
maintain exchange and fluid information using what anthropologists call native informants.
The Third United Nations Conference on Trade and Development occurred in Santiago
(Chile) in 1972. Cuba’s delegates denounced the fact that between 1962 and 1966 some 60,2000
highly educated professionals migrated to the U.S. Among those, 12,261 were from Latin
America. 125 The Institute for International Education (IIE), created by Root as president of the
Carnegie Foundation in 1919, managed resources to educate cheaply subjects from the PanAmerican Union members using governmental and other private foundations and institutional
resources. In the height of the Cold War, IIE designed programs to counter the “Axis propaganda
threat,” and began its cooperation with some agencies of the U.S. Department of State through
large-scale Latin American exchanges. 126
During the sixth Pan-American Conference held in Havana (1928), education was a
major topic. The activities of the Office of Intellectual Cooperation, founded in 1924, increased.
The official objective was to collaborate in the relationship between intellectuals and institutions
of the member countries (by that time 21) in order to cut the cultural dependency on European
models. The Pan-American Union intended to neutralize the influence of the International
Institute of Intellectual Cooperation, one of the five organizations of the League of Nations
created in 1922. 127 The League’s idea was to establish autonomous (and paired) commissions to
42
discuss issues related to international diplomacy in a purely horizontal structure. It would bring
to the international table debates on the politics of the moment (the raising power of Nazi
Germany, Spanish, and Italian ultra-nationalism, for example). In contrast, the Pan-American
Office wanted to keep its discussions as apolitical as possible. They functioned in mere technical
and administrative terms. As a result of this policy, the (non political) Inter-American Artists and
Writers Association was establish in Cuba in 1938. A year later (1939) a number of bi-national
Cultural Institutes were created. The new Cultural Institutes, 20 in total, became centers of
cultural diffusion and bilateral cooperation; the Argentine-American, the Cuban-American, the
Colombo-American centers, among others, thereby reducing the discussions to U.S.-Country-toCountry relations into mere cultural exchange. It would be important to study in more depth the
role played by these inter-American institutions and their impact on contemporary culture in
Latin America. 128
During the seventh Pan-American Conference (1933) in Montevideo, Uruguay, a plan
was approved to be conducted by the Educational Institute for the History of the American
Republics. The Institute would examine the teaching of history in the member countries. The
objective was to “eliminate from school texts, any non-friendly appreciation towards another
member nation that could engender hate among nations.” 129 If the initial argument tried to keep a
sustainable peace in the region, after a convoluted century, the rewriting of history resulting from
this directive produced a deep distortion; taking out from school-texts important facts that could
provoke reaction towards neocolonialism. In the visual arts (not across the whole spectrum of the
region but in an important segment) it fuelled the production of images related to national and
regional identity and later armed struggle. In the cases of the Mexican muralismo, Central and
43
South America indigenismo and costumbrismo, these sought for a fair representation of local
histories. 130
Later conferences built on the educational directive in the same terms. With the outbreak
of World War II and its aftermath, the Pan American Union changed its focus towards a fervid
anticommunist endeavor, changing its name and structure. In 1948, the Pan American Union
gave birth to the Organization of American States (OAS). On April 9, the Ninth International
Conference of American Countries was held in Bogotá; Colombian President Mariano Ospina
Pérez was present at a meeting with U.S. Secretary of State, General George Marshall.
According to historians that day is the starting point of the Colombian modern history of
violence and marks a new chapter in U.S. – Latin American relations. The assassination of the
presidential candidate for the Liberal party, Jorge Eliecer Gaitán, the same day of the installation
of the meeting, resulted in a near revolution known as El Bogotazo. 131
Later on, many of the social movements in the region would test the new organization.
OAS became the extended arm of U.S. foreign policy during the height of the Cold War. A new
policy called “Alliance for Progress” was established by J. F. Kennedy replacing the “Marshall
Plan,” which had itself replaced the “Good Neighbor” policy of F. D. Roosevelt. The creation of
the CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) and USIS (United States Information Service), in late
1940s, and controlled by the State Department in order to gather intelligence about the influence
of foreign governments in the region, in junction with American cultural foundations, used the
net of American embassies and cultural centers in the region. This effort became a pervasive
foreign policy during the 1960s, 70s, and 80s. 132
44
2.2.2
A New Face
After WWII, the United States emerged as the largest economy of the world with an
interest of consolidating that power, not only in military, economic, or politic terms but also in
cultural ones. The particularities of the country had lead to such growth, creating organic
monopolies in which the most important families participated. Many became, also, art collectors
and benefactors. Some created and sustained important art institutions in the U.S. and beyond –
and are still doing so. Art museums and cultural institutions in the States are part of an equation
were family, market-economy, connoisseurship, and foreign policy are entangled. In the best
modern fashion the consolidation of an art system took place using more than one dimension of
society.
The art business, which was secured in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries out of the
consolidation of the bourgeoisie society and the flow of capital, would give birth to auction
Houses. Sotheby’s -later Sotheby’s Park Bennett (1744) and Christie’s (1766) became cartels of
the art world. By early 1920s these and others like Wildenstein & Co. opened their branches in
New York. French merchants, such as Paul Durrand-Ruel, traded impressionist art to the new
magnates of America. Kahnweiler, the Rosenberg brothers, and Ambroise Vollard famous
European dealers sold paintings (during their life in Paris and then in exile) to the new collectors,
eager to have a piece of the modern vanguards. 133
The consolidation of the art work as capital investment (which helped to save fortunes
during the depression of the 1930s), and its introduction to the flow of the market, in addition to
the creation of art institutions such as The Museum of Modern Art in New York (by the
Rockefeller family, 1929), the Whitney Museum of American Art (by the Vanderbilt Whitney
45
family, 1930), the Seattle Art Museum (by the Fuller family, 1933), and the Guggenheim
Museum (by Salomon Guggenheim, 1937) among others, established a new cultural imperative.
By the end of World War II, New York became the new art center. Serge Guilbaut has
described how “New York stole the idea of Modern Art” using the same strategies and model
Paris had used; publications, critics, collectors, museums, galleries, dealers, artists, etc. 134
Guilbaut looked at the complicated, intertwining relationship among art, politics, and ideology in
the consolidation of the New York school. He explored the changing New York and Paris art
scenes of the Cold War period, the rejection by artists of political ideology, and the co-opting by
part of left-wing writers and politicians. The same policies were in place in Latin America. The
institutionalization of a formalist agenda on the visual arts (in form of Abstract expressionism, or
a local version of it) wrapped up the phenomenon, taking away the political content out of the
realm of art.
2.2.3
A New Body
With the creation of the OAS, replacing the Pan-American Union, a new cultural organ
was born, the Inter-American Cultural Council. It was created to attend cultural policy for the
American States. It was part of three technical agencies comprising the OAS. 135 As part of the
Cultural Council an Office of Intellectual Cooperation, a Visual Arts division was also formed to
attend the specifics. OAS followed the spirit of the Pan-American Union and asserted the role of
culture as “not only an end in itself, but also a medium -used by the Inter American system- to
reach and affirm new goals and conquests in the political and spiritual order.” 136 The quote is
interesting because at first glance it evidences the interest and understanding of the organ with
respect to culture. At the same time, it connects culture and politics in an environment that
46
increasingly tries to separate them. In 1954 the OAS celebrated the Tenth Pan-American
conference where the delegates adopted the “Declaration for Inter-American Cultural Relations”
and the “Carta Cultural Americana” (The American Cultural Constitution). 137 These documents
exhorted culture and tell “artists to paint democratically in a world of democracy.” In other
words, they allow a political dimension of art. However, both were framed by what the new
cannon and the official art institutions in the U.S. dictated.
In December 1952 Alfred H. Barr Jr. had written his “Is Modern Art Communist?” in
which he discusses, at the same level, the attacks on modern art made in Nazi Germany and by
the Soviet State. 138 It is important to mention that it was Barr Jr., in 1946, who recommended
José Gómez Sicre, a Cuban art dealer and critic, to be head of the Visual Arts Division part of
the Office of Intellectual Cooperation of the OAS. 139 Gómez Sicre became a powerful figure in
the art of the region. He worked for more than three decades in that position creating a
fundamental source of information about (what he believed was) Latin American Art.140 In 1960,
the OAS opened an Art Gallery, which 26 years later would become the Latin American
Museum of Contemporary Art in Washington, El Museo de las Americas. 141
47
Figure 7. Organization of American States OAS (at its rear, El Museo de las Americas), Washington D.C.
Gomez Sicre had a major role in the creation of the idea of contemporary Latin American
Art, an issue that is still in debate. His participation and collaboration in the now historical
“Salones ESSO de Jóvenes Artistas” (ESSO Exhibitions for Young Artists) demonstrate the
partnership between the OAS and multinational corporations. In this case ESSO, a subsidiary of
the Standard Oil Co. owned, in part, by the Rockefeller group, had also an important role in the
development of a generation of artists with clear U.S. influences in Latin America. As well, it
helped greatly to reinforce the role Nelson Rockefeller had not only in MOMA but in the politics
and economies of the region. The ESSO Salons would launch a new generation of Latin
American artists that from the 1960s on are part of the history of Contemporary Latin American
Art. The absence of Cuban art in this narrative is notorious since Cuba was expelled from the
OAS in 1962 after the Missile Crisis.
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The ESSO project, thanks to OAS Visual Arts Division, featured eighteen national
exhibitions in 1965. Gómez Sicre, who referred to this time as “the period ESSO of Latin
American art,” was juror in all of them. Using National Cultural institutions and local
informants, a call for artists got more than 3,2000 entries. One of the objectives was to establish
a Latin American Art Collection for Standard Oil, in addition to that at MoMA, which Nelson
Rockefeller’s had built. Argentinean-Colombia critic Marta Traba recognized the impressive
survey that placed its eyes not only on traditional art centers but also on small countries, “those
far away from any cultural route such as Bolivia, the Central American nations, and the
Antilles.” 142
The prizes consisted on, the national level, US$700 for painting and sculpture, and for the
Inter-American exhibition that took place in Washington, US$1,2000 plus tickets and hotel for
the winners to visit the opening event. 143 The jurors in the Inter-American event in Washington
were Alfred H. Barr Jr., Director of MoMA; Gustave von Groschwits, Director of the Carnegie
Museum of Pittsburgh; and Thomas Messer, Director of the Guggenheim Museum, New York.
Another interesting precedent for the intervention and shifting interest towards U.S.
culture was the exhibition titled “MAGNET: New York”. It was put together in September 1964
by the IAFA (Inter-American Foundation for the Arts) in order to bring attention to the art of
Latin America in New York City. The institute was created at a meting that took place in the
Bahamas in 1962. 144 Its objective was to come into terms with the raising ideologies crossing the
arts from both sides of the continent. 145 The exhibition showed the work of 28 Latin American
artists living in New York. In the introduction to the catalog Robert Wool, director of the agency,
affirmed, “Currently, Latin American artist are magnetized by New York as they used to be by
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Paris.” 146 The exhibition was curated by Stanton Loomis Catlin, director of the art gallery at
Yale Univeristy at the time; Thomas M. Messer from the Guggenheim Museum; and Ida E.
Rubin, IAFA visual arts director. 147
Many other exhibitions took place in the U.S. during the Cold War years. Most of them
organized through the OAS, IAFA (later the Americas Society, founded by David Rockefeller in
1965), and university galleries (in the peak of Area Studies dedicated to Latin America). That is
the case of “Art of Latin America after Independence” in 1967, curated by Stanton L. Catlin
(Yale) and Terence Grieder’s (University of Texas). Private Galleries, like Bonino in N.Y.C.,
and art events, supported by the Museum of Modern Art and with participation of the new
system of Museums of modern art in the region. 148
After the consolidation of an image more recognizable and malleable for the American
audiences and with help of regional institutions working under a controlled system, the next
logical step was the consolidation of the market. 149 A Latin American art market was a question
of strategy. In 1979, thanks to the contacts between the Rockefellers and Sotheby’s, the latter
started what is called the Week of Latin American Art. The first auction was a great sensation,
record prizes were reached by two of Diego Rivera’s portraits; Wifredo Lam’s Egue Orisi, la
hierba de los dioses (Ceux de la Porte Battante, 1945) reached a top price also. According to the
director of painting of Sotheby’s, Mary-Anne Martin, “Latin American Art is becoming a
sensation”; she explained that the affluence of some Latin American collectors (from Mexico
and Venezuela in particular) made the auction a success. Among the 500 buyers was David
Rockefeller. 150
Mary-Anne Martin, founder of Sotheby's Latin American Paintings Department, in her
essay titled "The Latin American Market Comes of Age," notes that "twenty-one years ago the
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Latin American art market didn't exist.” 151 She recounts that first auction (at which one Frida
Kahlo painting was bought for a mere $19,2000) because the minimal interest among non-Latin
buyers. After a series of prominent shows in the late 1980s, the public began to turn its attention
to Latin American art. To illustrate this, Martin traces the development of the market for works
by Frida Kahlo, Wifredo Lam, and Rufino Tamayo showing how renewed attention to Latin
American artists among both Latin and non-Latin collectors had pushed the demand for paintings
and sketches by these and other seminal artists through six and seven digit figures. A new
generation of collectors, Martin asserts, thanks to the work of Area Studies in Universities,
created a new generation of scholarship on Latin American placing a high premium on art, which
was unsold outside (and even inside) of Latin America itself a generation ago. 152 Finally the art
of the region had responded to the investments made by private-capital during the previous
decades.
2.2.4
Out of the Cage (the Cuban response)
Nonetheless, the major question remains; what does de-postcolonial subjectivity mean in
the Americas? After more than a century of the independence from Spain and Portugal, many of
the same forces are still in place in many dimensions of the social, political, economic, and
cultural life of the region.
By the 1980s the Cuban intellectual community understood the deep implications of the
economic and cultural models imposed by the Pan-American Union (and the OAS). If Cubans
wanted to establish an alternative path for Latin America’s cultural development in visual arts,
they had to find one that could be shared with others in the region. Using the early work of
sociologist Nestor García Canclini, Cuban art theoreticians and critics recognized a way to do it.
51
In 1975, Casa de las Américas magazine printed Nestor García Canclini’s his long essay, “Para
una teoría de la socialización del arte Latinoamericano.” 153 In the essay he offered a reading of
the socio-cultural implications of U.S. imperialism within the region.
Canclini reviewed the “universal aesthetic paradigm,” looking at the implementation of
the ideology of art for art’s sake in the subcontinent. He argued that it is evident that a regional
Art History cannot be constructed. 154 He underlined the fact that Art History had placed toomuch attention on “art pieces and the life of individuals,” that the new ideology in culture was
sustained on the notion of a weak individuality. It had been demonstrated as false by the
implementation of forces controlling the production, circulation, and demand of culture (he used
Adorno and Hockheimer’s Dialectic of Enlightment as theoretical base for his studies, and then
he applied empirical research).
If we consider that the aesthetic, as object of study, is the process that includes artists,
art works, mediators, and audiences. The history of art will be, then, the history of the relations
between those components, and its transformations from culture to culture. In sum, the history
of certain relations between practices, its aesthetic dimension and the condition of production,
in addition to the social projects one looks to surpass these conditions. 155
Using Garcia Canclini’s early work, in addition to the new readings of their own
intellectuals working at the time, Cuban scholars arrived at the conclusion that the supposed
individuality on which the model (of modern art and the ideology of Art for Art’s Sake) was
based had failed. The same socio-economic process that gave individualism space to be, took it
away when the new international canon was introduced (they refer to Abstract Expressionism
and the formalist agenda). 156 Standardization neutralized the role art could play in society. It
emerges from the new economic and cultural model, where art and the artist are under the
dictatorship of the market and framed under a “cinematic, visual, and mass-media model thanks
to the monopoly of production and circulation of goods and services.” 157 In addition, it erases
52
individuality, establishing a common ground where institutions and individuals were under
control without knowing it.
Other important contributors to Cuban intellectual awareness (besides the obligatory
readings of Marxist-Leninist literature coming from the Eastern Bloc) were the work of Marta
Traba and later Juan Acha. Traba showed how Latin American Art was under a “third wave of
colonization” (the first two were Spanish and French). She stated that “this third invasion has
new characteristics, not only it is about exporting aesthetic forms, facts, and principles but also
of being a magnet for artists. The inner-circle of Latin American artists is already living in the
Unites States and/or planning an exhibition in New York City” (Marta Traba refers to the
MAGNET exhibition when discussing the ESSO exhibitions). 158 With respect to the ESSO
exhibitions, in one of the selective exhibits in Venezuela (1965), she argued that “it is necessary
to review, objectively, the current artistic production of Latin America. It seems to me, based on
the art pieces in display, that young Latin American art is showing dangerous levels of mimicry
and loss of identity.” 159
Marta Traba had founded, with Gloria Zea (ex-wife of painter Fernando Botero) the
Museum of Modern Art Bogotá in 1963. Paradoxically, she was a close ally of private support
for the arts. In her book, Dos Decadas Vulnerables de las Arte Plásticas Latinoamericanas.
1950-1970 (Two Vulnerable Decades for Latin American Visual Arts. 1950-1970), written in
1973, she affirmed:
There are not the artists from the U.S, not even their critics or museums, whom had
dominated us. There are the cultural manipulators that need easy subjects with open paths to
absorb the dissident artist. The homogenization of Latin American art during these two decades
(1950-1970) is not, unfortunately, an homage to the great inventive spirit of U.S. artists; it is
only, and sadly, a “following (closing) rank” around the cultural manipulators. 160
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2.3
IN CULTURAL TERMS
“When in December 1976 I assumed the responsibility to create the Ministry of Culture, with a group of civil
employees we undertook the task of organizing a network of cultural institutions and, especially, artistic, within the system
of the economy of the country. I realized fully the importance, and enormous complexity that the cultural (spiritual)
production has as a source of economic wealth.” Armando Hart Dávalos 161
By popular culture in the late 1970s, Cuban officials, meant film and music. In fact, Alfredo
Guevara’s discourse on film during the 1976 Party Congress, that would be the bases for the new
Cuban constitution and trigger for the creation of the Ministry of Culture, focused on ICAIC’s
continuing political and cultural importance. Guevara would become Cuba’s UNESCO
ambassador from 1980-85. In the national press he proudly reported ICAIC’s 1959-76
production of seventy-one full-length films, and more than five hundred fifty documentary films,
etc., as national patrimony and as part of the process of “decolonization”. 162 Writers of the Latin
American “Boom” (Gabriel García Márquez, Carlos Fuentes, Mario Vargas Llosa, Julio
Cortazar, and José Donoso among others), traveled back and forth to Cuba -a sign that culture
played a major role in raising consciousness of decolonization. There were also an outpouring of
publications such as Casa de las Américas magazine, and the cultural journals Bohemia,
Criterios, Albur, Revolución y Cultura, Juventud Rebelde, El Caimán Barburdo and
Pensamiento Crítico etc., that brought to Cuba a flow of new ideas and contemporary debates,
not only in literary but also in cultural and visual criticism. 163
54
Figure 8. El Caimán Barbudo & Revolución y Cultura
2.3.1
Fluid Thought: Cultural criticism in Cuba at the time
Art criticism also rose exponentially and Cuba witnessed the re-appropriation,
expropriation, and transit of two generations of thinkers. A great number of publications became
training grounds and battle fields for important cultural debates, where young writers had the
possibility to express alternative concepts outside of the cultural establishment. The development
of a new Cuban criticism in literature, visual arts, architecture, design, theatre, cinema,
aesthetics, and popular culture emerged from these journals; international and local events
became a platform for debate. 164
55
During the decade of the 1980s, a new generation of art critics, born out the Revolution,
was taking over the places of the best known. Following Fernando Ortiz’ legacy, they exercised
an open and wider practice of writing from art reviews to cultural criticism, fashion and design,
theory, and political commentary. Among those active in the period were Desiderio Navarro
(philosophy), José Veigas (art); Roberto Segre (architecture and urbanism), Angel Rivero (film),
Jaime Saruski (literature and popular culture); Alejandro Alonso (art), Manuel Lopez Oliva (art),
Salvador Bueno (literature, folk, and pop culture), Adelaida de Juan (art history), Marta Arjona
(patrimony, architecture, culture, and art), Gerardo Mosquera (art, literature, and popular
culture); Jorge de la Fuente (philosophy, photography, and art), Rufo Caballero (art, theory),
Rafael Lopez Ramos (art), and Nelson Herrera Ysla (architecture, design, and art). At first, they
followed Lezama Lima, Cabrera Infante, Guillén, Fernandez Retamar, Benitéz Rojo, and
Portuondo’s work, but soon departed from formulas of literary criticism by introducing popular
culture and moving in the direction of cultural studies (informed by the work of people such as
Nestor García Canclini and Jesús Martín Barbero), postmodern thinking, and with a clear counter
colonial (anti-imperialist) discourse (in the fashion of the new cultural anthropology).
This group has been fundamental to the constitution of critical thinking in the 1980s and
had an important impact on the cultural production of the 1990s. In Déjame que te Cuente.
Antología de la crítica en los 80s /Let Me Tell You. Anthology of 1980s criticism (2002) the
authors, Margarita Gonzalez, Tania Parson, and José Veigas, collected texts from 28 critics in
order to “show the diversity of tendencies that meet then.” 165 The book evidences the dramatic
changes that the art critical practice underwent during the decade. The artistic momentum in the
island is manifested through the articles that emphasized the work of the generation of artists
who participated in the now historical exhibition Volumen Uno. 166 In fact the publication starts
56
with three articles on the issue, two by Gerardo Mosquera and one by Angel Tomás, discussing
the emergence of a generation and the new artistic practice. In “Seis Nuevos Pintores” (Six New
Painters) and “Volumen Uno” (published as texts for the catalogs of the exhibitions with the
same title), Mosquera announces the abandonment of formalist formulas and the upcoming of a
generation that “está abierta al futuro” (is open to the future), and that “regarding the results,
their importance is that there is a feeling of new air impregnated with the aroma of fresh paint
vital, experimental, and idealist enthusiasm. Welcome.” 167 On the other hand, Tomás makes a
more thorough analysis in his article “Desafió en San Rafael ¿Inicio de una ruta o retorno al
pasado?” (San Rafael’s Challenge: A new route or the return to the past?) this was published in
El Caimán Barbudo. The text mentions the street in which the exhibition took place, San Rafael,
and the artist’s medium-age (25 years). In addition, it introduces a series of comments on the
state of Cuban artistic practice at the time and underlines the experimental dimension of the
artists in the exhibition. For the author this is a complex issue since “this aesthetic attitude could
signal the danger of taking as direction the presuppositions made by the ‘vanguards’ promoted
and manipulated by the Metropolis.” 168 At the same time he calls for a vote of confidence,
comparing the new group with “el grupo de los once” (the Eleven Group) that in the 1950s
helped to actualize Cuban painting.
Figure 9. Cover of Déjame que te Cuente. Antología de la crítica en los 80s (2002)
57
These articles, written in the first part of the 1980s, would establish that, indeed, a third
generation of Cuban artists was coming to age. The first generation they refer to is that of
Wifredo Lam’s and the ones whom embraced modernism (among others, Amelia Peláez, Rene
Portocarrero, and Victor Manuel). The second generation is constituted by the Eleven Group
(Raúl Martínez, Sandú Darié, Salvador Corratgé, Luis Martínez Pedro, Loló Soldevilla, Pedro de
Oraá, Sandra Eiriz and Servando Cabrera Moreno among others). Both generations brought
international aesthetic influences to the fore (the first one modernism, the second lyrical
abstraction) and developed a transcultural Cuban style. For critics, such as Rufo Caballero “for
Luis Camnitzer those were the Cuban Renaissance; for Mosquera a movement of renovation; in
my opinion (they are) the fifth movement in the history of the Cuban art of twentieth century
after three generations of vanguard artists before 1959 and the fertile reverberation of the
60s.” 169
It is also important to mention the selection of texts by some non-Cuban authors in the
same volume, such as Lucy Lipard, John Bentley Mayss, and Luis Camnitzer. Lucy Lipard had
traveled to Cuba (a result of her friendship with artist Ana Mendieta) twice during early 1980s.
In her piece “Made in United States: Art from Cuba” published in Art in America in 1986, she
observes the specifics that made of the three Cuban artists under discussion (part of an exchange
program organized by Camnitzer) universal enough to be accepted in the U.S., and leave a space
to doubt and be amused by what the audience (she counts as part of it) cannot grasp from its
cultural specificities. 170
Publications concerning cultural matters were frequent in Cuba, and often acutely
perceptive. However, in the visual arts, few general books were published. Mostly it was
reviews, some catalogs, and critical essays addressing in particular the history of Revolutionary
58
art. 171 Finally, in 1983, Gerardo Mosquera published his Exploraciones en la Plástica Cubana
(Explorations in Cuban Visual Arts) in which he sets the tone for a new art criticism and
historicity. 172 The book is a compilation of articles from his publications in Revolución y
Cultura, Bohemia, Granma, and in catalogs and brochures for solo and group exhibitions. It is
interesting to note the way Mosquera builds up an intercultural structure and how a new set of
issues are raised when “exploring” Cuban art. The term exploration shows his interests in
anthropology and ethnology that bursts into his discourse in several levels. Travel logs, critical
history, iconologies, formalist analysis, monographic report, and poetry. An interest in cultural
anthropology, popular culture (it is better to say local culture), and Marxism where the socioeconomic context is woven in as part of a complex but engaging narrative, beginning from preHispanic, indigenous, primitive times and then jumping (literarily) to late modern and
contemporary artists. For Mosquera it was clear that a critical discourse had to set itself within
the local (but also have a universal objective). He places importance on oral traditions, popular
imaginary, ritual practices, customs, and traditions. At the same time, he brings (in waves of
comments and quotes) notes from anthropologists, sociologies, writers, critics, and to a lesser
degree art historians. However, it is clear that he had a deep knowledge of the history of art, and
not only of Western art history but also North American and indeed, Soviet Modern and
contemporary art. 173
The first part of the book is, as he puts it, an “exploration to the deepest past” in which he
seems amused by the abstract sophistication of the long extinct native indigenous people of the
island. This interest was also shared by Ana Mendieta, who traveled to Cuba in 1981 searching
for the essence of her Cuban identity in something beyond the politics of the time, going to the
59
ancient, to what was erased, the residues of ancient cultures in the caves of Jaruco near Havana;
and puts them (Mosquera and Mendieta) on the same plateau.
However, Mosquera draws attention to the formal characteristics of this type of art, and
connects it to universal values. These abstract forms, he believe, have a ritual dimension that
brings out from the silence of the past a powerful force. They could establish a new platform to
understand Cuban identity. On one hand, in the case of Mendieta, her individuality is at stake; on
the other, Mosquera’s work addresses the local-lost in a context of the national becoming a
universal (or at least Tri-Continental) identity. 174
Later in the book Mosquera jumps to the present, for him the mid-to-late 1970s. It is clear
how his experiences working in the Visual Arts Division at the Ministry of Culture shaped his
work and writing (since many of the essays featured were written for exhibitions organized for
the Visual Arts Division). His monographic reports go beyond the classificatory and surveying
purposes and describe the human dimension of the artist in each study. 175 Short essays on art
genres such as photography are directed towards the documentary value of the medium, and his
comments on landscape and portraiture underline the social and historical relevance of the
genres. 176 In this section he publishes one of his most important and celebrated interviews with
Wifredo Lam titled, “Mi pintura es un acto de descolonizacion” (My Painting is an Act of
Decolonization). 177 In the last section “Expedición al Futuro” (Expedition to the Future)
Mosquera establishes a generational battle that would take place in the 1980s. He states that the
future belongs to the youth, and argues that “some young artists, that we will visit, are so far
more important that many of the old generation.” 178
Publications like this would follow and featuring not only artists but also critics and
debates that would come to age taking by storm the Cuban and later the Third-World art scene.
60
Soon after, new names would join in making the debates rich in new thinking. Poststructuralist,
Postmodern, and Postcolonial criticism would inform the work of Guadalupe Alvarez, Antonio
Eligio (Tonel), Madeline Izquierdo, Iván de la Nuéz, Eugenio Valdez Figueroa, Osvaldo
Sánchez, and Magali Espinosa, and subsequently the younger curators and critics of the Lam
Center -Margarita Sánchez, Ibis Hernandez, Hilda M. Rodríguez, José Manuel Noceda, and
Dannys Montes de Oca among others. In the next chapters we will have the opportunity to
introduce their work and critical contribution.
2.3.2
Fluid Action: art exhibitions influence and impact
With the creation of the Ministry of Culture in 1976, many exhibitions started to take
place in Cuba and abroad. They set the tone for what was happening in the country just before
the opening of the First Havana Biennale. They attest to the return of Cuban artists to the Venice
and São Paulo Biennials, and the many international shows taking place in Latin America. They
are important sources of information not only about new tendencies in art, styles, fashions and
customs, but also in terms of structural models to follow in the creation of local exhibitions.
As major antecedents, some of the previous attempts to imagine a common identity in
Cuba, then in the Americas, and later the Third World are worth mentioning.
In 1940 the National Institute of Visual Arts (part of the Ministry of Education) and La
Universidad de la Havana, organized three major shows: “Escuelas Europeas” (European
Schools) in February, 1940; “El Arte en Cuba: su evolución en la obra de algunos artistas”
(Cuban Art: Evolution in the work of some artists) in April, 1940; and “300 Años de Arte en
Cuba” (300 Years of Cuban Art) in July, 1940. The curators for those exhibitions were the artist
Domigo Ravenet and the critic Guy Pérez Cisneros. 179 In 1941 the institute, pushing the Agenda
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of Modern Art, organized the “Exposición de Arte Contemporáneo” (Exhibition of
Contemporary Art) in November, 1941 as part of the events on the inter-American Conference
on Intellectual Cooperation taking place in Havana the same year. Modernist art was winning the
battle against academic practices, for instance in 1943 Alfred Barr Jr. visited the island on his
Latin American tour. He attended to a meeting where the major topic in discussion was the
cosmopolitan dimension of Cuban art and the international style of the school of Paris. 180 Barr
finished his Latin American trip bringing with him some 300 pieces from the region. In March
31, 1943 he opened the exhibition “Latin American Art in the Museum of Modern Art
collection”. As noted above, Barr had established contact in Cuba with young critic and gallery
manager José Gómez Sicre, by the time director of Galería de Prado in Havana. In his trip, Barr
had promised Gómez Sicre an exhibition on “Modern Cuban Painters” that would take place in
MoMA in April 1944. It would shape the generation of the “Eleven Group” establishing a
formalist agenda in the Island before the Revolution.
International Biennales were held (with some regularity) in Latin America during those
decades, but with the exception of São Paulo (1953) none of them survived. Among others: The
Bienal Interamericana in Mexico, organized by INBA (1958); La Bienal Americana de Arte
organized by Kaiser Auto Industries in Cordova, Argentina (1962); La Bienal de Medellín,
organized by Coltejer, a textile company (with international character from 1968-80); The Salon
Internacional Armando Reverón in Venezuela, organized by the Fina Gómez Foundation (with
biennial character during the 1960s); and three graphic art events taking place in Santiago
(Chile), Puerto Rico, and Cali (Colombia); the Bienal Americana de Grabado (1963); Bienal
Internacional de Grabado (1972); and the Bienal Americana de Artes Gráficas (1973)
subsequently, among others.
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It is worth mentioning, also, academic events that emphasized the identity of Latin
America and its cultural autonomy. In 1981 El Foro de Arte Contemporáneo de Méjico / the
Contemporary Art Forum organized in Mexico City was devoted to, “Latin American Visual
Arts and Identity.” The event discussed under the postmodern critique the identity of the arts of
the region. For Cuba, Lesbia Vent Dumois (Director of Visual Arts from Casa de las Américas)
and the artist Flavio Garciandía (from Volumen Uno) attended. The same year Garciandía won
the first prize for drawing in the IV Bienal Americana de Artes Gráficas in Cali, Colombia. 181
Exhibitions taking place in Havana during the 1980s were also fundamental to the
circulation of knowledge on the new artistic scene, and for establishing a collective
consciousness on the role of the visual in the new cultural policy, building a group (a community
of interest), and carrying the project further. Some galleries and cultural centers, prior the
opening of the first Havana Biennale, became important as platforms for new artists. Galería L
(Gallery L) and the Centro de Arte Internacional (International Art Center) opened in 1980.
These were spaces of debate. In 1980 Gallery L organized the Salon Nacional de Artes Plásticas
-Escuelas de arte (Nacional Salon -for Art Schools), and the Internacional Art Center opened the
1er Salón Nacional de Pintura y Escultura Carlos Enríquez (1st National Salon of Painting and
Sculpture Carlos Enríquez), the Salón de Artes Plásticas de la UNEAC (UNEAC’s Visual Arts
Salon) presented an exhibition featuring the first promotion from the ISA. The same year the
Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes (the Nacional Museum of Fine Arts) organized its VIII Salón
Nacional Juvenil de Artes Plásticas (the 8th National Salon of Visual Arts for youngsters).
In 1981 three new art spaces (re) opened, Galería Habana (Havana Gallery); Centro de
Arte 23 y 12 (Art Center 23 and 12); and Centro Provincial de Artes Plásticas (Provincial Center
for Visual Arts), which would played an important role in recognizing new talents. In addition,
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the former Hilton Hotel, now named Hotel Habana Libre, allowed young curators to use some of
its spaces as galleries. Mosquera, Garciandía, and Veigas organized an exhibition titled “Jóvenes
Artistas: Retrospectiva” (Retrospective of Young Artists). The National Museum of Fine Arts
featured the work of American post-conceptualist Roger Welch with an exhibition titled
“Escultura subconsciente” (Subconscious Sculpture), this artist would influence the young
generation of Cuban artists who were interested in international movements. 182 1981 was a
particularly intense year with respect to the new generation of Cuban artists. It is the year of
Volumen Uno; other exhibitions such as “Sano y Sabroso” (Healthy and Juicy) in Centro de Arte
23 y 12 featured the same group of Volumen Uno just months after their break-through show.
Later that year seven out of the eleven artists of Volumen Uno participated in a collective
performance against the fabrication of the neutron-bomb in Old Havana. Artists such as Antonio
Eligio (Tonel), who then was working as a cartoonist, would have their first chance in the world
of art (today he is also an important critic). The exhibition “Humor, Línea y Concepto” (Humor,
Line, and Concept) in Gallery L introduced this kind of practice into the Cuban main-stream.
Internationally, thanks to Ana Mendieta and Luis Camnitzer, the artists in residence
program at Westbeth Gallery in New York City featured the work of ten Cuban artists in the
exhibition titled “First Look: 10 young artists from today’s Cuba” in November that year. It
opened a new era of art exhibitions of Cuban artists in the United States, a link that broke more
than twenty years of isolation. Other international exhibitions organized by the Cuban
government were circulating aspects of the new Cuban art during early 1980s. “Cuban Posters,
Drawings, and Graphics” toured India in 1980-81 (Lalit Kala Gallery, New Delhi); “Art from
Cuba” was exhibited in the T.V Tower Gallery in the G.D.R.; “The Generation of the Real
Hope” toured Eastern Europe (Prague and Budapest), among other places.
64
In June of that year Gerardo Mosquera presented his book Trece artistas jóvenes
(Thirteen Young Artists) with an exhibition in Galería Habana featuring artists from Volumen
Uno. In 1982 the Havana Gallery exhibited works by José Bedia, Gustavo Peréz Monzón,
Ricardo Rodríguez Brey, and Rubén Torres Llorca in an exhibition titled 4 (Four); in addition it
featured the exhibition “Vereda Tropical” by Flavio Garciandía (first of a series). Another space
that became important was the Casa de la Cultura Plaza (Culture House) in Plaza featuring work
by Bedia (his Crónicas Americanas, first of a series), Rogelio López Marín, Francisco Elso (his
famous exhibition “Tierra, Maíz, Vida”), and the first solo exhibition by Marta María Perez
Bravo. Centro de Arte 23 y 12 featured the exhibition “Generación de la Esperanza” (Generation
of Hope) and the first exhibition by the collective 4x4 (Gustavo Acosta, Moisés Finalé, José
Franco, and Carlos Alberto García). Later that year the collective would exhibit at Gallery L.
Exhibitions in New York, “Los novísimos Cubanos,” (The New Cubans) was held at the
Signs Gallery and in Mexico “Pintura Joven Cubana” (Young Cuban Painting) at Gallery Rafael
Cortés circulated the new art production, increasing the interest and opening a market for new
Cuban art.
In 1983 the Latin American Gallery of Casa de las Américas invited Luís Camnitzer to
exhibit his work and to participate in a series of talks on conceptual art. 183 Havana Gallery
featured the work of a new collective “Hexágono” (Consuelo Castañeda, Humberto Castro,
Sebastián Elizondo, Antonio Eligio, Abigail García, and María Elena Morera). Another
collective, with support of Armando Hart Dávalos, organized an art-event in a factory (“Arte en
la Fábrica”) to introduce workers to the new art-practices. And, also, took place the first
Encounter of Art Historians and Critics where Mosquera presented his book Exploraciones en la
plástica Cubana.
65
In 1984 new names were included in the program for local galleries; the most important
artists, however, were eagerly working to answer the international call-for-artists to participate in
the first Havana Biennale. The Biennale took place in the National Museum of Fine Arts and the
Cuban Pavilion from May 22 to July 9. 184
2.4
THE FIRST HAVANA BIENNALE
“By the projection of Wifredo Lam’s work and by the sources that nourished his figure - the Center that bears
his name summons the artists who forge the authentic contemporary image of a world that has undertaken the reconquest of its own identity. In this first opportunity, the call is confined to the visual artists from Our America. In the
future, there will be also with us those of Asia and Africa.”
Wifredo Lam Center 185
The catalog of the first Havana Biennale begins with these simple but visionary words.
The exhibition opened on May 22, 1984, simultaneously in the Museum of Fine Arts and the
Cuban Pavilion in Havana city. It was organized by Beatriz Aulet, director of plastic arts and
design office of the Ministry of Culture, and produced by a group of specialists from the
Ministry. Among them were Gerardo Mosquera, Nelson Herrera Ysla, and José Veigas with
assistance of Leticia Cordero and others.
The short text that introduces the Biennale also underlines how “victims of the powerful
mechanisms of the market, the so-called Third-World artists, have struggled to gain a space in
the metropolitan centers; isolated and without the possibility to confront each other.” 186 The
Biennale organizers understood the lack of circulation and recognition of the vital art in the
region. In opposition to OAS views, they believed that the only way to establish a real counter66
cultural response to cultural imperialism was by creating a common ground where an
autonomous identity could be forged not for individuals but for the region at large. They
recognized cultural dependency as the enemy to confront, and suggested a way to overcome it.
According to them, it is through recognition, by “knowing each other better,” through
understanding between artists and the people (the public or the audience) that a subject comes to
age. 187 The preface ends by noting the modesty of their approach, but at the same time, their
commitment and audacity to continue. It makes clear that under the ideal of connecting Third
World artists to the people, they will make possible a dialog, the same dialog that had nurtured
the many cultures and the one nation that believes in art (the text refers to Cuba). The preface
ends “because, as art, it had been struggling over and over for just the right of being in the
world.” 188
Figure 10. Cover catalog (depicting the Cuban Pavilion), 1st Havana Biennale
67
Poet Eliseo Diego (president of the UNEAC at the time), wrote the introduction for the
catalog. In it Diego, using an official tone, recognizes the work of Wifredo Lam as a great
Revolutionary artist and, perhaps, the most important Cuban artist ever. He expressed gratitude
to the more than seven hundred artists participating and underlines the multiplicity of styles and
tendencies that give a glimpse into the creativity and world views of artists around the region. He
emphasized the cultural fusion, the transcultural dimension of the Americas, referring to
Guillén’s use of the term mestizaje, “where the strength of Latin America and the Caribbean
inhabits, and from where the region could offer hope to the convulsive humanity of the time.” 189
He remembered the work of the Mexican Muralists that included artists in the construction of a
new society. He argued that the Cuban Constitution, drawing from this experience, recognizes
the same spirit. Diego emphasized the fact that photography is participating at the same level
than the rest of the arts, introducing a testimonial dimension to the exhibition. Finally, he
envisioned the role the Havana Biennale would have, not only in recognizing new names (young
artists) but also in connecting what is disconnected. In creating a net, as the Cuban Revolution
had intended by itself, in order to reintegrate what was dispersed (and here he mentions the
future presence of African and Asian artists) by the colonial forces of the new imperialist
adventure. 190
According to Nelson Herrera Ysla, “the idea of establishing the Wifredo Lam Center and
the Biennial came forward during a meeting between Lam’s widow and Fidel Castro, in the
presence of Hart Dávalos and other members of the cultural community. It seems that during the
meeting the idea was discussed. The Biennial’s character was also defined; a space for ‘ThirdWorld’ artists, in part following the new set of artistic events taking place in Havana.” 191 These
included the Latin American Theater Festival (1980), the already famous Festival del Nuevo
68
Cine Latino Americano (1979), in addition to Casa de la Américas’ international program.
Herrera Ysla recalls: “Immediately, under Aulet’s direction and with support of other cultural
institutions, we started to work for the first Biennial.” 192 Marcia Leiseca, Vice-Minister of
Culture supported the event in its totality. A few months later Llilian Llanes would be called in
from her work at ISA to structure and form the Wifredo Lam Center as the academic and
research center for contemporary art and to oversee the planning of the Havana Biennale.
The First Havana Biennale was organized entirely under the Ministry of Culture’ Visual
Arts Direction. It was envisioned as an international survey exhibition and conceived as a mega
event that reacted to, but also mimicked, the bourgeois legacy of the world-expo and the art-fair
model, but which could become a force for the art produced outside the North-European axis. In
its first edition, it called artists from Latin America and the Caribbean, and invited few others
from North America, Asia (Japan), and also from East Europe (Poland, and Czechoslovakia).
Using initially the data base and link of institutions such as Casa de las Américas, and with help
from critics, artists, and art historians from Latin America it brought together some eight hundred
artists (715 in competition) and more than two thousand art works. The format was a surveycontest covering all artistic genres such as painting, sculpture, drawing, graphic art, and
photography.
As a survey, it also offered a number of awards and mentions. The winners of prizes
were: Arnold Belkin, (México), José Gamarra y Carmelo Arden Quin, (Uruguay), Branca de
Oliveira y Alirio Palacios (Venezuela), Carlos Alonso (Argentina), Fernell Franco, (Colombia),
Gustavo Acosta y Rogelio López Marín (Cuba). A thorough discussion on some of these works
will appear in chapter 5.
69
Figure 11. Arnold Belkin, “Betrayal and Death of Zapata.” Portable Mural (detail), 1982
In addition to the competitive section, four exhibitions were assembled, presenting to the
Cuban audience the work of Venezuelan Jacobo Borges, Ecuadorian Oswaldo Guayasamín,
Chilean Roberto Matta, and Mexican Francisco Toledo. Parallel to the event a symposium
dedicated to the life and work of Wifredo Lam was organized. It invited scholars working,
internationally, on Wifredo Lam’s legacy.
Gerardo Mosquera, Nelson Herrera Ysla, and José Veigas (in a lesser role) under the
direction of Beatriz Aulet, are noteworthy the founders of the Havana Biennale. The first edition
closed in late July and the returning of the works took several months to complete. It is during
that moment that the Wifredo Lam Center would become operative. Later that year Mosquera
and Herrera Ysla would join Llilian Llanes at the nascent art center.
The first Havana Biennale also underlined its collective spirit. When looking for the
names of the organizers in the Catalog and related material published around the Biennale, no
names are mentioned. Credits to the museographer, Fernando O’Reilly (Architect) with the
assistance of Hector Veitía, Rodolfo López, and Juan Betancourt were given. The organizational
70
committee (The direction of Plastic Arts and Design of the Ministry of Culture) expressed
gratitude also to a series of institutions and people mostly from Latin America and Europe
(France and Spain in particular) but not mention themselves.
In the same year, events such as the XVIII São Paulo Biennial occurred, and ARCO 84
(the Ibero-American Art Fair founded in 1981) celebrated its third staging in the Cristal Palace in
Madrid. The Museum of Modern Art, in New York, was also reopened that year after a major
expansion on its now traditional locale in 53rd Street. In May 17, 1984 a week before the opening
of the Havana Biennale MoMA opened the exhibition titled, International Survey of Recent
Painting and Sculpture, curated by Kynaston McShine; later that year it would open the
controversial “Primitivism” in 20th Century Art. Affinities of the Tribal and the Modern
organized by William Rubin, the successor of Alfred H. Barr as chief curator. Artists such as
Robert Mapplethorpe were succeeding raising contentious issues in the art centers of the U.S.
Identity politics and postmodernism that made their entry through philosophy and architectural
projects had become central to discourse and practice.
2.5
CONCLUSION
The Havana Biennale is the product of the debates on identity politics, decolonization,
postmodernity, as well as major geopolitical changes in relation to the U.S. and the Eastern Bloc,
during late 1970s and early 1980s, and which were fully deployed in the 1990s. As well, it is an
extension of the political and ideological debates that took place not only in Cuba, but also in
Latin America, Africa, and Asia during the post Second World War years. It has responded to
and generated dialog among equals, at the same time promoting and recognizing diversity and
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difference. The consciousness of an emergent artistic culture, parallel to but critical of the
mainstream, was cultivated in the first part of the 20th century, above all by the avant-garde
movements of the early 20th century. By the 1960s variants of it were occurring throughout the
South. Cuban critic Osvaldo Sánchez says of the Cuban art production during the period: “We
lived the copy as the sublime operation; we built our heritage on opportunistic license, Neither
Cartesian logos, Yankee pragmatism or modernist epistemologies succeeded in dominating the
ritual dimension of our praxis.” 193
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PART TWO
73
3.0
PORT/PIER – MAPS – ROUTES – NETWORKS
This world map of radial nuclei and unplugged areas causes intense currents in search of connection. The global orbit
structurally generates the Diaspora. The inherent contradiction is reproduced in the centers' control toward immigrants: they fear
them as much as they need them.
Gerardo Mosquera
194
This chapter describes the work model of the Wifredo Lam Center, its paradigmatic
practice, and the process of developing the center’s conception of Third-World art. It also
functions as a chronotopi of the nine enactments of the event, presenting an archeology from the
inside out using primary material and interviews.
Note. This section is informed by a series of interviews that took place during 2003, 2006, and
2007. The interviews were conducted with members (active or retired) of the core group of
curators and collaborators working within the Wifredo Lam Center for Contemporary Art. Some
occurred during the 8th and 9th Biennale in 2003 and 2006, in Havana City, others in Barcelona,
Madrid, Merida (MX), New York, Rome, and Pittsburgh during the same period. Each subject is
identified by his/her name; the complete transcription will be attached as an appendix.
Additionally, a series of charts and maps have been produced in order to visualize the
discussions, trajectories, debates, artists, curators, and institutions involved in the Biennale’s
history. Short discussions of some of the ‘land-mark’ artists in each edition will also be presented
(if relevant). Above all, an exploration of the academic, empirical, and conceptual dimensions
that informed and illuminated the group’s inner work will be central to the present chapter.
74
3.1
THE WIFREDO LAM CENTER
Dedicated to and named after the great Cuban surrealist painter, this cultural center,
exhibition venue, and research institution was founded in February 28, 1983. Currently it is
located at San Ignacio No. 22, the corner of Empedrado Street at the east side of the Plaza de la
Catedral de la Habana in the Old Havana district declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in
1982. The Lam Center is housed in an 18th-century building (Casa del Obispo Penalver). The
Wifredo Lam Center for Contemporary Art is a cultural institution dedicated to the study,
research and promotion of contemporary visual arts from developing countries in Africa, Latin
America, Asia and the Caribbean. The building has spacious exhibition rooms, a library, a video
library, an internal patio, and areas for other cultural activities.
Figure 12. The Wifredo Lam Center. (left to right) Cathedral Plaza, external view, courtyard
The Havana Biennale is the Center’s main project. Since the event was first held in 1984
and throughout its many editions (ten by 2009), it has become a privileged meeting place for
those interested in contemporary art from Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean. More
than three thousand artists and over ten thousand art works, mostly from the Third World, have
been exhibited. A large number of critics, museum directors, merchants, editors of art magazines
and collectors from all over the world have met in Havana during the nine editions to exchange
thoughts and positions on the state of art and culture at the time.
75
For the founding members, the Wifredo Lam Center was an opportunity to build an
institution from the bottom up. At the same time, it became an institution that would train a new
generation of cultural agents. Remarkably, it began without an organizational structure; as part of
the cultural system, it had to find its place and start relating itself to the larger cultural policies
and institutions. It began from the activity of one person, Llilian Llanes, who searched for a
group of collaborators and, in a short time, formed a collective with a clear vision of what had to
be done to make real the objectives established by the official decree that brought the Center into
legal existence. The Lam Center also is one of the steps taken by the Ministry of Culture in order
to develop a system that was intended to put Cuba on the international map as the cultural
vanguard in the region, not only in Latin America, but also in the Third World and beyond.
The figure shows how the Ministry of Culture functions as an administrative center
where national directions (under the Minister and four Vice Ministers instruction), national
councils (one for each artistic area), and related institutions (such as the Casa de la Américas, the
National Museum of Fine Arts, the National Theater, etc.), function in relation to each other and
in concordance with other institutions under the management of the Ministry of Education. That
is the case of the Instituto Superior de Arte (ISA) and the national and provincial art schools. The
system is mirrored in the provinces and localities, which on a regional and local scale reenact the
same structure.
76
Figure 13. The Cuban Ministry of Culture structure
77
3.1.1
The Lam Center Organizational Model
Currently the Lam Center is under the direction of the CNAP (Consejo Nacional de las
Artes Plásticas). CNAP is an organ of the Ministry of Culture at the executive level, defining
cultural policy for the visual arts of the island. The Wifredo Lam Center is an institution
supported and fully funded by the Cuban state. However, like other cultural institutions, such as
Casa de las Américas, for example, the Lam Center has enjoyed a certain degree of
independence in the way it functions (thanks to Llanes’ direction). Other institutions, such as the
Provincial Center for the Arts, the National Salon (now Salon de Arte Contemporáneo), and the
network of art galleries, are more integrated into the system.
The Lam Center did not begin with a clear organizational structure, budget, physical
setting, or employees. That is why the First Havana Biennale was organized directly by the
Ministry of Culture’s Visual Arts and Design Office. In order to fulfill the functions the Lam
Center was charged with at the moment of its official creation in February, 1983, it had to start
building itself up from scratch. As noted in the first chapter, its functions are as follows:
78
Figure 14. List of “attributions and functions” of the Wifredo Lam Center at its creation
Several months after its creation, in March 1984, Llilian Llanes was appointed by Marcia
Leiseca (the powerful Vice-Minister of Culture at the time) as director of the new institution. 195
Llanes, an art historian by training, had been working at the University of Havana and later in the
ISA. An academic and civil servant, she subsequently became the administrative force and
conceptual leader of the Lam center. As artistic director and curator she is internationally
recognized as the person “who has probably built the largest biennial with the least means,
Llilian Llanes has pitted faith and imagination against scarcity.” 196 Llanes served as the director
of the Lam Center from 1984 to 1999.
The Center soon became an alternative venue for research and work for local artists and
scholars who were not well acquainted with the international circuit. While it went almost
completely unnoticed in Europe and the U.S., it was an extremely popular institution locally and
in the region. It soon became an artistic laboratory where Llanes’ vision for the Center (and the
Biennale) as a scholarly and artistic venue would be accomplished. In conjunction with the
Cuban Ministry of Culture, it constructed a discourse based on the collective experience of
marginalized artists affected by underdevelopment. At the same time they intended to establish a
79
high quality institution to research, promote, and exhibit the work of regional and Third World
artists. 197
Because of Llanes’ experience as an active member of the Revolution, and as a university
professor and cultural administrator, she had a vision of what the Lam Center and the Havana
Biennale would be like and what it might achieve. As a visual laboratory diametrically opposed
to the dominant U.S.-European model, it was focused on not only mapping the production of art
coming from the Third World through research and exhibitions, but also on placing their work
throughout the international circuit. Llanes had to establish a team that could cover all points
from the list of ‘attributions and functions’ for the new art center. That initial vision evolved in
almost a curatorial rhetoric, based on Llanes’ anti-imperialistic worldview and shared by
Mosquera and Herrera Ysla at the time. It also was influenced in many ways by the postmodern
impulse to de-centre the art world and its hegemonic history.
To make real such an institution, Llanes worked to establish a cultural center that had to
deal with: (a) research (about Wifredo Lam and Third World art); (b) exhibitions (local and
international); (c) documentation and archival material; (d) international relationships (to make
the Biennale part of a larger circuit); (e) communication and publications; (f) education (to
connect the Cuban public with contemporary art); and (g) an administrative dimension to support
their activities and actions. She initially discarded the idea of starting an art collection since it
was clear that for some time they would not have a physical space to store a growing collection.
The initial and most important part of the whole equation was to assemble a group of people who
were adequately prepared, but also open minded and malleable. This meant young and
inexperienced, but also enthusiastic and ready to join the enterprise.
80
Without the problems of a centralized and official (hierarchical) model, the Lam Center
has experienced a series of transformations which has made it in practice an organic, highly
flexible and adaptable institution. The changing conditions in Cuba, in addition to the external
pressures (economic, political, and cultural), as well as the volatility of the art world – all these
have acted upon it.
The figure shows the two key phases of the development of the Lam Center. The first
half, pictures the approach from its creation in 1983 to the first crisis in 1991 when Gerardo
Mosquera left the Center (reading it from bottom to top). It also depicts the location of the Center
with respect to the system (see previous figure). The second phase is expressed in a merely
horizontal organizational model, in which a central figure (the director) becomes just a
coordinator of the actions taken by the rest of the team. These phases in the evolution of the Lam
Center will be explained further in the next section and also in the one titled “Unpacking the
Biennale” at the end of this chapter.
81
Figure 15. Wifredo Lam Center Structure
82
3.2
TIME CAPSULES
Mikhail Bakhtin’s notion of a chronotopy can help, to some extent, to understand the
Havana Biennale as an intricate tangle of ideas, peoples, art works, historical contexts,
environments, political agendas, etc. The Russian literary theorist first introduced the concept in
a posthumously published study of the novel, where he sets out to disentangle different
connections between time and space in this literary genre. Chronotopy is a neologism in which
both dimensions are regarded as symmetrical and absolutely interdependent. The experience of
time and space are unconditionally connected and –at least from a theoretical point of viewdemand to be treated as equivalent analytical concepts. They constitute the observation grid by
means of which cultural products – in the case of Bakhtin mainly literature or more precisely, the
novel- can relate to the cultural context within which they are produced as well as perceived.
The particularity of a chronotopic analysis is the fact that it does not privilege time or
space, they are interdependent and they should be studied in this manner. If this is true we could
argue that Chronotopes become almost landmarks in time and space, something like a monument
for future reference. Chronotopes are symbols or forces, operating to shape communities and the
image of them. 198
The following material has to be treated and read as a chronotopy, its intent is to open a
time capsule via interviews of the agents involved in the development of the Havana Biennale, in
which individual experience is crossed by time and space. The Havana Biennale then becomes a
landmark for future reference in the art world of the Global South. It is not the only one, but is
one of the most relevant when analyzing cultural contexts in detail.
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3.3
A PERSONAL ARCHEOLOGY OF THE LAM CENTER
“In the search of a true universality where everyone may have their own space, the Center decided to
promote a more thorough understanding of the artistic values in developing countries, to advance a close integration
among artists, critics, and researchers based on their common interest and on the defense of their art, culture and
existence and, at the same time, to attract all those interested in a truly universal art everywhere in the world.”
Llilian Llanes 199
Members of the Center recall how they were invited to be part of the newly created Lam
Center. It is necessary to give them voice in order to understand this institution not as a machine
that produces certain products (a Biennale, catalogs, symposia and other exhibitions), but as a
body of experiential flows and connections that emerged in a particular historical window and
physical place that would help us to disentangle what James D. Helbert calls the age of “global
art”. 200
In this section, five of the members recruited by Llanes during the first years of the
Biennale recount their experiences. They comment on their initial approach to the Center, their
training and background, as well as some facts that help to set the organizational structure of the
institution during its gestation and development into a fully operational mode.
JOSE MANUEL NOCEDA. (Art Historian, at the Lam Center since November 1984) “I was
invited by my advisor, after graduation, to teach an architectural course at Havana University.
That was in 1984, when simultaneously Llilian Llanes contacted me to work in the newly
founded Wifredo Lam Center. She had been a professor at Havana University and she knew me,
so the invitation was tempting. I had just graduated and I knew after talking to her that the new
center would have a research nucleus and that it would be, maybe, the only one of its class in the
region. That would allow young art historians like me to work as researchers. Besides, it would
be in charge of organizing the Havana Biennale, which I had visited that year. I did not think
twice, and accepted. I went directly to work at the end of the first Havana Biennale. 201
SILVIA MEDINA DE MIRANDA. (Philologist, at the Lam Center 1984 to 1991) “Luisa
Campuzano was my advisor at Havana University; she was a good friend of Llilian Llanes, who
84
had recently been appointed Director of the Lam Center. In a meeting between Campuzano and
Llanes, the first commented that I could be a good candidate to work in the newly created Lam
Center. Campuzano also told Llanes also that I was a believer (practicing Catholic), and she did
not have any problem with that; I think that was important to clarify that, since in Cuba by the
time there was a complete separation between church and the state. Besides, the Lam Center was
established to be an international institution which would have to be in contact with people from
all over the world and any attachment to something that was not part of the project could be
against the candidate.
After an interview in which Llanes explained to me the emphasis on visual arts that the
Lam Center would have, and the fact that she was planning to incorporate a more rigorous
approach to the visual arts, which (according to her) were at the time a little “disorganized”. To
do research in the area, Llanes needed people coming from other disciplines and that factored
into her decision to have me there. It was precisely that, to bring methods from the classics to the
visual arts. For me it was like entering a new universe, however, I told her that I was interested. I
started to work with José Manuel Noceda on December the third, 1984.”
IBIS HERNANDEZ ABASCAL. (Art Historian, at the Lam Center since December 1984) “I
graduated in 1982 and immediately thereafter I started having my family. In 1983 the Wifredo
Lam Center was created. It started as a collective of specialists taking care of the first Havana
Biennale, which was organized under Beatriz Aulet, director of the visual arts office of the
Ministry of Culture. In mid 1984, I was contacted by Leticia Cordero, a former classmate and
college friend; she already was working in the Ministry of Culture during the organization of the
Biennale, and later would integrate the newly formed Lam Center. 202 She introduced me to
Llilian Llanes who had recently been appointed director. By November that year, I was working
on the return of the works of the first Biennale. It was organized entirely by Jose Veigás,
Gerardo Mosquera, and Nelson Herrera. Our first office was located in the building occupied by
the magazine Revolución y Cultura in Old Havana. Later in September 1985, the Wifredo Lam
Center would have its first physical space.
That is why, in the words of Llilian Llanes, the ones that worked before September, 1985,
are considered the founders of the Wifredo Lam Center for Contemporary Art. By that time the
group consisted of José Manuel Noceda, Nelson Herrera Ysla, Silvia María Medina de Miranda,
Leticia Cordero, Gerardo Mosquera (who had an important role in the vision of the Biennale),
Juan Blanco (who was in charge of customs and international relations), José Manuel Varela (the
founder of our library), among others.”
MARGARITA SANCHEZ PRIETO. (Art Historian, at the Lam Center since October 1985)
“We, in the Casa de las Americas, where I used to work, did not have a direct relationship with
the First Havana Biennale and the people working initially at the Wifredo Lam Center.
Nonetheless, we knew some of the people that started to work there -José Noceda, Silvia
Medina, and Ibis Hernandez in particular, because they used to come to the Casa asking for
information, directories, materials and the like. They did not have office space in those days and
used to work in a building, I do not recall now where. They worked with Llilian Llanes, the
founder and director of the Center. Later on, when I found out about the official opening of the
Wifredo Lam Center for Contemporary Art in 1985, at a physical location, I decided to apply.
The Center had to deal with Latin American art. That was clear from the First Havana Biennale.
Besides, the Center would be located in Old Havana, which for me was an important thing since
85
I was a new mother. A former professor from the University introduced me to Llilian Llanes. She
had expressed her interest in having a very young team, just graduates from Art History or
related areas. However, she made an exception with me since I was coming from the Casa de las
Américas. Llilian is a very demanding person not only in personal and in administrative terms,
but she also has a rigorous academic mind. She proposed that I would work in the area of
communications, but I expressed my interest to work in research. Finally, she accepted, and I
started in October 1985 in the newly restored house in Old Havana where the Lam Center was
located for some years.”
HILDA MARIA RODRIGUEZ. (Art Historian and Artist, at the Lam Center from 1986-2004.
Director 2001-2004) “During the Second Havana Biennale in 1986, the Provincial Center for
Visual Art participated actively in many parallel events. Collaboration has been one of the
Biennale’s strategies, it is part of the Biennale’s spirit, and many institutions come to join the
efforts of the Lam Center. As part of the general structure, the Provincial Center worked on the
collateral exhibitions and on the academic event. I participated in the organization of some of the
Cuban exhibitions that took place during that Biennale and in some of the discussions around the
international exhibitions that would take place during the event. We inserted ourselves into the
structure of the Biennale; we were part of it.
Since my research interests matched those of the Lam Center, and Llilian Llanes had the
opportunity to know me in action when working for the Provincial Center, I was accepted to
work with them in 1989. At the beginning, the Biennale was a survey and a competitive event for
the art produced in the Third World.”
3.3.1.1 Training and background
What Llilian Llanes was looking for in the new members of the Lam center was a solid
background and training in Art History or related areas, with emphasis on research and, if
possible, knowledge of contemporary art. In this section, the agents recall their experiences as art
history majors at the Universidad de la Habana; it also functions as an image of the ways
scholarly education took place in Cuba during the late 1970s and 1980s.
JOSE MANUEL NOCEDA. “I started my education in philosophy at the Marxist-Leninist
Department of Philosophy at the Havana University in 1976. At the end of the first academic
year I shifted to the Department of Arts and Letters and changed my major to Art History. This
change was not fortuitous, the philosophy department asked for something I could not give at the
time. With a group of friends from philosophy we made the decision. My interest in literature
and arts made the transition easier.
My parents used to be good readers, but without a particular orientation though. They
read works on a wide range of issues, and specially literature, not only Latin-American but also
universal. We did not have any connection with the intellectual world at the time, since my
parents were accountants immersed in the work of economics. However, today I find a link with
my childhood, my interest in literature, and world issues.
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Being at school, I realized the limitations of studying art history in a university in Cuba.
Nonetheless, we numbered an impressive group of professors; Doctors Rosario Novoa, Adelaida
de Juán, Mario Rodríguez Alemán, and Luz Merino Acosta, among others. They led the teaching
of art history in those years, and had developed a general bibliography for all students, with
materials they found available from all over the world for the classes they taught. They had a
profound knowledge and a large experience in the teaching of art. They dissect the concepts with
a simplicity and efficiency rarely found in a professor nowadays.
Indeed, the curriculum emphasized historiography and iconography. We did have some
classes on form and design as our bases for reading art, complementing the more historicist
approach. I would like to add, that the focus in those times was on the history of Western art,
rather than on a wider or particular perspective. Actually, we received really good training in
Western art from antiquity to the 1960s, even the 1970s. We had some classes on pre-Columbian
art, but the emphasis was always Europe and later the U.S.
I had the advantage, with that group of friends that jumped from philosophy, of having
received training in the history of science and Western thought. At the moment of studying
aesthetics, for example, we realized that the names were the same ones we had already studied
but now with a especial emphasis. In an unconscious way, I had previous training that allowed
me to see things from a wider angle.
I have always been more interested in history than in the practice of art in contemporary
times, so I have asked myself repeatedly how I have been able to work for so many years in an
institution that deals with contemporary art. On the other hand, I do have an interest in
architecture. My undergraduate thesis was a critical and theoretical treatise on Cuban modern
architecture.”
SILVIA MEDINA DE MIRANDA. “I graduated from Classic Literature and Philology at
Havana University in 1983. I had the fortune of having Luisa Campuzano as advisor. 203 I am
proud of being a philologist since it taught me to approach problems in a general way. As a
matter of fact, Llilian Llanes had a plan in mind when she asked me to work for the Lam Center;
she intended to establish an open archive starting with the material produced by the first Havana
Biennale. The material was entrusted to us, and who better to be in charge of it than me? My
skills as a philologist were important for the nascent Center; it was like building an institution
from the documental dimension. The artist’s curriculum vitae, the critical texts, the
administrative papers, etc., had to be organized in such a way that was useful for the future
institution. For me, it was a challenge since the material was coming from the Ministry of
Culture’s Office of Visual Arts and Design and would become the basis for the next Havana
Biennale.”
IBIS HERNANDEZ ABASCAL. “I was born in Havana province, in a tobacco town called
Santiago de las Vegas. My family has Spanish and African components; my grand-grandmother
Altagracia, from my father’s side, was a free-black (negra liberta). The rest of the family traveled
from the Canary Islands and Spain to the Americas during the colonial period. During the
Mexican-American war, my maternal grandfather traveled from Mexico to Cuba and became the
first judge in Santiago de las Vegas in the newly constituted Republic of Cuba in 1902. My
parents were workers in the tobacco and textile industry. My mother used to be a
“despalilladora” (striper), those who clean the tobacco leaves. Later, at the time of the
Revolution, she became a civil servant at the Ministry of Education. My father used to work in
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the textile industry. After the Revolution, he studied and became a food technician specializing
in the citrus industry. Like many Cubans, he was also a musician, and had a vocation for
education. At the triumph of the Revolution, he was already 42 years old and used to say that
“thanks to the Revolution, we will all have the opportunity of a better education.” He went into
the study of history, politics, and Marxism; he took me down that road. Certainly, he was a poor
man, but he had a conviction that education could transform us all.
I studied music since I was very little, maybe that helped me to choose Art History when
the time came. I studied in the Department of Art History at Havana University. In perspective, I
remember my professors who were in charge of delivering materials and bibliographies. I recall
how small the bibliography was comparing it with the work we do here at the Lam Center.
Nevertheless, they had a real vocation for education; Adelaida de Juán, Carlos Riña, and Rosario
Novoa, among others, were my teachers. They made a great effort because of the precariousness
of the working conditions that we have always had, not only here, but all over the Third World. I
talk about resources, technologies, and materials. Against the odds, we had access to hundreds of
images in each class, thanks to the outdated slide projector. We used texts prepared by our
professors for each course, and we explore the great Spanish collections and encyclopedias.
Because of our proximity to the department of history and philosophy, a theoretical component
was always present. In addition, a rigorous training in dialectical materialism, the political
economy of capitalism and socialism, and scientific communism was part of the curriculum.
During those years we studied all subjects from the perspective of Marxist-Leninist texts and
authors.”
MARGARITA SANCHEZ PRIETO. “I was born in Havana City. I got my undergraduate
degree in Art History from Havana University. I studied in the 1970s there; professor Adelaida
de Juán was my mentor in the Art History Department. She also was my teacher in contemporary
art. I do not have a post-graduate degree in advanced contemporary aesthetic matters, however, I
have studied for various graduate certificates. My practice as a researcher and curator, for more
than twenty years constitutes my credentials. I have been in charge of the contemporary art from
Latin America, in particular the Souther Cone (Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, and Chile).
During my training it was Adelaida de Juán who was most acquainted with the collection
of contemporary art and the activities developed by the Casa de las Américas. In addition, she
used to be a prestigious art critic and member of the AICA (International Art Critics
Association). With respect to pre-Columbian art, my professor was Bibiana Acosta, a devoted
scholar and researcher. At the beginning, I was not that deeply interested in the visual arts as I
was more interested in film and drama. Actually, I opted for these two areas as part of my
specialization during my time at the university; unfortunately, the department did not have
enough resources, or professors, or materials to be invested in that area. I chose Latin American
contemporary art as my concentration during the last part of my professional training. It used to
be possible during the 1970s at the university to opt for specialization. However, some time after
that the department of Art History was separated from the faculty of Philosophy and Letters.
That gave the department a certain autonomy; that is why they decided to introduced a series of
specializations for us to choose from: General Art, Cuban Art, Film Studies, Latin American Art,
and Performance Studies, only two survived, General Art and Latin American Art.
Elena Serrano, who used to be a professor in the department, was finishing a Master’s
degree in Mexico, and, with Adelaida de Juán, put together general and specific bibliographies
for the entire department. It was a compilation with an emphasis on Latin American art and its
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participation in the avant-garde. It was the first time Latin American and Cuban art had space in
the curricula at the Art History level in Cuba. This compilation was the first attempt to show art
from a new vantage point, using the work of the Mexican Muralists, the Machete collective, the
Madi group, among others. It intended to shift the attention from a Euro-American centrism to a
multi-centered one. They, Serrano and Juan, are the ones who finally took over the sub-specialty
of Latin American art in the department.
I remember that the idea of alternative histories did not exist in art history at that time.
That would have been to deny the centrality of New York in the contemporary world. Another
thing that helped us to navigate these new waters was a course called “Panorama Cultural
Cubano” (Cuban Cultural Panorama); in it we discussed the history of the island from the
colonial times to the present. For example, the architecture developed by the Spaniards to control
the population and to defend their colonies was one of the cases we studied. By the way, we have
just there, outside, the best examples, to our delight. This course helped us to develop an interest
in empirical research; it showed me the importance of interaction with the object of study. In a
sense, all this pushed me to specialize in Latin American Art, the proximity to the artists and art
works made me chose it. During the 1970s, the Mexican Muralist movement had a renaissance in
Cuba; our own poster art of that decade is a direct result of that interest.
To comprehend the production of Latin American art it is necessary to have direct contact
with artists, environments, art pieces, and collections. The best place to have that opportunity
was at that moment the Casa de la Américas. I started to work at the Casa after I graduated, I had
contact with the collection and the artists coming to exhibit or give lectures. I worked there for
three years as a specialist supporting the exhibitions, assembling exhibits, giving general
assistance, and curatorial work –marginally. Lesbia Vent Dumois was for several years the
senior curator at the Casa, I do recall not only the great exhibits she organized, but we also had
the opportunity to talk with artists such as Leon Ferrari, Julio Gamarra and Julio Le Parc, among
other important figures that used to visit us. The academic events and the contests were
important also. The Latin American Photographic Essay Award organized by Casa used to be
central. Thanks to it, I had the opportunity to meet artists from all over the region: Martín
Chambí from Ecuador, Graciela Iturbide, Sebastian Salgado and the great Brazilian
photographers working at the time, and the people supported by the Photography National
Council in Mexico used to visit us all the time. It was great visual and personal training for us
working there. In addition, the art collection at Casa brought in new pieces and many issues were
discussed by scholars, establishing an important area for the study of photography. The strength
in what Casa used to organize was the fact that always the emphasis was on the artists
themselves. It happened during the ‘golden years’ of the institution, the early 1980s. In fact, Casa
became the place where important exhibitions originated; for example, Volumen Uno had several
previous meetings that took place at Casa. Other exhibitions such as “Al Lado Carrasco”
displayed at the Habana Libre Hotel (former the Hilton Hotel), among others, were planned
within Casa’s reach and through its aintervention. It was a magical moment for Cuban art.”
HILDA MARIA RODRIGUEZ. “My academic training started at an early age since my family
had an interest in music. I was in dance and music classes since I was a child, later I started to go
to art classes also. After high school, I choose art history for my career. I also had an interest in
theoretical issues, which is why I took the exams at the ISA in a new program that would be
called Criticism and Art Theory. Only fourteen students passed the exams. This was too few, so
ISA decided not to start the program since Havana University was already offering art history,
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and had introduced a set of reforms recently. So we were sent to that program at the university.
At the same time, I wanted to be an artist, however, it was not recommended at the time to be in
two programs simultaneously. I graduated in 1982 from Art History, and applied right away to
the San Alejandro Academy, where I finished my second program in Studio Art in 1986. San
Alejandro is a traditional art academy, and during my training at San Alejandro I worked as a
volunteer at the Provincial Center for Visual Arts and Design, where I finally was appointed
Director some time after graduation. I worked there until 1989 and became very aware of the
administrative dimension of culture, and in particular in the visual arts. 204 Because of my interest
in theory and praxis, I decided to apply for a position at the Wifredo Lam Center for
Contemporary Art, where I was accepted that year.
During my work at the Provincial Center for Visual Arts, I had the opportunity to
organize several events. Among them was the Havana City Art Salon, which used to be a
competitive event. That Salon was part of the network of events that promoted visual arts and
that had a direct relationship with the National Salon created by UNEAC in 1960; it would later
become the National Contemporary Art Exhibition. The Havana City Salon had as its objective
to recognize and promote the artists living in Havana. After 1995 it became a curatorial project
(as we would say today), a laboratory to address different issues and/or art practices taking place
in Havana during those years.” 205
Figure 16. Wifredo Lam Center's curatorial team
In the photo (left to right). Nelson Herrera Ysla, José Manuel Noceda, Ibis Hernández Abascal, Margarita
Sánchez Prieto, Hilda Mária Rodríguez (retired), and Dannys Montes de Oca.
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3.3.1.2 Organizational model and team-work
The curators comment on the process of conformation of the group and the inner
dynamics coordinated by Llanes. They recall the division of tasks and the way the first structure
of the Lam Center came into being.
JOSE MANUEL NOCEDA. “In November (1983), just at the closing of the Biennale, we had
the task of returning the art pieces that had been part of that first ambitious edition, thousands of
works from all over the region. That was my first contact, face-to-face, with the world of
contemporary art. I recall my earlier experience visiting the Biennale, it was impressive. It had
been a monumental event and I felt I was in an environment that I had never experience before.
As a novice art historian, it was a dream come true. I had never been in front of such an array of
aesthetic diversity of visual and poetic narratives. In addition, the presence of many well-known
and emerging artists coming from Latin America, the Caribbean, and beyond was something
never seen before in Cuba. It was a great coincidence and I felt fortunate to have the opportunity.
At the beginning the Lam Center did not have a physical location. We were like nomads.
And to make things more complicated, I had this fixation with historiography and the analytical,
and those were contradictory times. Our leader, Llilian Llanes, knew about our anxieties.
Actually, she was the chair of my thesis committee and she understood my interests. At that
moment, without any resources or office space, she proposed that I take over Wifredo Lam
research. 206 I knew little about him and his oeuvre at the time because he had been not located
fully in the cannon of modern art. For instance, his work was almost absent in the courses we
took at the university at the time. Lam used to be an uncomfortable figure for the history of art,
because he did not fit anywhere very well. He was marginalized in courses on universal modern
art or just mentioned for his participation in the surrealist vanguard after the 1920s. But his
treatment remained superficial and shallow in the curriculum and in the major texts. Only in our
course on Cuban modern art was some attention was given to his work, I remember that we
discussed the participation of Cuban artists in “modernismo” in the arts using his work; it was
during a presentation by two fellow students with the materials available then.
The challenge I faced at the moment of being assigned to do research on his life and work
has been significant for my carrier. In that moment at the Wifredo Lam Center and in my task as
a researcher of Lam’s work we had started to interact with many institutions locally in order to
get as much information as possible about Lam and to build a bibliography that allowed us to
document his life and work fully. I had the opportunity later in 1988 to work on the task while on
a fellowship at the Georges Pompidou Center in Paris; it is a task that continues today.
As you know, the Lam Center exists under two postulates. First, to give more visibility to
the work and legacy of the Cuban master Wifredo Lam, not only among Cubans but also for the
rest of the world; and second, to investigate, promote, and reveal the art produced in the Third
World, in particular, through the organization of the Havana Biennale. At first, I saw myself
committed to making concrete the first postulate and to working on the research. Thanks to the
vision of the director Dr. Llilian Llanes Godoy, who was adept at integrating a strong work-team,
the two tasks were eventually discharged. She also counted with the expertise of Gerardo
Mosquera and Nelson Herrera Ysla from the office of visual art at the Ministry of Culture. In
reality, they were the founders of the Havana Biennale having worked actively on the
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organization of the first one. Besides them and me, Silvia Medina de Miranda, a philologist, was
brought onto the team; progressively Ibis Hernandez Abascal, Magda Elián González Mora,
Leticia Cordero, and Margarita Sánchez Prieto, among others, completed the initial group.”
SILVIA MEDINA DE MIRANDA. “The Lam Center, at first, was merely a table on which
José Noceda and I worked. And since it was not big enough, Llilian Llanes thought that it would
be better to send Noceda, who had an interest in historical research, to investigate Lam’s life and
work around Havana, based on what was delivered in the First Biennale. Since that moment he
would be in charge of that area of the Center’s work. The few people who worked for the Center
were working in the attic of the building in which the magazine Revolución y Cultura functioned.
The material coming from the Ministry of Culture arrived there; it had all the information
regarding the first Havana Biennale. Several boxes contained not only information about those
who had participated, but also of those who did not make the cut and many that sent their
material after the due date.
At that time other ‘girls’ arrived, Noceda was the only man for some time, and had to
perform many tasks that were not supposed to be part of his job description. Ibis Hernández,
Leticia Cordero, and Magda Elián González (who were classmates in the art history department)
joined us. They were close friends, having the same training and interest. At that moment Llilian
decided to divide the work of the group. The second Biennale was coming and it was important
to put everyone to work on specific areas. The documentation area was created then, with Ibis
Hernandez and I as the team. Then Gerardo Mosquera and Nelson Herrera arrived. They came
with all the background and experience after organizing the first Biennale; in addition, they were
already very active as researchers and authors.
When we finished the organization of the initial material, we started to establish contacts
with institutions in the country and in the region in order to have an influx of information. We
created format letters for museums, cultural institutions, embassies, art critics, curators, artists,
etc., that would allow us to create and maintain a network of support for the Biennale. We
utilized certain material that came from the Ministry of Culture, but I could say that it was
limited and insufficient for the Lam Center’s aspirations. This work, in addition to the
bibliographical search we launched across Havana’s libraries, documental centers, and
institutions with respect to what was contemporary art, was highly valuable in my own
experience. It is important to remember that at the time we did not have computers, search
engines, or web browsers; everything was made by hand. We used shoe-boxes for our reference
cards; each card was a descriptive entry showing the author, origin, and a basic description of the
contend of the material. In that way we were later able to find a particular article, catalog, or
book of interest.
By late 1985 we moved again, this time to a newly renovated house in Alameda de Paula
in Old Havana. We worked on the second floor of the Juan Marinello Center, where the whole
group, finally, could work together. The Lam Center was divided then into departments;
Mosquera led the research department and worked with José Noceda and Margarita Sánchez,
who came from the Casa de la Américas. Nelson Herrera coordinated the exhibition department
and worked with Magda Elían Gonzalez. Ibis Hernandez and I worked in the documentation
department and Leticia Cordero in publications close to us. An international relations department
was also created.
Before having contact with institutions from all over the world, and thanks to Cuba’s
position in Latin America, we established strong partnerships with countries in the region. Later,
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through our diplomatic network, we sent out mail in different languages advertising our
objectives, goals, and activities. We thought that it would not work; however, we started to get
responses from all over the planet. We received catalogs, books, magazines, brochures, artists’
materials, letters; it was unbelievable. We paid close attention to the magazines since they often
had a directory of contacts at the end which was relevant for us at the time. I had the opportunity
of processing most of that material. We were starting a map of the world that had not existed
until then.”
Figure 17. Centro Juán Marinello, Old Havana. Cuba
Located in Alameda de Paula, this place housed the Lam Center from 1985 to 1993
IBIS HERNANDEZ ABASCAL. “At the moment of my first interview with Llilian Llanes, she
gave me a series of sketches on which she had typed the Wifredo Lam Center project. ‘Read
them and give me your comments in few minutes,’ she told me. Those pieces of paper had her
thoughts on the objectives, activities, and tasks of the institution. 207 Those papers gave me a
clear idea that if the Biennale was an important moment among the objectives of the institution,
her interest was not only in developing an international event for the visual arts, but also in
establishing a place for research on Third World art and that as a result of this, it periodically
would publish its findings. That was for her the Havana Biennale. I think that that was why, in
the organic structure of the Lam Center, an archive, information center, and library were
contemplated. This is what I started to structure. That was the task Dr. Llanes gave me. It had as
its purpose to create a body of material about contemporary art, particularly on the artistic
production of Asia, Africa, and Latin America. From the beginning we had to be creative and we
worked really hard to establish the archive, library, and information resouce that the Lam Center
has today after more than twenty years of existence.
The tri-continental dimension of the life and work of Wifredo Lam, I am sure, is the
spiritual force that moves the Center. His oeuvre encapsulates components of geographies and
cultures from these continents. Gerardo Mosquera and José Manuel Noceda have written
extensively about it in their work on Lam and beyond.”
MARGARITA SANCHEZ PRIETO. “Upon my arrival at the Lam Center, I joined the
research department, which was composed then of Gerardo Mosquera and José Manuel Noceda.
Immediately, we started to work with Nelson Herrera, who was responsible for the exhibitions,
for the organization of the second Havana Biennale in 1986.
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I assisted Mosquera for the academic event, co-organized by Noceda. The topic was
Caribbean Art and Culture. There were many important figures to work with, Maurice Xavier
from the Ecolle de Art de la Martinique and Edouard Glissant, among others. Being a really
important region of the world, the Caribbean was obscure; that Havana Biennale was organized
to fill in that lacuna of information and knowledge about its visual and cultural production. The
Biennale invited a group of artists and scholars to represent the region, and also issues an open
call to artists to participate. We did not have every single artist and intellectual from the region,
but we had participation from many nations and island territories; Guyana, Guadalupe,
Martinique, Jamaica, Haiti, etc. Organizing the Biennale was a highly valuable experience for all
of us.”
HILDA MARIA RODRIGUEZ. “The Biennale always has been nurtured by the collaboration
of people and institutions from Latin America and the Third World. Initially it came into being
thanks to institutions with a presence in Havana and through our diplomatic agencies in the
world, but later through a network of solidarity. Our most important antecedent is Casa de las
Américas, one of the pioneer institutions in showing Latin American art in a new way. Our idea,
promoted by Llanes, was based on the necessity of knowing the materials we will face from the
inside-out rather than from the exterior. In order to distance ourselves from the Euro-centric and
hegemonic discourses that used to govern art we have to interact with it in a new way. Because
of my experience in administrative issues, I worked in the area of communications and
education, organizing events for the public, students, artists and visitors. Nonetheless, I had the
opportunity to participate in some of the major discussions, and I observed how the decisions
were made. At that point, the curatorial decisions were made by Llilian Llanes, Nelson Herrera
and Gerardo Mosquera. However, that ended in 1989, when the Havana Biennale became a
curatorial project. I did not participated as curator on that occasion -as a matter of fact, ‘curator’
was not a term we used then, and have not until very recently. We did not participate on the
selection of artists until the Fifth Biennale; that marks the shift in the way the Lam Center
assumed its work. The core group at the moment counted with; Sergio López, Ibis Hernandez,
Magda González, Silvia Medina, Leticia Cordero, and José Manuel Noceda, among others.”
With the exception of Mosquera and Herrera Ysla, the team shared not only a
generational view, as full members of the Cuban venture –being Children of the Revolution, but
also shared a similar ontogenesis and training. All studied at the University of Havana, and came
from the Department of Art History (with one exception). It is important to note that being
accepted in an undergraduate program at University of Havana for a career in the humanities
after the 1971 “Educación y Cultura” Congress became quite difficult. During the Congress,
Castro had asserted that the nation needed more people with technical and agro-industrial
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backgrounds; in fact, some factions of the Communist Party argued against the bourgeois and
Western character of the humanities. 208
Inaugurated in 1774, Havana University is still the largest institution of higher education
in Cuba. After 1971 it had to change its policy with respect to the number of seats for the
humanities, and a reform took place in such areas. Some programs were eliminated; others were
fused (that was the case for the program in criticism at ISA). A demanding exam was also issued
in order to limit the number of students admitted to undergraduate programs. Only the best were
accepted.
3.4
THE WORK MODEL CURATOR-INVESTIGATOR-TRAVELER
The Havana Biennale work model has become famous in contemporary curatorial
practice. For a small operation, keeping a distance from other mega events such as the Biennials
of Venice, São Paulo or Documenta, the Havana Biennale has set high standards for its work
since its creation. But what became distinctive about its curatorial practice is the result of a
process that took almost ten years to come to fruition.
Mosquera and Herrera Ysla’s participation in the process is relevant. From 1985 to 1990
Mosquera led the Department of Research at the Wifredo Lam Center, and also simultaneously
began to curate international exhibitions of Cuban and Latin American artists. Herrera Ysla, on
the other hand, was in charge of exhibitions and promotion; he also participated in the selection
of artists and the general assembly of the project, including preparing the catalog. Mosquera’s
international connections, in addition to his deep knowledge of Latin American, Caribbean, and
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African contemporary art, helped him to start a solo career around the fourth Biennale. Herrera
Ysla stayed, and became the director after Llanes resignation in 1999.
Changes came during the first crisis that the Lam Center faced. It occurred during the late
1980s and early 1990s when many artists of the generation of the 1980s migrated, this was the
time when Gerardo Mosquera, a key player during the first Biennales, left. Rachel Weiss has
stated that when Gerardo Mosquera left, the “restless eclecticism, enthusiasm, and iconoclasm he
had brought to the project were also gone.” 209 She, however, acknowledges the professionalism
of the Lam Center for assuming responsibility and continuing the event with high standards.
Mosquera’s departure may also may have been connected to a clash between an
individual consciousness and the almighty and by the time, highly bureaucratic state. In addition,
the “periódo especial” (the desperate euphemism used to describe the economic crisis that has
prevailed since the fall of the Soviet Union), motivated Mosquera’s departure.
Since the beginning of the special period, things have become increasingly difficult. The
Museum of Fine Arts in Havana is closed indefinitely and the maintenance of the national
collection is being neglected. Casa de las Américas has fallen into bureaucratic paralysis. There
are frequent instances of censorship and we have lost many of our best teachers. For my own
part, I no longer receive official invitations to anything. I am considered a dissident. 210
Since 1991 the curatorial and critical work of Mosquera has been located outside of the
country. 211 Cuban historian Alejandro de la Fuente argues that this was the last phase of the
possibility of achieving “Una Nación Para Todos” (A Nation for All). This was a key factor in
the opening of the economy, a traumatic incursion into globalization that was accompanied by
massive migration, not only by artists and intellectuals but also common people during the first
years of the 1990s (it is an emigration that continues today).
As well as being a time of scarcity and uncertainty, the special period brought back the
old phantoms of class and racial division back to haunt the country. Phenomena such as
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“jineterismo” (a Cuban word for female and male street prostitution), and the emerging informal
economy (a survival economy), became widespread not only among poor blacks and “mulatos,”
but also the white population. 212 A rectification period in the Cuban economy had started in 1986
as a result of the Third Congress of the Cuban Communist Party, which had forseen in the
limited yet real market economy implanted during the period 1971-1985, a menace against social
equality. 213 The Congress decided to promote centralization in the job market, revitalizing the
mobility of masses and voluntary jobs. “That was the situation when the Soviet Union collapsed,
the Cuban economy entered in a severe depression.” 214 The IDP (Income Distribution
Percentage) fell almost 40%, strongly affecting racial and social equality. Actually, in 1993 in
the middle of the crisis, the Cuban government was obliged to introduce a series of measures
oriented toward increasing productivity: the legalization of the American dollar to drive
humanitarian help from families living abroad, foreign investment that would boost the tourist
economy, the liberalization of the agricultural market creating cooperatives and free associations,
and a certain liberalization of job creation with the result of the emergence of small business, and
for instance a new business class. With the increasing connectivity, free movement of capital,
awareness of the world and boom in cultural and eco-tourism accompanying globalization, there
is at the same time an increasing divide among social groups, inequality, urban growth and
internal migration. The later was under control in Cuba before, nowadays it is possible even to
find small rings of poor areas around the cities. There is also migration (that for Cubans has been
a life and death matter), political instability and repression, as well as poorly redistribution of
wealth among her citizens. On top of these factors, the reinforcement of the U.S. economic
embargo has further constricted Cuba’s participation in the global market, making it a painful
punishment rather than a medicine to enter the “free world.” 215
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Mosquera’s departure was obviously a controversial and problematic issue for the
Biennale, but it was faced with stoicism and dignity on the part of the collective in Havana. In
the middle of probably the most complex moment, individually and collectively, the members of
the Revolutionary project, in addition they had to face the loss of one of the more important
elements of the Biennale itself. Mosquera, besides his knowledge and enthusiasm, was (is) a
tremendous public figure. His splendid personality (talkative but humble, easy going and
charming) was always at the service of the institution and the event. But in those times of
uncertainty, mass migration, scarcity, and even physical hunger, the state strengthened its grip
over society. At first it allowed migration, welcoming ‘remesas’ (money sent by Cubans abroad).
Later, however, the Cuban regime assumed a stringent position when the crisis unfolded. Cubans
were as isolated as ever, but completely alone as never before. For people such as Mosquera and
the artists of the 1980s (most of the members of Volumen Uno), the future had looked promising.
They had been traveling the world as a result of the interest in their work; the same had happened
during the ‘thaw period’ with the conceptual group coming from the Soviet bloc in the early
1980s, many of whom had migrated to the U.S. or Europe, for example, Vitaly Komar and
Alexander Melamid, Ilya and Emilia Kabakov. These artists were harvesting the rewards and
their success in exhibitions taking place in the U.S., Germany, Mexico, Colombia, Venezuela,
Spain, Japan, etc. 216
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Figure 18. Gerardo Mosquera (August, 2006)
In Cuba until recently, all spaces of exhibition were official, and although this situation
might suggest a monolithic control, the attempt has ended in plurality: this almighty purpose
can be cracked by virtue of its own stretching, as the imperial language, Latin spoiled in
romances. Who wants total control only a few can grasp, especially when it is in opposition to
such a widespread horizontal and powerful resistance as that of the contemporary Cuban
culture.
Such critical culture has been born out of the crevices of power, by transforming stone
into vital force, as weeds and also trees do when growing in the fissures of Old Havana. 217
The world was eager to see the generation of Cuban Revolutionary artists in action.
Unfortunately, things were not easy for them at home. Mexican-based cultural critic Osvaldo
Sánchez, who forms part of that generation of cultural exiles, notes that the authorities “proved
themselves incapable of distinguishing between the sincerity of a critical comment (present in a
work of art) and the causes of the disaster. They could not grasp that the political acerbity
expressed by the young was one last legitimizing gesture toward the Revolution as a genuine
participatory process.” 218 Indeed, what Cuba’s revolutionary children have continually done is to
test, in the words Gerardo Mosquera (who still lives in Havana), “how far the bounds of the
permissible will stretch in a society in which the function of criticism has not yet been
defined.” 219
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Mosquera concedes that state intervention and the routine discomforts of daily existence
do not necessarily equal diluted political agendas or compromised quality when it comes to
cultural activity. To take one example, Mosquera discusses the work of the collective DUPP (Por
Una Práctica Pedagógica / for a pedagogic practice), led in those times by ISA professor Rene
Francisco Rodríguez with the participation of students at the art institute who were producing
pieces, performances, and happenings as insertions into everyday life. Mosquera maintained that
they are all beneficiaries of Cuba's free system of higher education. He also recognized and
argued that “there is the Centro Wifredo Lam, the host organization of the Havana Biennial,
which maintains an active program focused on non-Western art, and the Ludwig Foundation of
Cuba, established in 1995 for the protection and promotion of experimental, non-market-oriented
Cuban art, among other institutions.” 220
Referring to DUPP, Mosquera argues that “their work is more engaged with everyday
reality than that of the older, internationally successful generation who led a nomadic life-style
and has an export mentality.” Mosquera is himself a victim of the situation he describes. He was
raised in the midst of the internationalism of the Revolution and has become a nomad in the art
world. 221
Figure 19. The DUPP collective in 1997 and 1998
Dupp’s coordinator Rene Francisco Rodríguez (in circle), photos during the intervention in “la época”, a
shopping center in Old Havana in 1998
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Today Gerardo Mosquera serves as Adjunct Curator at the New Museum of
Contemporary Art in New York and advisor at the Rijksakademie van Beeldenden Kunsten in
Amsterdam; he has been curator and co-curator of important exhibitions and biennials such as
the Second Johannesburg Biennale in 1998, more recently “Multiple City: Art>Panama” in 2003
and the Liverpol Biennial in 2006. He also is the author of books such as Beyond the Fantastic
(2000), which became the first scholarly text on art criticism and theory for contemporary Latin
American art edited and published in English, and he writes constantly for magazines and
specialized publications. He is also a member of the advisory boards of several art journals. 222
At the moment of Mosquera’s departure and in the midst of the most complex economic,
political, and humanitarian crisis that ever existed in Cuba, the collective at the Lam Center
reacted by embracing the responsibility and by distancing themselves from the burden of the
“especial period” and, in an almost monastic manner, devoted themselves to a collective,
scholarly practice as a way of dealing with the art and the problems of the new complex world
then in formation. The result of such a decision, as delusional as it may have seemed, would be
the Fifth Biennale 1994, entitled Art, Society, Reflection -the Biennale that was recognized by the
critics at the time and subsequently as the most successful to date.
The process started in 1989 with the introduction of a conceptual problem, and evolved
until it took form in the intricate multi-layered Biennale of 1994. That is the course that is going
to be traced in the remainder of the chapter.
3.4.1
The Work Model and the Spirit of the Biennale
“The circumstances have made us flexible. I would say that our work is not a model or method; it is a practice. We always say
that a criterion for truth is based on the thesis of our work as a practice. I think that one does not have to reject any method, but
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rather to juxtapose them, one over the other accordingly to the circumstances, and use everything in order to fulfill our purpose.”
Ibis Hernandez Abascal
3.4.1.1 <1989> Rethinking models
The Havana Biennale, as laboratory for the art of the Third World, found a place to
develop a curatorial approach that could be parallel to the innovations made by Harald Szeeman
in the late 1960s and 70s. 1989 has become a maker in recent history, in politics as well as in
arts. Exhibitons such as the most celebrated and debated Magiciens de la Terre, in Paris and
others such as The Other Story which was an exhibition held at the Hayward and known as the
first exhibition for the work of Black British artists in the UK; among others have become
markers in the constitution of the emergen “post-colonial costellation, global south, global art
phenomenon. 223 The Havana Biennale has to be taken into account in the discourse when writing
the new histories of art. In this section, the curators of the Lam Center discuss such a proposition.
Nelson Herrera Ysla. (Architect, at the Lam Center since 1983. Director 1999-2002) “We had
asked ourselves, how has the Western art World responded to its history and conception? How
has it come to terms with the mass-culture? And we answered, perhaps through the creation of
events such as the Venice Biennale. That mega-exhibition has incorporated the forces of the
modern into the usual formula of the ‘new.’ Without major transcendence, I might say, and
always around the inner debates, the soap-operas and misfortunes of the art world.
Unfortunately, the West is not interested any more in developing a critical tradition; it is only
interested in events, buildings, and institutions. It has supported on a great scale powerful
apparatuses of capture, able to reach any place on the globe. Its interest is in its own
maintenance. The one of the modern project, with its constant innovation cycles, restrains itself
from going further; a capture machine so that it confines and digests all, without really
processing it anymore.
Paris is one of those cities that used to function as a capture machine; it could also be the
place to develop an experience or an institution (a counter-one) around the so-called Third
World. Paris is a cosmopolitan city which peoples from every corner of the colonized world pass
through and keep arriving and leaving. But now we see how French culture has created the socalled vali or les citté, subjects that live in diasporic-spheres, coming from France’s former
colonies, a subclass that is ready to act (violently if necessary). Paris could be the place to initiate
such an artistic, curatorial, and intellectual movement, but they are not interested now. We had to
do it instead, in Havana. From the Third Havana Biennale on, we realized that the only fruitful
route to take, and take it without limits, was that one.
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In the last decades we have been trying to do something. However, we are not fully there
yet. In five or ten years it is not possible to know, to understand African or South East Asian art.
At least one-fifth of the world population lives there, how is it possible to even suggest we have
done it all? At every moment things are changing, there are renovations, flows, new forms of
expression, etc. When we invite a handful of artists, let’s say from Trinidad and Tobago or
Madagascar, there is not possible to say that we know them all.
Since the beginning, we have kept clear the fact that we are just starting to look at certain
things, that it is impossible to know that we know little. We only know that we know a little, but
we have the will and passion for this work, and slowly but surely we are discovering and
understanding, what allows us to reveal more consistently what is important. Meanwhile we are
still finding things, works of art that amazed us.
After we finished that third Biennale in 1989, we had gathered a great amount of
material. The Wifredo Lam Center had been created five years prior, so we already had
information and friends around the World. Thanks to the help from our friends and the reputation
we built in past biennales, we started to receive a flow of information, not only from important
institutions such as the Pompidou Center in Paris and the Smithsonian Institute in the U.S. but
also from institutions in Africa and Asia which were sending us their materials via our embassies
and consular posts. They knew that we were eager for such information. From the beginning, it
was not only textual or documentary, but also visual and graphic. The first thing we did was to
process it: artists’ dossier’s, slides, videos, catalogs, books, magazines, printouts, films, etc. We
used to sit around a big table, all of us, and classified the material according with our interest and
necessities. From all these oceans of information, we selected artists, art pieces, signs of new
practices –both individual and collective, popular arts that would be, eventually, part of a future
Havana Biennale. In those initial explorations we found, for example, interesting artists from
Africa. I remember one from Morocco named Belkahia, of whom we did not know anything. His
work looked promising, so we had to contact him. We had to go over all the documentation and
material to try to find contact info for his work studio, gallery, cultural institution, and city
anything that could lead us to him. The material could be part of a recent number of the African
Arts magazine, or be featured in a pamphlet from the Pompidou, from the Arab Institute in
London or Paris, or coming as part of a remission from some embassy or some place in the
world.
At that moment and because of the peculiarities of our job, the group of researchers
started to organize their work into areas. At that time there were not definitions in terms of
geographical areas to cover, or particular artistic practices, so we worked collectively. Mosquera
used to be the head of that group. Each researcher had to present, to all members of the Lam
Center, a research report every six months; the report not only covered artists and art pieces, but
also contextual information. Some were taking more interest in certain areas, Latin America,
Africa, or Asia. I would say that the division was an organic process. If one of us had more
experience or had traveled before to some place, that did indeed help. I initially did not
participate fully in the process since I was responsible for the exhibitions and the promotion of
the Biennale.”
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Figure 20. Logo for the 3rd Havana Biennale
JOSE MANUEL NOCEDA. “The role of the young art historians hired to work at the Lam
Center, initially was relatively limited, especially during the first three biennales. It remained that
way until, I would say, the fourth one. During that time the Lam Center’s organizational
structure consisted of four departments: Research, Exhibitions, International Relations, and
Documentation. In my case, I used to work under Gerardo Mosquera, who coordinated the
Research Department. My role during the Second and Third Havana Biennales focused on the
development and organization of the academic forums that were part of the larger scope of the
event. The exhibition, as a physical space, was the responsibility of Nelson Herrera and his team.
Everything was coordinated by our General Director Llilian Llanes Godoy, with the close
participation of Mosquera. The academic events were designed and managed by our department.
It was during the Third Biennale (1989), when the topic ‘Tradition and Contemporaneity’
was used. It was an intelligent and relevant decision since it was the first Biennale organized
around a conceptual problem. That year was very complex for the history of the Third World.
The differences were flourishing in all their intensity; the desperation for the disappearance of
the Second World was imminent – yes, the end was near. The Biennale started its preparations at
least two years in advance, which means that in 1987 we were already discussing what was
going on in the world at the time. A series of problems were emerging in the art world with
respect to issues such as ‘the other,’ from a wide range of perspectives. The politics of difference
and multiculturalism in the cultural discourse (in particular in the U.S.) were also topics of
discussion at the time. These topics were relevant to seeing the challenges and contradictions that
Third World art was facing with the new formation of a global scene. We began to work from
the points of convergence and dissent present in the notions, ‘tradition and contemporaneity.’ I
remember that during the theoretical events we had the privilege of inviting important thinkers
such as Juan Acha, Federico Moráis, and Pierre Restany. The debates between Latin American
and European intellectuals used to be centered on the Eurocentric world views versus alternative
ones. Restany used to see the Havana Biennale as a big ‘bazaar’; he could not understand the
profundity of the project we were immersed in at that moment. Later, he would change his mind.
In 1989, we purposely set in motion dialogs between popular objects and expressions of the socalled ‘high-cultural’. African toys made with scrap metal and wires, Chinese kites, and colorful
wooden Bolivar figures sculpted and assembled made by so-called artisans were displayed with
installations, paintings, and sculptures. They shared the same spaces and the same level in the
hierarchy of the curatorial and museographer.
1989 was the year such problems were worked through from dirrerent contexts, the
exhibition Magiciens de la Terre organized by Hubert Martin at the Georges Pompidou Center
that in a sense responded to the Primitivism show at MoMA in 1984 are testimonies of the same
discussions taking place in those centers. These events, from their own vantage points, contexts,
and interests, were responding to the same issues that we were responding to. They are good
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examples that typify the problems facing artists and institutions all over the World in the
changing conditions of the moment. The encounters and dis-encounters, the dichotomies and
contradictions with respect to these dimensions (the traditional and the contemporary), were at
stake. Federico Moráis and Juan Acha’s Third Word modernism versus the dominant version of
Greenberg or Pierre Restany, who by the way had a genuine interest in the primitive, was part of
that discussion also. Our theoretical interest pushed us into bringing to the table many other
scholars that could help us disentangle such issues. Among others, we counted Mirko Lauer
(Perú), Ery Camara (Senegal), Geeta Kapur (India), Guy Brett (U.K), and Nestor García Canclini
(Mexico-Argentina).
Our work became possible thanks to the experience accumulated over the years. We had
participated in the organization of the Second, Third, and Fourth Biennales, we knew the
challenges and the material, and we had managed artists, art pieces, critics, and exhibitions, our
objects and subjects of work. We were completely embedded in the structure that we assumed as
a group in an almost an organic way (after the departure of Mosquera). At the time, the term
‘curator’ was not in usage, we were researchers, who also worked on administrative and
organizational issues, and on what was needed for the realization of our goals. The assignment of
geographical areas to the members of the team was the result of affinities they felt, or out of the
necessity to cover a particular region of the world.
At the time, Llilian Llanes had established a ‘diagnostic study’ about the contemporary
scene in each region. In that way, we were able to familiarize ourselves with the object of study
and to refined our research methodology when sharing our findings with the rest of the team. The
evaluation system used to be scholarly, collective, and harsh. We had to defend our diagnosis,
evaluations, and general research in front of everyone. A debate followed, which used to be the
first step before having any contact with the art works, artists, and/or cultural agents. You will be
surprised when taking with the other members of the team at the knowledgeable there was with
respect to their college’s work. The constant feedback enriched our own work; the participation
of the others was also a key factor. Simultaneously, a long directory of institutions, academies,
schools, museums, galleries, agents, critics, curators, artists, and a database of pieces, practices,
objects, etc., was built. It used to be very important to identify the leading institutions or
galleries, and the names and positions of important people in each country. Our work thus was
investigative not administrative, although it was used to do public relations and to make
international contacts.”
IBIS HERNANDEZ ABASCAL. “At first I worked in documentation. Llilian Llanes thought
that I was a good subject for that area. As a matter of fact, I have always thought that that was
the future of the institution; actually it has been its nucleus and source of information. When we
were working on Revolución y Cultura, Silvia Media and I were in charge of that area. We used
to have a couple of shelving racks with some books and catalogs on contemporary art and a few
magazines, in addition to a few monographic studies on some key figures. Then we developed an
efficient exchange program. At that time in Cuba the editorial industry was thriving and books
were really cheap. There were few publications on the visual arts, but we could exchange used
books in the social sciences, literature, essays, and political thought.
At first we used the directories from the National Theater, managed by Maria Lascayo.
We were growing fast thanks to the advice of Casa de las Américas, which was our fundamental
source of contact with people and institutions in Latin America. Later on, we wrote to the
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magazines and institutions directly and they gave us names and contact information about those
artist and critics we were looking for. We also asked the authors directly for their major texts and
publications. It was a successful strategy that was producing results rapidly and consistently.
There was no information in Cuba about Third World art, at least not in the systematic
form we needed and were starting to gather. Actually, I can say that by that time (the mid 1980s)
there was not a single place in the world that was consistently and systematically collecting such
information. One of our missions was to discuss and defend the existence of a form of
contemporary Third World art, from Africa, Asia, and Latin America. There were only a handful
of primitive and folkloric practices (exotic) that were considered at the time. I believe that until
that moment they were not important for art biennials and documentas, nor were they even part
of the literature on the visual arts. On the other hand, we did consider that such a thing existed,
that was our belief, and that is why we had to start doing serious research in order to implement a
thesis that could give visibility to that art. We had to come up with a thesis that was able to
establish a discursive space for the diversity of what was being produced in all regions.
That was how the Havana Biennale coincided with the exhibition Magiciens de la Terre
in 1989. Like the exhibition in Paris, we also had been working on that thesis, which had been
settled on in December, 1986, after the end of the Second Havana Biennale. In order to have
such an event in 1989, which we announced as having ‘Tradition & Contemporaneity’ as its
theme, we worked in advance on the thinking of intellectuals such as Nestor García Canclini,
Juan Acha, and Rita Eder which had passed through the Biennale in their first versions. They had
influenced our way of seeing the world. Other authors and thinkers such as Nelly Richard, Lucy
Lippard, Pierre Restany, Pierre Bodiver, Louis Sims had also been in Havana during that period.
In fact, many of them had come to find in Havana what was de-contextualized or fragmented, or
simply did not exist at other international events. Perhaps our position in 1989 reinforced that
stereotype. Today the dichotomy is widely discussed. The local versus the global, the popular
versus the erudite, the public versus the private, etc., I believe that at that juncture the Biennale
touched and made visible certain fundamental points in that discussion.
The circumstances have made us flexible. I would say that our work is not a model or
method, it is a practice. We always say that a criterion for truth is based on the thesis of our work
as a practice. I think that one does not have to reject any method, rather juxtapose them, one over
the other, according to the circumstances, and use everything in order to fulfill our purposes. The
curatorial team continues with the process of researching and doing fieldwork, when we can, in
order to be updated in a reflective way. Always with the idea of establishing an aesthetic
discourse that is tuned to contemporary production, not only under international standards but
also from an internal view that helps us to autonomously find answers to the concepts and
questions.
To arrive at a conceptual matrix there are many paths. For example, in different moments
of the Biennale, we have had art works that have been important, becoming like guides. Some
become the conceptual base for the next Biennale. For example, I remember some pieces of
Paolo Gasparini in the Fifth Biennale, his work was inserted in the exhibition we called Entornos
y Circunstancias (Surroundings and Circumstances). Tthat exhibit talked about the Third World
physical (real) context, with the intention of locating new geo-political areas as conceptual
spaces, while at the same time showing the social and cultural surroundings. But Gasparini’s
work, in addition, talked about a memory and history in a very particular way. From that one
individual, in his pieces, we found images of Frida Kalho and Che Guevara intertwined with his
own images. Those pieces led us to think about memory, pushed us to read again Chantal
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Mouffle’s take on the issue, and even to decide that the next topic for the Havana Biennale
would be ‘memory’, but in a completely new way.”
Figure 21. Paolo Gasparini, “El Cuerpo del Che” (fragment). 1994
MARGARITA SANCHEZ PRIETO. “Before arriving at the Lam Center I had written little,
since my work ath the Casa de la Américas was always limited to technical assistance. However,
at the Lam Center it was central to produce intellectually, from an investigative point of view. At
first, the idea was to produce a series of value and theoretical judgments in addition to acquiring
as much visual, historical, and theoretical information as possible from Latin America and the
Caribbean, and to expand our scope to the Third World. It did not matter who was in charge of
what, the idea was that all the members of the team had to have information about all the areas of
research. The information we gathered used to be expanded by the invitation we sent to experts,
cultural critics, curators, etc., from many disciplines such as sociology, cultural criticism,
economy, and politics. The first years at the Lam Center were highly instructive. Simultaneously,
we assisted in every single event related to our work, and in particular, the ones related to the
reassesment of Cuban art. It was then that I began to write about art, especially about the Cuban
scene.
By the Third Havana Biennale, we worked on the issue of ‘Tradición y
Contemporaneidad (Tradition and Contemporaneity). It came to us organically. The Lam
Center’s name comes from a paradigmatic figure in the modern art movement. Wifredo Lam, his
father was Chinese, his mother ‘mulata’ (mostly black), and his god-mother was Montonica
Wilson, a black santero priestess, and he was born on a Caribbean island and had studied in
Europe (Spain and France). He was a total hybrid. In his person he united three continents. I say
we came into this in an organic way because it was possible during those years to know the
world in such complexity, that was in part why we were there for. Cuba was leading the nonaligned movement (NAM) during the 1980s and that gave us the opportunity to ask the right
questions. To ask about those segregated areas of the world we did not have any contact with
before. To me personally, the challenge was Asia and the Arab world rather than Africa. I had
grown up as a white Catholic; however, we had the opportunity to know the syncretism of
African cultures, because of Lam and because of our own racial and cultural composition as
society.
That is how we started to make contacts. We faced all kinds of problems; communication
was difficult between the African countries and us. We arrived in Kinshasa, Zaire, or Benin, into
the capitals and small towns also, and we found artistic production of the first order. Some
galleries used the problem of communication to benefit from it. If, for Latin America, we already
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had contacts, we turned completely towards Africa and Asia. Distance and language was the wall
to overcome. All of us took language courses during those years. Mosquera and Herrera began
contacting people and institutions; later the entire team expanded the network and the research
work increased exponentially.
At first we worked in departments; Research, Exhibitions, Documentation, etc., always
working together at the moment of the Biennale. In 1991 Research and Exhibition were fused, as
a result of Gerardo Mosquera’s departure. The figure of the specialist-researcher (curatorresearcher) emerged then. From that moment on, all of us got into a work-action-production
mode. Each was given a responsibility; the world was divided by areas. There was a distribution
of responsibilities, at first I thought I had to deal with the Caribbean, however, I got the Southern
Cone. I have to clarify that the distribution did not mean that we were isolated from the rest of
the areas.
First, there is a research work in which we get acquainted with the area and create
documentation about it. Later we travel, accordingly to the resources we have (thanks to the
Ministry of Culture budget and our friends in many parts of the world). After the field work, we
bring a proposal for the production of the Biennale. In that way, it is possible to recognize not
only the artistic scene but also the social, historical, and economic context. We embedded
ourselves in our research area, we travel and try to live the cultural experience, and then we have
to extricate ourselves from it in order to start a general selection. By the end, we have to know all
the artists on the list and we have to interact with many of them… coming from many regions of
the world, during the assembly of the exhibitions and the Biennale itself.
The Havana Biennale establishes a space for the contemporary artist as an object of
study, to emphasize that artistic and intellectual production that has affinity with a certain
conceptual discourse. I cannot forget the pieces of Rogelio Polesello, a group of display cabinets
containing religious icons. He presented pop icons, such as Mickey Mouse, much in the fashion
of the German artist Josephine Meckseper. To imbricate art works and physical space is a
challenge; in the Biennale ‘Tradition and Contemporaneity’ we showed how art is in dialog with
the building process of new nation states. As in the case of many African artists or in the case of
artists from the Middle East who work with calligraphy to address the role of women in the Arab
culture, some of these artists subsequently have become central to the world of art. 224
That possibility is given after the end of the idea of a ‘Second World’. Cuba was living
what we called the ‘special period’ and at the same time it was embedded in the adventure of
connecting the members of so-called Third World art. The Biennale is primarily an ideological
event that establishes an aesthetical and visual dimension.”
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Figure 22. Rogelio Polesello, "Trama diagonal -lupalente- prisma" (from the series icon-abstraction),
1975
HILDA MARIA RODRIGUEZ. “It was just after the Fourth Biennale that the geography of
the Lam Center changed. From the moment the group of curator-researchers formed, we have
been responsible for organizing the Biennale from 1994 to today. The Director, Llilian Llanes,
decided that each of us would become a systematic thinker and a specialist in one of the different
areas of the world. That means that from 1990 to 1994 we had an arduous period of preparation.
During that time would take place the initial research journeys and we experienced many
challenges; at the same time we met important artists, curators, critics, and cultural agents around
the world. Our work became more complex because now we were also ambassadors of Cuba, the
Lam Center, and the Biennale itself. In order to promote our work, the Lam Center organized a
series of international theoretical events featuring the participation of important critics and
researchers. In between biennales, we also had to continue with the schedule of national and
international exhibitions and the research that was focused on Lam’s oeuvre. This issue surfaced
as a result of the necessity of organizing an event that took care, in a modest but systematic way
too, of the work of artists from the so-called Third World. Les Magiciens de la Terre had
occurred in 1989; that exhibition had settled a series of curatorial issues and how to present the
work of artists who work outside of the mainstream. That exhibition left conceptual vacuums and
de-contextualized much of the art displayed there. However, it helped to start an international
debate that opened up spaces to talk and show Third World art. We had been doing this since
1984 and for the direction of the Lam Center it was an opportunity to embrace more deeply our
commitment to with the art of those regions. That is in part why the Biennale abandoned its
competitive model. How is it possible to reward artistic practices from Africa, Asia, or Latin
America produced under such different conditions? How do symbolic and poetic productions
respond to particular cultural values?
With the constitution of the documentation area and a system to have a flow of material
coming from those territories (and the first diagnostic and exploratory journeys), an objective
was defined. It called for the constitution of a group of specialists who would become acquainted
with the artistic practices of those territories. Thanks to the trips, we could exchange experiences
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and ideas with the artists and cultural agents; we were able to establish contacts with institutions
and intellectuals, etc. I did not choose my area of research, which is Asia. The Director of the
Lam Center based on our necessities and the strengths of some of our members decided that. For
me it was a huge challenge but at the same time it was a great opportunity, I believe this has to
do with the “mística” of the Biennale. We already had contacts with Latin America and we were
building a good network in Africa, but Asia was different. Some time before some of our people
had had the opportunity to travel to the region, but for me it was a big challenge. Not only the
languages (where a challenge), but also the cultural gap that separate us from them. My task was
to penetrate that universe and be able to transmit it to my colleagues. I believe that is the spiritual
force that moves us. Beyond shallow and touristy views, our work began (in practice) to
transcend the professional level; it is an ethical stand. How do we understand what happens in
such places? The idea was not only to know about the artistic practices, but also to understand
the different spheres that constituted their cultural life. That is the ‘spirit’ that gives us the
opportunity to see in broader terms, the same that helps us to transmit rigorously what is
happening in artistic terms.”
3.4.1.2 The Fourth Biennale, a breaking point
JOSE MANUEL NOCEDA. “I had co-organized the academic events for the 1986 (on
the Caribbean) and 1989 (Tradition and Contemporaneity) Biennales and for the Fourth Biennale
in 1991, I organized the event solo. It was focused on the challenges of the new colonial forces
and brought postcolonial theory to the fore, ad-portas of the celebrations of the five hundred
years of European presence in the Americas. Unfortunately, after that biennale, other models
were used for the theoretical event, some more successful, other less fortunate. We concentrated
on the artistic content, and worked really hard on developing that aspect. After 1991, however,
we did not continue to attract the great thinkers that used to come to Havana for the Biennale,
rather, the Lam Center organized a series of meetings with young intellectual figures in-between
each biennale. The theoretical event was resuscitated in 2000, and in particular thanks to the
appointment of Dannys Montes de Oca as coordinator for the 2003 and 2006 forums.
In my case the Director (Llilian Llanes) asked me to assume responsibility for Central
America and the Caribbean around 1991, what we call the ‘cuenca del caribe’ (the Caribbean
basin), a geopolitical and cultural area with very particular and multiple characteristics. The idea,
then, was to denote, identify, and define its cultural accents. At first, I was fascinated with the
insularity (the archipelago) of the region, leaving aside the continental part. I had to explore
authors such as Pierre Chadis, Manuel Moreno Fraginals, and Adelaida de Juán, who had started
the study of the contemporary art of the region. Writers from Martinique such as Edouard
Glissant, Rene Louis, and Aimé Cesaire, in addition to intellectuals like Franz Fanon with an
interest in history and politics, were part of my initial readings. This diversity was what helped
me to understand better the visual dimension of the region. In contrast, my work with Lam was
more historical; the idea there was to track, document, define, and describe the phenomenon of
the visual arts based on my knowledge of the history of art of the region. With the time I
extended my research to the continent, using initially the work of Alejo Carpentier and finishing
with the work of contemporary authors such as Antonio Benitez Rojo and others.”
IBIS HERNANDEZ ABASCAL. “At the end of that Fourth Biennale, and looking towards the
fifth one in 1994, many of those who had been working in the different instances and areas of the
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Lam Center, started to work with a different profile. Among these, Magda Elián Gonzalez and
Eugenio Valdez Figueroa worked with Nelson Herrera in promotion and exhibitions, as well as
Margarita Sánchez Prieto, José Manuel Noceda, and Hilda María Rodriguez who used to work
with Gerardo Mosquera, besides me from documentation. They were the one who had worked
the longest (around seven years at the institution) and by decision of Llilian Llanes. She felt that
the Lam needed a group that, having acquired maturity thanks to the previous biennales, focused
just on research and curatorial issues for the Havana biennales as well as for the Lam Center.
Thus, the research and curatorial teams were consolidated. The specialists, as we were called,
had to be trained to be experts (through research) in the areas of interest to the Lam Center. That
was central and basic for the consolidation of the general project of the institution. Llanes
decided that we had to divide the world, and with new eyes we began to explore each region in
depth. Some of us decided to work on Latin America (North, Central and Caribbean, Andean
Region, Brazil, and the Southern Cone), others on North Africa, South Saharan Africa, the
Middle East, and the Far East. The division responded perhaps to geo-political areas already
defined. We believed that they were basically the result of the view of the Center. In that fashion,
Margarita Sánchez Prieto has worked the Southern Cone, with exception of Brazil. José Manuel
Noceda works on Central America and the Caribbean; Silvia Medina used to work on the
Andean Region; and me Brazil and Mexico (later, because of Silvia’s departure, I had to assume
the Andean Region also). Magda Elián Gonzalez and Eugenio Valdez worked on Africa; Hilda
María Rodríguez and Juan Antonio Molina (new at the moment) worked on continental and
insular Asia; Lourdes Castillo (who started to work with us in 1991) worked on North Africa and
the Middle East; and Nelson Herrera worked as a meta-curator and general coordinator, taking
care of whatever we could not.”
By 1993 the Wifredo Lam Center was fully operational, covering several areas of the
world and using the building that has become a signature of the Havana Biennale, in which a
collection was accumulating (1,250 pieces at the time, according to the records). The cultural
supplement Bohemia published in November 1993 an article in which it presented the newly relocated Lam Center. In it Llilian Llanes talks about the dream of an institution, which by the time
was becoming a major destination for the art of the Third World.
LLILIAN LLANES GODOY: “In the future we will have an open sculptural yard, which will
create an ambiance for meditation… We will invite famous artists to produce works in a garden
design by the Cuban architect Quintana. It will be ready when the country is completely
recovered.
In the long run, we will be a fully self-financed operation, selling contemporary art,
publications, models, and gifts (in our shop), etc, directed toward international tourism. We will
create the Lam Center’s Society of Friends to enegize the collection and for the acquisition of
new pieces –which won’t be only the result of donations. We will ask enterprises to help in this
regard. Our galleries will prove that even if the Third World is economically poor, our spirit is
rich. We will also embrace new technologies to teach contemporary art, using sophisticated
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techniques (like video art) to make more accessible wonderfully original pieces of art made in
places like the Amazon.” 225
Figure 23. The Lam Center featured in Bohemia, November 11, 1993. The Lam Center today
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Figure 24. Division of research areas, Havana Biennale
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3.4.1.3 Research Journeys, “the world in us”
“This ‘mística’ is a psychological condition that in part is a parallel form that operates as a vital work tool, and that
allows (in Córdoba, Argentina as well as in Reykjavik) the Havana Biennale to be respected and highly estimated. When the
Wifredo Lam Center decides to send someone to places which any other curators, even the local ones that usually live in the
capitals or cosmopolitan centers, do not go it is because that spirit is in practice and action”
Nelson Herrera Ysla
NELSON HERRERA YSLA. “Everything comes from a scholarly work, starting at the table;
what we see prior and catches our interest and attention is the first step. After that, we program
trips to the places, and make contact with the curators, critics, artists, and institutions. We inform
them about our interest and thanks to that, we get more information which helps us to make
progress and at the same time alleviate costs, time, and effort. With the possibility of traveling,
what we call ‘research journeys’ we corroborate the initial thesis, and incorporate new names
into the lists that we will discuss ‘collectively’ later on. The journey is a confrontation and/or
confirmation of our initial findings and ideas back in Havana. The cultural and psychological
shock is important, for example; when arriving alone in Jakarta to visit a group of artists living
650 kilometers away from the capital as representative of the Havana Biennale, one does not
have any idea of the impact that causes to that community of artists (as it causes to you too), and
the repercussions it has on the cultural institutions of that country. They feel respected, and
recognized for their cultural value. When one arrives in Bangkok or Calcutta and tells them you
are coming from Havana, Cuba, at first they look at you as an extra-terrestrial and later they feel
so extraordinarily pleased that your presence and work there becomes extraordinary rich. In the
end one does not know how to take all the material gathered; the level of respect we offer by
going there to try to understand their work and life and what you get from them is fundamental.
When the researcher arrives in a small city, let’s say Cali (Colombia), San Luís Potosí, or
Cochabamba (both in Bolivia), he/she shows genuine interest in the work of the artists and for
the art scene in general –thanks to the previous knowledge of it, of course. The artistic
community feels respected and astonished, and gives as much as they can in terms of information
and support for that person and the institution. That practice has generated what we called the
“mística” (the spirit) of the Havana Biennale.
This ‘mística’ is a psychological condition that in part is a parallel form that operates as a
vital work tool, and that permits (in Córdoba, Argentina as well as in Reykjavik) the Havana
Biennale to be respected and highly estimated. When the Wifredo Lam Center decides to send
someone to places which any other curators, even the local ones that live in that country’s
capitals or cosmopolitan centers, do not go, it is because that spirit is alive in practice and action.
It is well known that some French curators do not go to Lille or Nice to visit artists, but a Cuban
curator for sure will go there. That has helped also with the constitution of networks of support
and solidarity. This point has proven important, because most of the time when a curator travels
people expect the arrival of a sort of ‘royal’ figure associated with events such as the Documenta
or the Venice Biennale. They usually stay at the best hotels, call two or three relevant critics and
curators, share a luxurious dinner, and come up with a list of ten or twenty of the ‘most important
artists of the country.’ In the end, the artists on the list feel flattered and life goes on. But what if
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(and let’s use as an example Brazil) the curator not only contacts the critics and curators, in this
case living in Rio and São Paulo (Aracy Amaral, Federico Moráis, and Paulo Herkenhoff for
example), who provide the names anyway, but also goes and visits the artist’s studios in the
major urban centers, not only those artists who live in the best neighborhoods, and then goes to
the small urban centers too, e.g. Curitiba, Salvador Bahía, and Tenerife. That is much more
relevant for an artist, to be treated with respect by the curator. Both would learn about an event
such as the Havana Biennale together, rather than being part of a list of ‘noble’ curators who
stayed during a weekend in the country and came up with a list deciding who is going to
represent the nation in a particular mega-event.
During all these years we have confirmed this effect, over and over again. That is one of
the motivations to keep doing what we do. Even with the small budget we have for research
travels, we try to stretch it as much as we can, every time, we go to more than one city, one more
country, one more artist. We have sacrificed our well being (a hotel or a good dinner) to be there.
We have created networks of solidarity; we stay at friend’s houses, gaining one more town, one
more studio to visit. All in order to maintain that spirit that has given us that “other curatorial
view,” the one that nurtures the ‘mística’ of the Havana Biennale.”
HILDA MARIA RODRIGUEZ. “There is an important period that comes prior the research
journeys, and it has to begin with bibliographic work. Our documentation center has played a
key role in keeping us current, with catalogs, magazines, books, reports, interviews, etc. It was
created immediately after the Lam Center opened its doors, and thanks to the collaboration of
artists, scholars, critics, and cultural institutions around the world. They send us their material
and information as a result of the work of people such as Ibis Hernandez and Silvia Medina de
Miranda, they were in charge of organizing, processing, and cataloguing that info. They took the
time to produce reference cards, to comment on and circulate the latest exhibitions, art events,
fairs, etc., among the Lam members. That has helped not only the curators but also the art
students and faculty who come to the Lam Center and use the facilities.
I can argue that it was what we were able to see through the documentation that the
research journey came into being. They would constitute the weaving nail that has maintained
our network. Besides, thanks to it we were able to be atttuned to with the most current questions
and debates that have helped us to reach our goals.
Before the trip, the first thing we do is to study, think, and reflect, to explore and evaluate
the artistic manifestations that correspond to with our conceptual interests. From there to the
final product is a complex process. The second step is to arrange the trip, an administrative
dimension comes in here, and later the direct encounter with the context and with the artists and
works can expand the conceptual horizon. We will face challenges to our interests and changes
in our general plans and sometime these can change the whole spirit of the project. The third
phase takes place back in Havana, where all the members of the group get together and discuss,
horizontally, collectively, and in a scholarly manner, the material we have gather. There is a
moment of definition, when the list of artists, projects, parallel events, etc., are defined.
After that, the really hard work begins. Contacting artists, institutions, defining the
venues, permits, production, work teams, etc., that for months in advance, absorbs all our time. It
is during this time that person-to-person contact with the artists takes place; we discuss with
them, through letters, phones calls, faxes, and now e-mails, the creative process of each
particular project, the pieces involved, the technical specificities and the like. It is during this
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time when contradiction and disillusionment happens; we realize many times that what we
wanted to be part of the Biennale is impossible to bring about.
It was during 1991 and 1992 that the first trips took place; my first trip to Asia was in
1993. It was an exceptional opportunity to visit China and India, actually I only went to China,
and Nelson Herrera, who had more experience, visited India. Fortunately, we put together a good
collective of Chinese artists that time. It was a difficult situation since the new Chinese scene
was already huge. We compromised our curatorial decision making process by inviting critics
and curators to be part of it. I traveled to Beijing, Shang-hai, among other cities. From the
Second Biennale Chinese art has been present; in 1986 we had a wonderful display of Chinese
kites and other expressions of Chinese popular culture. We had a vision but we did not have the
knowledge. That was the moment of the famous 1989 Modernist Exhibition in Beijing. A
moment in which curators and artists had flew the country for persecution. We had some official
contacts with the National Museum and the National Academy in Beijing. For me it was an
exjhausting trip because of the lack of knowledge and information we had. In the end we
organized an important exhibition with artists from China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand,
and India. I have to make that my participation in the final cut was limited because my
knowledge was also limited at the time of the ‘Art and Society’ Biennale in 1994.”
JOSE MANUEL NOCEDA. “The context of the Caribbean is special. My first research journey
was in 1993. I traveled to a group of small islands that were part of the Dutch enterprise in the
region -Aruba and Curacao. In the case of Aruba, there was a very little information because it is
one of the most isolated territories of the Caribbean. Upon my arrival I encountered a country in
which a modern tradition in art was not completely defined. However, I found a small group of
artists working eagerly; some of them had studied abroad in some of the Dutch academies in
Amsterdam and they were doing interesting work, applying the problematic of the country in
their explorations. The issue of national identity and the self were part of their work during that
time. There was not a cultural establishment or institution, and they lacked even an academy and
basic infrastructure was lacking as well as gallery space and museums were almost non-existent.
But it was possible to find groups working, discussing, as if they were anywhere in the world.
After that, I was invited to participate in the Second Caribbean and Central American Biennale,
an event that since then has created a circuit and a forum for the art of the region. Indeed,
previously I had worked in what we call the table-research; in addition I had collected
interviews, bibliographies, documentation, something that all of us had started doing years
earlier.”
IBIS HERNANDEZ ABASCAL. “My first research trip was to Mexico. When I arrived there
my mission was more than doing curatorial work and come up with a list of names. The idea was
to gather as much information as I could, to bring it over to our collective table. I would be the
first filter of those works that did not fit the conceptual discourse we proposed for that Biennale.
We had proposed a series of issues that we believed were in place on the new global stage migrations, the environment, cultural appropriations and crossings, the postmodern self, among
others- affecting the aesthetic and symbolic registers of the art produced in our regions.
I arrived in Mexico City with that mission. Fortunately, we already had a good
relationship with institutions such as the Carrillo Gil Museum, directed by Silvia Pandolfi at the
time. I worked with Raúl Tostado, Edgardo Banado, José Reinoso (aka Manfred) and others,
who introduced me to collectives such as Temístocles (they were at the time young artists
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making radical work). The INBA (National Institute of Fine Arts) directed by Nidia Molina gave
us information that led me to a universe of new artists. The gallery circuit was very intense at the
time, in particular the Galería Arte Contemporáneo, The Nina Menocal Gallery and the UMR
space, among others. I had the opportunity to meet historian and critic Raquel Tibol, who taught
me a lot when reading her books and papers over time. That research journey lasted 45 days and
took me to Guadalajara, Tijuana, Puebla, Merida, and Mexico City. The idea was to create a
network of communication and contacts which would permit mutual collaboration. Thanks to
that network that has nodes everywhere in the Third World and beyond (even in Europe and the
U.S., but specially in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and especially in Latin America), the Havana
Biennale has been possible.
We use Cubana Airlines flights which bring us to certain places, but after that it is all up
to us. It is important to clarify that we travel with very little money, since the Lam Center has a
really small budget. For example, when arriving to Bogotá we do not have the resources to travel
to Medellín, Cali, Pereira, or Bucaramanga. We have to rely on our friends (people and
institutions) that understand the role the Havana Biennale has played in world art. We also have
that network of affection which has been growing through time. Perhaps that is the most
important thing to have when working in an event like this, affection. Other institutions have
become important for us, for example, the Universidad de Antioquia in Medellín, Colombia, has
helped a lot, giving us the opportunity to teach as international professors and paying us
accordingly. Events such as the Regional Exhibitions of Art in Colombia invited us all in 199798 to travel around the country to give lectures and serve as jurors for events, which helped us a
lot in a moment of finantial exigency in Cuba. All the information and experiences we have
gathered are an asset for the Havana Biennale.”
MARGARITA SANCHEZ PRIETO. “My first research trip as curator for the Lam Center was
to Uruguay, Paraguay, and Chile. The second one was to Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, and
Chile; those were exhausting trips not only physically but also emotionally. Previously, at the
end of the 1980s I had traveled to Venezuela and Colombia. In 1991, I went to Holland, were the
famous exhibition America: The Bride of the Sun had taken place. I went with Llilian Llanes,
taking an exhibition for the celebration of the 500th anniversary of the encounter of worlds.
The research trips are intense every time; you have to make sense of the cultural universe
of each country and region, always working under adverse conditions (economically in
particular). This has been an additional challenge. There is an eagerness to understand the
cultural doings and whereabouts in wide terms. For example, Chile is a very complex place,
crossed by a history of repression and self indulgence, while Argentina is closer to the Western
model, being more white and academic regardless of its diversity. If Transvanguardia (NeoExpressionism) is in fashion in Italy, then in Buenos Aires almost simultaneously, one way or
the other, they would invite Aquile Bonito Oliva to introduce and present it. That is why
Argentina has characters such as Leon Ferrari, working with pop-art from very early on. That is
how it used to be in Argentina; now, after the crisis of 2001, it is different. Chile, on the other
hand, is more semiotic and dense in terms of theory and praxis; much more complex; perhaps its
recent history and their politico-cultural environment are part of it.”
EUGENIO VALDES FIGUEROA “In 1993, Magda González and I traveled to Africa. In
Dakar (Senegal) we met African art critics for the first time. Before we had approached African
art from Euro-American perspectives, but not anymore, for example, after meting Ery Camara, a
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critic and museographer graduated in Mexico, but who cannot work in his country because of the
difficult economic situation there. He is highly critical of the way African art is treated by
Western curators and institutions. We witnessed a debate between Camara and André Magrin,
one of the curators of the exhibition L’Magiciens de la Terre (also responsible for the exhibitions
Africa Today and Explores, both traveled the U.S. and Europe). They discussed, for example,
why Africa was (still is) absent from the market-boom of African art in the West.” 226
MAGDA ELIAN GONZALEZ. “I want to talk about our experience in the 1993 Dakar
Biennial. It gave us the opportunity to contact and met new people. In addition, we realized how
the Senegalese Biennial at Dakar had been able to bring artists, critics, institutions and museums
not only from the region, but also from Europe and the U.S., since its creation in 1966 (but more
steadily since 1992, when it opened up to the international circuit). We were surprised at their
knowledge of the Havana Biennale and the expectation the 1994 edition engendered.” 227
Figure 25. Magda Elián González and Eugenio Valdés Figueroa. Bohemia, 1993
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In 1993, the two curators (González and Valdés Figueroa) traveled to six African
countries (Senegal, Ghana, Nigeria, Mozambique, Congo, and Zimbabwe) in search of artists for
the 1994 Havana Biennale. Ethiopian artist Zaruhum Yentingeta won the 1993 Dakar Biennial in
Senegal and he had been invited to the 1989 Havana Biennale. That year the curators from the
Lam Center had interviewed and worked with many African artists, critics, and curators. That is
the case for Izek Kingelez (Zaire) who in the words of Magda E. Gonzalez, “mixes different
visual and architectural codes, making models for utopian cities where he projects his ideas
about what a city might be. From his utopian vision, a new African man emerges, one that
participates in the enlightened program. Kingelez does not shut the doors on the possibility; he
calls for a fight where Africa has a right to dream, even under the worst conditions” 228
3.4.1.4 The Fifth Biennale, special period and maturity
JOSE MANUEL NOCEDA. “It was during the Fifth Biennale (1994) that we achieved
complete control over the list of artists and art pieces on display. For the very first time we had
not only a voice but also a vote in the definition of the event. That would constitute at the same
time the concretization of our work model. However, at the same time we were in a limiting
situation; we were losing people at the Lam Center (as was the case everywhere else in the
country). The dismissal of Silvia Medina pushed Ibis Hernandez to take over two new regions.
She was responsible for Mexico and Latino Art, with all its manifestations of border art and
Latino culture in the North, and suddenly she had to deal with Colombia and Brazil too. Those
countries were almost universes in themselves; they were not events that were connected neither
geographically nor culturally.
That diversity of realities gave us the possibility of risking a new event, proposing several
topics and artists that we considered had to be in the Biennale that year. In fact, we, the curatorresearchers, had disagreed with some display solutions used by other events like ours. There the
participation was determined by national pavilions, national or regional representations, by
continent, genre, racial and gender divides, etc., instead of creating ‘zones of contact’ and
‘fluidity’ where dialog and encounter were possible. This Biennale started from working with the
different geographical areas, then we came up with a series of exchanges, cross lines, and leaps,
to finish with the decision to make five separate exhibitions, completely independent of one
another but related in spirit. That decision, to use five sub-topics, was assumed by pairs of
curators; the challenge was much greater but the result was superior. I worked with Antonio
Molina and we had under us an international group of artists that emphasized self-referential
practices, working with their own identities. The title of our exhibition was The Periphery of the
Postmodern. If some argue that the final result was fragmented, it was not only because of space
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problems since we used for the first time several venues and alternative spaces in Havana City
(many of the old colonial houses in the historic district) and we adapted the fortresses of La
Cabaña and El Morro as exhibition venues. But the fragmentation also arose from the conceptual
universe in exploration. The spaces and the multiple views on the conceptual problems are now
the signature of the Havana Biennale. The museography was a challenge too, to resolve such an
exhibition in the middle of the ‘special period’ with a very limited budget was another test, that
added up to the hard conditions. Administratively it was a monster, since we had to assume all
the spaces were real “white cubes.” That was what we had imposed on ourselves that time.
In retrospect, undertaking such an effort during the worst moment of our recent history as
a country, the fall of Eastern Europe, the new global economy, our own blockage (cultural and
economic), our own corruption… Nonetheless, we celebrated one of the most ambitious Havana
biennales of our history, that Fifth Biennale is for us a paradigmatic event. There were more than
two hundred artists distributed among five exhibitions, across the entire city. It was a challenge
indeed. We remember that biennale as the most special of all, with solid works of art by many
artists from around the world. And by Cubans such as Kcho (Alexis Leyva), who showed his
now famous “Regata”, which became the signature of that biennale. Art proposals of exceptional
treatment, sincerity, and courage from artists dealing with the themes were exhibited and
debated. Pierre Restany, one of our friends, but a fierce critic as well, said that the Fifth Biennale
marks the maturity of the event.”
Figure 26. Kcho, “La Regata.” Installation, 1994 (El País, Madrid, p.35, SPAIN, May 15, 1994)
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HILDA MARIA RODRIGUEZ. “In 1994, the whole team participated in the decisions of our
own peer-review process. Thanks to that process, in 1994 the Biennale took a multi-dimensional
structure, each one addressing and connecting to other topics. Migration, marginalization, social
and environmental problems, cultural interweaving where popular (kitsch) and high culture met,
dreams and individual obsessions were very important for the discourse of art and representative
of our own cultures.
Those aspects helped us to make our work concrete. We had to separate each approach
and design for the unconventional venues, deciding which would work better. We assembled
shows with pieces coming from every region of the Third World. In order to do that, we
established work teams (pairs). I had the opportunity and fortune to work with Eugenio Valdez
Figueroa on the exhibitions La Otra Orilla (The Other Shore) and Espacios Fragmentados
(Fragmented Spaces) that took place in El Morro and La Cabaña fortresses. We studied each
artists and project in depth in order to build the guidelines for the exhibition. In that way we were
able to address the issues at stake systematically. We faced a universe of concepts and problems
that materialized when the artists and art works arrived. Indeed, what we always remember are
the physical and financial burdens and the harsh conditions that we and the artists, no matter
where they come from, faced during that year.”
MARGARITA SANCHEZ PRIETO. “For the Fifth Biennale we worked in teams for
the assemblage of the exhibitions; this has become a signature for the events that followed. I
worked with Ibis Hernandez on an exhibition we called Apropiaciones y Entrecruzamientos
Culturales (Appropriations and Cultural Interweaving). That was a really interesting mise en
scene in which hybrid works in terms of symbolic, media, and market-driven forces were in play.
Artists were drawing nurture from mass-media interacting with iconic and traditional images and
popular merchandise. We worked with texts produced by important intellectuals such as Jesús
Martín Barbero and Nestor García Canclini, who gave us theoretical light to assume the complex
interweaving present in the works with which we were dealing. For example, wood blocks that
could work as printout for the currency of certain African countries in the 1970s. Those pieces
among other were challenging to any intellectual reading made under purely Western methods artists understand icons as part of the market of contemporary live. It was a very broad Biennale
thematically, theoretically and museographically speaking. Pieces by Fernando Arias Gaviria
(from Colombia) and Carlos Capelán (from Uruguay) became encrusted in the hard spaces of the
fortresses of La Cabaña and el Morro. There were five big exhibitions extended across the city.
The exhibition titled ‘Arte y Mercado’ (Art and Market) in the Santa Clara Convent, thanks to
the artists’ following the curatorial decision was a great show also. There were great installations
with a powerful presence in the space that produced a sort of aura. The academic events were not
well put together (our mistake). However, we counted the presence of intellectuals such as Pierre
Restany, Néstor García Canclini, and Shifra Goldman.
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Figure 27. Work sheet for the parallel events, 5th Havana Biennale (1994)
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It is important to underline the role the Havana Biennale played at that moment. It
became an event for the art of regions not covered before, starting with Latin America. We
started with our region, to promote the great masters of our time, later extending the coverage to
the rest of the Third World to establish a global dialog in an open field of practices and interests.
When the Biennale canceled the contest-representational model, this opened up the possibility to
guide a reading toward those regions that were completely obscure, to locate coordinates on a
map that would help us to know and understand those territories. We say that ‘tradition and
contemporaneity’ are still two coordinates to guide the sight. It was necessary to shut down the
grip of participation to guide the public and ourselves so that each time was more demanding.
Many of the pieces we knew were supported by their context and traditions, but were not part of
one or another Biennale because of a rigorous, and many times painful, process of selection by
part of the curatorial body through a horizontal and consensual decision-making process.
The Fifth Biennale marked our maturity, in terms of ideas, the aesthetic interest and the
extra-artistic was looking to project itself into the world of the contemporary discussion in arts
and culture. Quality, poetry, and factura (among other issues) were entangled; the social and
cultural contexts for us were one. That Fifth Biennale occurred when Cuba, all alone without
moral or economic support, faced outrages of energy, oil, food supply, the balsero phenomenon,
external pressures, the blockade, etc., which causes a series of problems in our economy and in
everyday life in general. During that time, in contrast, the Lam Center reached its apex in
research terms and in international recognition. Finally, we had the possibility of fusing the
artistic with the coverage of the Third World with the curatorial topics of the moment for our
territories and the globalized world at the time. Simultaneously, we were responding to local and
regional problems. From our own reality, phenomena such as HIV (as in the case of Fernando
Arias), migration, mass-media, new-liberalism, global communication and the market, etc., were
treated systematically. That is why we consider that Biennale as a cult event for us. It was the
one in which the ‘spirit’ (again the term ‘mística’) of the Havana Biennale is most clearly seen.
Everywhere in the art displayed, the artists, the discussions, the problems -all were aligned in one
discussion, a collective one that took place that year.”
The figure presents Fernando Arias’ work titled “Sero/(0)-Positivo”, a major installation
involving a larger-than-life image of a nude man (a photographic self-portrait) covered with a
transparent layer of thousands of anonymous blood cells - some healthy, others infected with the
AIDS virus. The artist had worked with his mother, a microbiologist working in hospitals in his
country and in awareness campaigns (also addressing his own-gay condition). The resulting
sanctuary-like work, illuminated with UV light, was presented in one of the niches in the Morro
fortress (a good curatorial decision), creating an atmosphere for reflection on our ethical
responsibilities in contemporary society.
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Figure 28. Fernando Arias, “Seropositivo.” Installation, 1994
3.4.1.5 New challenges and crisis, revision and regression
HILDA MARIA RODRIGUEZ. “After many trips and more reading and research it was in
1997 that I finally felt I had more control, and I felt more proficient over the artistic production
of my region of focus, regardless of its size and complexity. I think we did a good job of
bringing the most progressive and radical artists from South East Asia for our Seventh Biennale
titled El Individuo y su Memoria (the Individual and His Memory).
My most important contacts in the region were in the Philippines, Manila principally; in
Indonesia, Bandung, which had a long relationship with Havana and Jakarta also; In Thailand
and India we have great relationships with artists, curators, critics and institutions. That is the
case of Geeta Kapur, one of our most important contacts and a good friend of the Biennale.
Malaysia has been more difficult as a whole; however, we do have artists coming consistently to
our events. This variety of contacts allows us not only to recognize the most important artists
coming out those territories, but also to identify the younger ones operating in alternate and
parallel circuits -sometimes working underground. The Havana Biennale is known for giving
space to emerging artists, to allow less well known artists to show their work, which has given a
certain aura to the Biennale. The idea is not to bring the ‘best of the best,’ since they already
have their own place in the international circuit. Our task is to offer an alternative viewpoint
from a real knowledge of what is going on through the work of less well known artists,
sometimes the ones that have been put aside by the official circuit.”
IBIS HERNANDEZ ABASCAL “At the time, another issue became apparent. It was the arrival
of the new millennium. It was at the center of the debate, launching revisionist agendas
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everywhere. The Biennale decided then to revise, in a sense, the issue of memory from several
perspectives. From the individual, the familial, the social, the cultural and historical, in other
words, to revise it in an organic way while being at the same time flexible. That is how a
selection of artists is made on a reflexive line, it supposes discussion and debate in order to find
its artistic feasibility, since it is necessary to evaluate if there is an artistic practice that supports
the discursive line.
Another example, the Ninth Biennale, takes again a topic that was worked on during the
Seventh Biennale. In 2000 the issue under discussion was ‘Más cerca el uno del otro’ (Closer to
Each Other) and its foundation was based on communication from multiple vantage points.
During the ninth version the focal point was the city, not only from the issue of public space but
also from the interaction among populations and groups that inhabit the social tissue in relation
with the city itself. We called it ‘Dinámicas de la Cultura Urbana’ (Dynamics of Urban Culture)
as in the works of Mónica Nador, the collective Barrio San Isidro, Gustavo Artigaz, Bijarí,
among others. The idea was also to de-structure our previous model of work. To really take the
Biennale out to the public space -not in rhetorical terms but in real terms. In order to do that we
needed to put together a series of artistic projects that based their practices on participation and
interaction, with an ephemeral and trans-disciplinary character. Indeed, we did not make it….
We asked ourselves how to make it happen, this was a recurrent fear in our previous discussions
and we were not happy with the result. Events such as InSITE Mexico-U.S. counts on important
budgets that allow them to bring artists to interact with and understand the context of the city (in
this case two cities, San Diego and Tijuana), its inhabitants, problems, etc., to make the projects
go deep into the real and not only to produce shallow positions with respect to what it means to
intervene. We tried to find artistic projects that could create new dynamics, new senses beyond
our own questions in that Biennale. Our vision for the event failed, we did not make it…”
Note: During the interviews, the members of the Wifredo Lam Center declined to speak on the
record about some cases. For example, the pieces by Lam that were stolen during a parallel
exhibition during the early editons or the facts surrounded the Eight Biennale in which major
sponsor institutions decided to suspend their financial assistance. The cases of the seventh and
eight biennales will be discussed in depth in the following chapters.
3.4.1.6 New Generations and Proxy Wars
For other collaborators on the biennales, the work method has constituted the core of the
activities that give personality to the Lam Center’s inner life. Dannys Montes de Oca has been
working for the Lam Center since 2000, organizing the theoretical events parallel to the
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Biennale; she has been part of the curatorial team of the Lam Center since 2007. She is a curator
herself, being the first one to curate the new Cuban Contemporary Art Salon in 1994, when it
became a curatorial project instead of a competitive show. She has won several awards in
curatorial and art criticism on the Island and has collaborated more actively as part of the new
generation of international Cuban art curators in the definition of the future of the Havana
Biennale.
DANNYS MONTES DE OCA. (Art Historian, critic and curator. At the Lam Center since
2003.) “The Biennale has its own methodology that started long ago. The curator-researchers
travel, when they have the chance, to their areas of specialization, exploring new practices and
visiting the most relevant artists in search of works that match the conceptual dimension that is
the topic for the following biennale. During that exploration they face many risks because they
find promising works and artists; unfortunately, when they are place in the space of the Biennale
some do not achieve the desire level. The Havana Biennale is an event produced with limited
resources; compare to others like it, it is a ‘poor’ event. Small events in many places of the world
can count on more economic support than this biennale. Now, even the research trips are at risk.
Between what is planned and what really happens, there is a big gap filled with problems and
frustrations. For example, for the 2006 Biennale (number eight) the trips to Africa did not
happen. They did everything they could to generate contacts and search the material available
through documentation, the internet, on-line magazines, web pages, institutions, curators, art
critics, etc; something similar happened with Asia. This fact accounts for the absence of a strong
presence of African and Asian artists in Havana that year.
Nonetheless, from the methodological standpoint there is important to recount how they
work. I can say that it is a completely horizontal process; there is not an individual personality
that overshadows the other members of the group. From the selection of the conceptual topic, the
choice of works, to the assemblage of the exhibition there are not individuals, only a collective
will and consciousness. There is a voluntary renouncement of individuality, where the
geographical areas do not determine any focus. The final result is a horizontal landscape of
diverse local and regional accents. That gives the biennale the possibility of exchanging ideas
and knowledge that in other ways would be part of their own individual experience. The same
method is used now in the design of the academic event. In 2003 the model was different; art
critics, curators, and specialists moderated the panels. But for 2006, the curator-researchers
returned to the table, and they were important for the success of the event. They were always
giving feedback, from the introductions to the most theoretical presentations. This helped to
establish a context for the panels from their own knowledge and view of the Biennale’s topic and
their views on global art. Thus it is possible to generate a real dialog otherwise difficult since
their experience is subsumed in the exhibition.
Certainly, their critical stand before the world art system has been the most relevant
action they have taken. The Biennale’s curators are a cohesive and knowledgeable group, highly
critical with respect to their work too. They are not ‘curator-artists’ as many practitioners are
today; they do not treat their practice as a definition of style. They are not happy with the result
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of the last biennales. As spectacle, the Havana Biennale cannot fulfill expectation, it is still a
work in progess, bringing people from all over the world, and increasing its presence among the
Cuban public. What is true is that it is facing difficulties. However, it has to keep going, the team
knows what is not working and that gives it a positive future perspective. They know they cannot
abandon their rigorous practice. The other fifty-percent is the financial, the economics of the
event. We have to be optimists, for many of us the most important part is the process and work
ethic; that is what marks the difference with respect to many other events.”
This auto-critical attitude is noticed when discussing the problems in recent editions of
the Biennale with members of the curatorial team. Although, they detect a series of problems
which go beyond the administrative aspects of the organization (budget, venues, lack of
direction, gaps in production, etc.), cases of censure and intervention are part of these also. They
are more concerned with how artistic practice has changed during the last decade. With respect
to the future of the event after the crisis of the last two biennales, Ibis Hernández notes:
Going back in time, I would say that the sixth Biennial, in 1997, sent the first
intermittent signals about the necessity to rethink the structure of the event. Incipient attempts
at transformation have taken place in the successive editions with only partial results,
achievements and errors. The ninth edition rang the alarm like no other, emphasizing the
urgent and vital necessity of renovation. For this, it will be essential to contemplate not only
aspects concerning the structure and the regularity of the model, but to review its intentions
and projection according to the complexity of the changes that have taken place in the worldwide geopolitical map, the national and international artistic scene, and the demands and
operating exigencies of new means, languages and ways of operationalization. All these must
be consider without losing sight of the restrictions that the accomplishment of an international
biennale implies from our own here and now. This is the challenge. Through the years we have
received very objective criticism –which we always receive gratefully– as well as judgments
that suggest a superficial approach to the art of the regions that the Biennale focuses on, and an
ignorance or underestimation of the conditions under which it takes place. The present
circumstances are not the same ones that caused the eruption of the event in 1984, as the
interests to mediate are not the same either. To project utopias never was the most difficult
thing to do; the greatest challenge lies in making their materialization viable. Thus any
criticism or suggestion is welcome. 229
On the other hand, Margarita Sánchez Prieto is more positive about the success achieved
at the last two biennales and argues that:
The gathering of an ample representation of international works on various subjectrelated topics, local works, some projects (created) on the spot, ‘living’ experiences of our
urban culture and the ultra-modern achievements of an architect of world-wide recognition as
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Jean Nouvel, is the best way of attaining an unbiased selection, encompassing the the diversity
of urban cultures, their interconnections, their common aspects and their contrasts. Once again
the Biennial established its stance through the curatorial selection, in spite of the
precariousness of some projects, the excess of bi-dimensional works and the disproportionate,
respectively inappropriate, space given to some topics that conspiring against the artistic level
of the event and blurred its general reading. Although the above explained difficulties made it
impossible to develop a curatorial work that would be more invasive of the urban space, it is
nevertheless true that this biennale increased its public attendance thanks to an unprecedented
effort at diffusion in the local media. The laudable effort of designing and editing the catalog,
by a team at the institution –a task not being carried out in Cuba since the Third Biennale, is
another success.
The same can be said about the theoretical symposium Forum Idea 2006. Attended by
key figures of international thought, and (lesser or non-internationally renowned) lecturers,
who from their respective fields and perspectives contributed with substantial reflections on the
analysis of contemporary transnational, regional and local experiences on the subject. There is
much to be said about the various lectures of the program, but I would like to at least highlight
those dealing with instructive proposals of discourses contrary to the hegemonic narratives,
both on known artistic typologies and on art works of recent production.
The operation of situating on a plane of equality the axis of “north and south”, and with
it their respective problems and utopias or, which is the same, the equal recognition of works
from our regions with those originating in the First World on the subject, would be the strategy
that would sustain the thesis of this biennale. In this sense, we have achieved our goal. 230
To face the proxy art-wars, it could be productive to go back to the beginning of the
global issue in art, and recall what Llilian Llanes said, in 1992, about it. It becomes important
after a decade and a half of the new global order to slow down and reflect on the forces in place
then and now. How are information technologies and global networks challenging old structures
of art production and consumption? Is the market co-opting solidarity among artists and
institutions across the new routes of art today? Is it supporting or just integrating new subjects in
the mix?
An effort should be made to clarify what goes on globally in art. We are faced with a
great diversity of art centers. It would be useless to deny or ignore this, but I must admit that
developing a complete picture of what goes on in art world-wide is really difficult. We have
many means available to learn about what goes on in Europe and North America, where the
leading art magazines are published, the most prestigious museums are located, and the most
renowned events take place, but what can we do to learn about Third World artists? Save for
rare exceptions, there are no contemporary art museums in their countries that can afford to
collect works by their own national, let alone regional or provincial, artists. We certainly
cannot count on a system of attractive, internationally-distributed magazines to "sell" their
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products. Commercial activity has only just begun for these artists, but a demand for the work
which would be capable of supporting its development is non-existent. 231
Figure 29. Llilian Llanes by Antonio Zaya in 1993
3.5
UNPACKING THE BIENNALE HISTORY
When discussing a possible history of the Havana Biennale, and according to Juan
Manuel Noceda, there are three fundamental moments in the event: a conventional survey, a
transitional phase, and a research-based event (which is still functioning). However, considering
recent shifts it is possible to introduce two more to add to the first three (a global triennial, and a
state of suspension). The phases are elaborated bellow.
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Figure 30. Opening of the Second Biennale in the Cuban Pavilion, 1986
(Llilian Llanes at the far right)
1. A conventional survey (1984-1986). The Havana Biennale was born without a strict
curatorial process in place. Actually, there were four biennales in which (semi) open calls for
artists were made, and two that offered awards –based on a competitive model. At that point the
Lam Center was supported by institutions and peoples with an in-depth knowledge of the art
produced in the three continents in focus, its institutions, and events. The first biennales were
also supported by friends of Cuba and thanks to the relationships established in the past with art
critics, theoreticians, art historians, artists, among other people. The first two biennales (1984
and 1986) were surveys. Panoramic, and in a sense classificatory, they primarly presented,
especially, art from Latin America and the Caribbean. They were organized under a competitive
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model that honored artists according to artistic practice and the specificity of the medium. This
first moment was inspired by long running exhibitions such as the Venice Biennial and by the
more local manifestations, such as the São Paulo Biennial. It was by following these models that
the Lam Center was able to establish a status among institutions, initially in the region and later
in the Third World. Thanks to the material gathered during the first two biennales, an active
networking through Cuban embassies and emissaries around the planet, Third World
participation was active from the third staging on.
This qualitative jump was possible, thanks in part to Cuba’s position in the non-aligned
movement during the 1980s, its support of the African cause as well as solidarity with the
freedom movements in South East Asia, and by some explorations made by Mosquera, Herrera
Ysla, and Llilian Llanes during the initial years of the event.
2. Transitional phase (1989-1991). By the Third Biennale (1989), the presence of
scholars such as Geeta Kapur, Federico Morais, Juan Acha, Aly Sinon, Roberto Segre, Sergio
Magalhaes, Rashid M. Diab and Pierre Restany, among others, debating an integrated view from
the Third World, would corroborate this as the turning point. 232
However, this second stage was transitional. It started with the decision to cancel the
competition (1989) and would last to the end of the Fourth Biennale (1991). Since then, the event
has become a topical one in which a conceptual problem determined the curatorial decisions as
to what would compose the exhibitions and academic events. The first topic explored was
“Tradition and Contemporaneity,” (1989) the second one was “The Challenge of NeoColonialism” (1991). According to Noceda, the shift would restructure the Lam Center and
generate certain frictions within it, since it did not emerge from the research area necessarily.
The shift happened just before Mosquera’s departure in 1991, and it would determine a new
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practice: the creation of a team of curator-researchers (los especialistas / the specialists) of the
Lam Center. It would be driven by a scholarly style of research work directed by Llanes and
informed, initially, by Mosquera’s academic interests.
3. Research-based biennales (1994-2000). In 1994 the introduction of a new element for
the conception and concretion of the Havana Biennale would bear fruit. The Biennale, affected
by the departure of Mosquera in 1991 and many artists from the 1980s generation (during the
‘special period’), turned completely to research as the basis for building the biennale. 233 It
conferred authority on the group of researchers and established a horizontal decision-making
process. The curator-researchers started to examine in detail and through complex ways the
different regions of the world. They have been taking an active part in the selection,
organization, and assemblage of each biennale ever since. From that moment on the Lam Center
turned to a complex yet systematic machine that is nurtured by documentation, exchange,
research journeys, academic events, and symposia. The Biennale itself became a diacritical way
of working, which became the precedent feeding forward into the next event, reinforcing the
network of support. That third phase, according to Noceda, lasted from the Fifth to the Ninth
Biennale.
Nelson Herrera wrote about the structural change that took place around 1991-94, stating
that:
From the Third Havana Biennale (1989) and resulting from a serious analysis of the
granting of prizes within a too diverse panorama, multiple, heterogeneous, and based on
different material and social circumstances in each region and within specific countries, it was
decided to eliminate this competitive character. Then (it was possible) to step into a
confrontation where (we could) reflect the democratic and much more plural world in which
we are living.
At the same time, it was decided that each edition would be structured around a
conceptual object, identified previously by the curatorial team through investigation, and which
figured as a topic of interest within the international debate on contemporary art. This has
permitted us to confront a variety of approaches and points of view, as well as to identify
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strategies and resources use by the artists to project different angles on the proposed subject.
Since then, the academic events and the exhibitions have summoned the analysis and the
theoretical discussion, in agreement with the curatorial peculiarities of each Biennial. 234
The third moment also attests to the many partnerships the Biennale started in order to
expand its reach and counter-balance the economic burden of the ‘special period’. To name only
a few, there was Peter Ludwig’s interest in promoting (and collecting) Cuban art; Antonio
Zaya’s support through the Centro Atlántico de Arte Moderno CAAM (Atlantic Center of
Modern Art) in the Canary Islands, and his participation and involvement in the fifth, sixth, and
seventh biennales (as editor of the 1994, 2000, and 2003 catalogs and as consultant curator
during that time); the Prince Claus Fund, AFAA (French association of artistic action), and the
HIVOS Foundation sponsorships, among others. 235
4. Global Triennial (2000-2004). This perspective followed after the resignation of the
long-term director Llilian Llanes in 1999 (due to personal matters). The situation in the island
nation had changed considerably and the uncertainty of producing the Biennale increased each
year. After the sixth edition (1997), a lack of funding and interest on the part of the Cuban state
made things difficult. Herrera had expressed, with a degree of reserve, the challenges they faced,
Near already the arrival of the new century -and the third millennium of the history of
the humanity- we celebrated the Seventh Havana Biennale in 1997, the event for the second
time, became every three years. The difficult economic conditions and an extremely delicate
international context caused by the changes produced in the extinct socialist bloc did not allow
an ordered systematization of the event. Being a small biennale, it sees propitious for the
revision and re-reading of what happened to each one of our societies, to seek a better
understanding of the present and an effective projection of the future. The curatorial team,
considered it opportune to stimulate a reflection about “the individual and his/her memory.” 236
Following Llanes’ resignation, the Center, apparently did not enter into crisis. Rather,
there was a smooth transition in which one of the senior curators (Nelson Herrera Ysla) took
over the direction of the institution and the Biennale kept functioning as before. Indeed, the
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curatorial team lamented her departure, as it was Llanes who really structured and maintained the
Biennale as a functioning event during the most complex times of the early 1990s. Collateral
issues had emerged, some in relation to the financial dimension of the event and others
concerning the commercial character of Cuban art, for which some blame her resignation (Llanes
commented in 1997 that if the Biennale became an art fair, she would rather close it / it could
caused her resignation). However, these matters had been present since the creation of the event.
Other issues such as the validity of the Biennale in a global context, where the discussions about
North-South, Center-Periphery, Dependence-Independence, and the very notion of a Third Word
were in question, could have affected her decision. 237
Llilian Llanes was also the one who had a complex administrative and artistic vision,
besides her talent and excellent public relations, which had established a strong network of
friends and collaborators around the world. These, in a sense, had made the Biennale possible
from its beginning. Yet that network had weakened recently. A generational change in addition
to a new world view – a global one, had challenged old networks and created new ones. Hilda
María Rodriguez, who became Vice-Director in 1999, recalls the second crisis.
The first thing we did was to evaluate the situation we had at the moment of the
departure of Llilian Llanes. For more than fifteen years, the Biennale had built a space for the
art of the Third World and we could not let that end. The direction of the Lam Center was
assumed by Nelson Herrera Ysla, and I assumed the Vice-Direction. We started to work under
the same structure we already had; we believed that was the correct way to do things. We kept
the same goals and objectives established for the next biennale, number seven, to be held in
2000 and which we discussed with Llilian Llanes before her departure. The conceptual topic
selected to guide the Biennale was related to communication and non-communication in the
global world. We titled the Biennale ‘Uno más cerca del otro’ (One Closer to Each Other). At
the time, Herrera and I had not only our responsibilities as research-curators but also the
administrative ones we had acquired. That implicated a double dimension, which I believed
complemented each other: the administrative, financial (in local and international terms), in
addition, to the selection, definition, assemblage, and maintenance of the Biennale as well.
Recently, I had to leave my work as curator. I miss the direct contact with artists and art works,
the randomness of our conversations and solutions to the problems on the field when working
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on an exhibition. Those things, that are part of our work as curators in our territories, in the
Third World, a term that may be outdated but that in a practical sense is still valid. 238
Rodriguez would become director of the Lam Center in 2002 (lasting to 2004) and the
following Havana Biennale, number eight, under the topic “Art within Life” in 2003. During her
tenure, the financial crisis deepened because of the end of funding by international agencies. A
group of artists also boycotted the Biennale and did not attend. Simultaneously, the impact of
Documenta 11 (2002) over the discourse on postcolonial art and the confirmation of a global art
scene, also affected also what Havana planned that year.
5. State of suspension (2005-). A decision made by the CNAP in early 2005 to appoint a
new director for the Wifredo Lam Center, after the resignation of Hilda María Rodríguez for
health related problems, and just before the opening of the Ninth Biennale “The Dynamics of the
Urban Culture” (2006), produced a series of reactions inside and outside of the Biennale itself.
Coming from outside the Lam Center and the curatorial team, although a close ally and
collaborator in previous editions, Rubén del Valle Lantarón (a young cultural official) arrived
from the upper ranks of the Ministry of Culture, where he had worked for two decades on
cultural policy. 239 He is also an art historian, from a younger generation than the rest of the team.
He was supposed to bring new impetus to the event. His tenure has been directed at improving
the image of the Biennale among Cubans, as well as at reconnecting the event to the general
cultural policy of the state. The first objective seemed to be accomplished; the Ninth Biennale
put great effort into creating a media strategy – through TV, radio, and newspapers – creating an
appetite for contemporary art among the population of Havana and neighboring regions. The
production of newsreels and notes for national TV and the edition of a publication, in the form of
a newspaper for free distribution, in addition to taking full control of the Biennale’s catalog,
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were strong steps in that direction. However, there are no independent statistics on the number of
visitors to the exhibition venues. 240 The second objective was clearly accomplished. For some
time the Biennale had functioned as a lose cannon, because of its autonomy and in a sense
distance from the institutional apparatus. Now it is part of the major official cultural events in the
Island. A new moment has started. That was experience during the twenty fifth anniversary of
the event (the tenth edition), which became a complete spectacle.
Structural changes taking place in Cuba as a result of the transfer of power from Fidel
Castro to his brother Raúl Castro in July-August 2006, could impact it also, aggravating or
improving the general crisis of the Biennale. The Ministry of Culture continues promoting events
that are part of a cultural policy that is related to cultural tourism and the creation of wealth
through cultural production, architectural heritage, and tradition (the next section will expand on
this issue).
In 2007 del Valle Lantarón was called to become the head of the Consejo Nacional de
Artes Plásticas at the Ministry of Culture. Nontheless, del Valle Lantaron keept the direction of
the Tenth Havana Biennale, 2009 and appointed a new director for the Lam Center, Jorge
Antonio Fernández Torres. The biennale celebrated also its 25th anniversary.
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4.0
ON THE CONCEPT OF (THIRD WORLD / GLOBAL SOUTH)
CONTEMPORARY ART: THE HAVANA PERSPECTIVE
“A worker in Cuba, for example, working in sugar cane, had more in common with a sugar cane worker in Brazil than a Cuban
tobacco worker, who was working a few kilometers away from him. This means that it is not the men who make the product but
the product, which forms the man. I also worked with steel workers in France and the Ukraine and they were the same workers,
there was no difference between them. They behaved like steel workers, they had the faces of steel workers and in their
workplace they behaved the same way. So, it was the steel that formed the workers."
Sebastian Salgado 241
A definition of contemporary art, one which is still in formation, was not part of what the
members of the Lam Center were looking at and/or working for at first. In the best Marxist
tradition, they used conventional definitions to explain a particular artistic production in relation
to its socio-economic and historical context. However, they found this definition fell short with
respect to what they were facing. As a universal concept, art was a Western construct, a product
of its history, in relation to the former colonized world; art (as a concept) did not include the
pervasive imbalances and the asymmetrical relations established by the colonial era that at the
time where still present in the mainstream of art theory and art history. Working from a
postmodern platform and with a postcolonial mentality, Mosquera, Herrera, Llanes and the team
were facing new theoretical challenges. To define contemporary art in a new dimension, one
which included those who had been excluded, they had to introduce new issues and authors into
their discussions. Those authors were available -as Magali Espinoza will further explain in this
section- “in a rich environment where several worlds collide, the insularity of Cuba is just a
mirage, it always has been traversed by many streams of ideas, languages, races, and
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interests.” 242 A structural understanding of art informed their approach: the Lam Center had a
task, and was doing what was necessary to achieve it.
A definition of art came together with their perspective on the Third World, and then
came to a definition of Third World contemporary art. First, it is necessary to explore how the
curatorial team used the term “Third Word.” In 1992, in a special number of the magazine Third
Text dedicated to Cuba (and in particular to the Biennale), Llilian Llanes comments on their
understanding of the Third Word and contemporary Third World art:
It is a fact that the term (Third World) was used for the first time in 1955 during the
Bandung Conference, and that it emerges in specific historical circumstances; it is also true that
its use now has become generalized. However, it identified a common interest among countries
which, irrespective of their geographical locations, their differences in cultural heritage,
religion, political systems, economic structures or developmental level, faced serious problems
(with few possibilities of solving them) arising from the system of relations imposed by the
highly industrialized countries in the aftermath of colonialism; that is, the underdevelopment
and economic dependence of neo-colonialism. This is the meaning of ‘Third World’… and
despite its limitations, we shall continue to use the term for lack of a better one.
As a result of the extraordinary fusion of peoples and cultures in the history of the
Third World, many people currently believe that it has great cultural wealth and variety, and
has a market interest in re-asserting its own traditions while striving for universality. Out of the
conviction that contemporary Third World art and artists are contributing to global art,
emerged the idea of creating in Havana a space which would favor the dissemination of their
work and encourage discussion on the problems of contemporary art, especially those of the
Third World. 243
Herrera Ysla in his 2003 book Coordenadas de Arte Contemporáneo (Coordinates of
Contemporary Art) insists that, “We are not obsessed with being recognized, something that
almost always comes from abroad, manipulated, and directed towards interests that support the
status quo of the contemporary art world (a concept, by the way, unclear).” 244 At the same time
he makes clear that Third World artists are trapped within the global system, which governs what
is considered contemporary art. The inner contradiction of the modern now is extended to the
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contemporary. It is not possible to exist without a mirror image, which makes possible a
consciousness of oneself. Herrera Ysla continues:
The Havana Biennale is a collective curatorial project in which it is difficult to subtract
ourselves from the context where we operate locally and globally. We are now navigating in
the current that is stronger each day and which has as its center the figure of the curator, the
new intercultural guru, a figure that privileges not individual pieces but the way they fit into
his/her narrative. We are neither preoccupied with the issues that are in fashion in Europe,
Japan, or the United States, nor privilege the practice of installation art, post-conceptual, or
minimal art in their many variations.
We are interested in searching for ways to give more public accessibility, more clarity
in the purpose of an exhibition, and to bestow an open reflection upon our past and present, as
ways to counteract the illness that our memory and history comprise. We want to be part of the
contemporary intellectual space, to locate ourselves in the universe of artistic practice, and join
the venture of others who are contributing to the understanding of what we are. 245
Figure 31. Cover of Nelson Herrera Ysla's book Coordinates of Contemporary Art, 2004
Author interviewing Mr. Nelson Herrera Ysla at the Wifredo Lam Center. Havana, April 2006.
In that respect, contemporary art exists in a sphere between the main current of history,
its multiple subsidiary streams which follows certain interests, and a reflexive, parallel, and
alternate historical dimension that aims to reach an understanding of what it is to live in
contemporary times without distancing itself from those particular historical forces.
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When confronted with the question of what contemporary art means, members of the
curatorial team responded elusively. For example, Ibis Hernandez said:
In the documentation area at the Lam Center, we used to do a quarterly bulletin in
which a series of bibliographical entries introduced issues related to the visual arts. We
distributed this document not only around the Center, but we also sent it to all the members of
UNEAC. It was a very important work, since we developed analytical cards with reference to
the content of the most important international magazines of the time: Artforum, Art in
America, Arte in Colombia (later Art Nexus), Lápiz, and the African Art Review, among others.
The Bulletin helped to rethink ideas and gave them input through the referential cards
organized by topic, author, tendency, media, publication, etc. During those years (1984-1989),
I was involved in this work, which kept me away from the discussions that people such as
Llilian Llanes, Gerardo Mosquera and his research team, and Nelson Herrera had between
themselves. However, I am sure that the discussions were based, in part, on what we were
producing from the documentation area. I recall that for the Third Biennale in 1989, a forum
titled “Por la defensa de un arte contemporáneo para el tercer mundo” (for the defense of a
Third World contemporary art) was organized. During one of the previous discussions about
the definition of the topic for that biennale, the question arose as to whether the Havana
Biennale had to maintain its competitive model. The parameters under which we had rewarded
one art piece over another one were discussed. For example, how should we honor an artist
such as Oioguibi Fanabe from Nigeria who used to work as ‘bogolan’ artist driving ancestral
and contemporary images and practices into his work, or the ‘tinga-tinga’ school of painting in
Kinshasa, or the extremely sophisticated Chinese kites, simultaneously with the work of artists
such as Luis Camnitzer who was practicing international conceptualism?
All these practices were sharing the same gallery space and recognition by the Havana
Biennale. How could we evaluate this, under which parameters? Did we have to look at all
these expressions through the eyes of the West?
We had to make a shift and to find a new space for discussion. In part, that discussion
helped to terminate the competitive model. In that sense, yes, we were discussing a possible
definition of contemporary art, but it was in the direction of inclusion. We decided not to
distinguish the production from the popular (sometimes called kitsch), the expressions tied to
living cultures, giving them space among the more conventional manifestations from the art
world established by the West, and in which we were trained. In that way we were establishing
a new contemporary symbolic production. It was an act of decolonization in our own
practice. 246
Responding to the same question, Margarita Sánchez Prieto recalled the way the
definition of contemporary art was debated during the third Havana Biennale.
We started from the bottom up. I remember how, during the 1989 Biennale the notion
of the contemporary was central, even talking about African art, which was part of the agenda.
Our library had more materials that treated African art from a traditional rather than a
contemporary point of view; it had (as everywhere else) an ethnographic flavor. There was that
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prejudice when recognizing the production coming from Africa as anthropological and
ethnographic. That old vision in which even for us, African art was traditional, because its own
colonial history made us ask about the diversity of cultural forms that were present before our
own colonial experience. A series of aspects showed how different the coordinates of artistic
production were in those territories, even in our own. The processes of acculturation, the type
of urban development, the colonial axis (the French, the British, the Portuguese, or Spanish),
and the way art was produced today were clear signs of how to work.
The concept of the ‘contemporary’ (as the actual) was a key to reviewing those regions.
I remember our first incursions into those places; the most senior curators were the ones who
ventured first. On the Eastern front, the work of José Luis Ayala in the Department of
International Relations was important to establish our first contacts with Asia Minor and the
Middle East.
We knew of the existence of artists in those territories, that even those artists working
on traditional media were making important works in our approach. It was a ‘virgin’ area of
research, which was completely unknown in this part of the world. We have an advantage with
Latin America: Casa de las Américas -founded in 1959 on Che’s initiative as a bridge for the
subcontinent- had established that idea, to unite us using our communalities. Culture and
language were the two forces behind it. We were looking for a space that could open a dialog
under a certain problem or phenomena. That was the way Cuba had been doing it since the
Revolution. Besides, there was no single space for the artistic production from the so-called
Third World countries. That is why the Havana Biennale became a powerful space to show the
production of artists that did not have spaces of representation, spaces for their work. 247
The younger generation of Cuban curators looks at the phenomenon from a different
perspective. It is relevant to underscore how, for Curators working in Cuba, the global age had
cut back the former cosmopolitanism of Havana and, for instance, the internationalism of their
institutional practice (rescuing individuals such as Mosquera or de la Nuéz). Comparing it with
the fluid exchange that happened during the 1980s with the Non-Aligned Group of Nations.
Simultaneously, awareness of the lack of regional and local criticism, which was common during
the postmodern period, had produced revisionist agendas that could center the discussion at a
theoretical level, which is necessary in areas of the world that do not have time to build critical
distance through constant documenting, reading, and re-reading of their histories. For example
Dannys Montes de Oca affirms that:
Today our position has changed again. It is difficult to have access and direct
communication with the Third World, since for us it is not easy to assist at events such as
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Documenta or the Arco Fair in Europe, we are less likely to go to visit any country of the Third
World. The situation is not like it was in the 1970s and 80s, for example; there is not a single
thinker such as Marko Lauer producing texts such as his famous “Arte y Artesanía” (Art and
Craft). The absence of figures such as Nestor García Canclini (in the Biennale and Cuba for
more than a decade) is symptomatic of a change in the practice of thinking to and from the
Third World. Many important thinkers are retired, or are too expensive to invite to events such
as the Havana Biennale. Or they simply are not interested in coming. I think that the global
market has co-opted thought. Latin American thinkers and intellectuals are under pressure; we
do not see much about them anymore and what we see is homogeneous and hegemonic. Today,
every action is connected to a particular view, to a local or regional event and functions toward
specific interests. Exhibitions, blockbusters, curatorial symposia, big art fairs, etc., they are not
like before. We used to give, not asking for anything in return. 248
In 1995, Gerardo Mosquera, from a global perspective, looked at the phenomena in new
ways. Critical distance has been difficult for the members of the Lam Center to achieve, for
Mosquera, his condition as an internal exile gave him the possibility to look at the problem in a
more complex way. In his text for the Marco Polo Conference in Berlin (on April 11 and 12,
1995 at the House of World Cultures) in which a group of the new breead of ‘global curators’
met, Mosquera stated that:
Yet we cannot simply think of globalization in the sense of a transterritorial orbit with
contacts in all directions. It does not consist of an effective interconnection of the entire planet
mediated by a webbed link of communications and exchanges. Rather, it deals with a radical
system spread from more diversified and different sized centers of power toward their multiple
and highly diversified economic zones. This fabric is laid out on the North-South axis.
Globalization has advanced little in the periphery, because it globalized from and for the
centers. Such a structure implies the existence of large zones of silence disconnected from one
another or only connected indirectly by way of the neo-metropolises…
In the middle of these complex confrontations is defined the use of the concept “art of
the South.” This has more to do with the geography of power than with a physical geography.
The concept itself is the axis of the debates and negotiations to which I have referred. It can act
as a ghetto, a check for the multicultural quota system and cultural correctness, or even as the
space for a new exoticism. Nevertheless, it can additionally function as a notion of solidarity
between the excluded, in their critique and action in the face of power. 249
Mosquera problematizes the issue of “Third World” art subjectivity and draws attention
to a series of new forces that are less positive. He calls for a better understanding of
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“globalization” as a new and often negative imperative. “I do not think it is plausible to look for
a difference per se in Third World art opposite to other contemporary practices. The differences
will originate from the use that each author, movement, or culture makes of art, which may be
conditioned by Weltanschauung, values, strategies, interests, cultural patrons, themes, and
particular techniques.” 250 Resistance to the emergent art, to its illegitimate origin and its
peripheral condition, might restrict its capacity to join the mainstream. However, the first half of
the first decade of the global age brought a surprise for the non-believers in such a possibility.
Mosquera puts it in these terms:
As contemporary art, it forms part of the universalization of the Western concept and
practice of art as a self-sufficient activity based on “disinterested” contemplation and driven to
the production of very specialized aesthetic-symbolic messages. It is, therefore, a colonial
product. However, as I recently heard Jimmy Durham say, -Does any contemporary experience
exist that isn't?- Western art is also a colonial product, only from the other side. 251
4.1.1
Third World Collapse, Third World Art Victory. The Global South.
To locate, to map, to identify, correlates with one of the modern imperatives: to know in
order to classify, organized, collect, and to possess. This is the logic of a colonizing power. But
what happens when, from the periphery, the possessed and collected tries to know and
understand? One uses what one knows, what has been learned in the process, to locate, to map
and to identify. That is, in part, what the Havana Biennale has been doing all this time.
That inner contradiction, based on a crude reading of Marxist theory, has produced a
series of misinterpretations of what the Biennale means and how far it can go. Manuel López
Oliva puts it this way: “From its second instantiation in 1986, the Havana Biennale has been
based on the theory of the ‘Three Worlds” (which in its many variants has been used by Maoist
rhetoric, the UNESCO programs, and by many countries and individuals). It looks contradictory
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in a sense, since it poses ‘First World’ perspectives on the so-called ‘Third World’.” 252 The
Biennale, therefore, replicates a way of seeing things in fragments, not in complex relationships.
In the magazine Revolución y Cultura (July–September, 1986) Mosquera presented an
article titled “El Tercer Mundo hará la cultura occidental” (The Third World Will Make Western
Culture), in which he comments on the identity problems of the former colonial territories. He
argues that it has been impossible to create an identity from the inside, due to the historical
circumstance in which the Third World has been placed. Due to the fact that it entered into
“capitalism by force,” the Third World did not develop a production system and was confined to
provide raw material and cheap labor, which meant that industrialization and freedom of thought
did not occur. Third World countries became the exploited nations of the new bourgeois order. In
addition, the local past was erased by the colonial enterprise; the original histories of those
territories were displaced and replaced by Western perspectives on history. That imposition has
created categories such as the modern and the traditional, connecting cultures to capitalism and
pre-capitalism (the civilized and the primitive). Mosquera also commented on the issue of
“Western Internationalism,” one that establishes cultural, economic, and political centers from
where Eurocentric views and nowadays American exceptionalism spread.
According to Mosquera, in such a situation the art produced in the Third World is worthy
only of being displayed in airports and in bazaars were souvenirs are sold. In the best case, it
could be labeled as exotic and sold by the piece in workshops, art and crafts galleries, and
ethnographic museums. For the visual arts, Mosquera explains, the antinomies of being a bad
metropolitan (because it is not original) and at the same time being local and primitive is a
common ground for the artists of the Third World. It has produced a lingua-franca that is the
most “contemporaneous” of all languages. The contradictions are solved by the fact that the
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peoples of the Third Word have been living in both worlds and have synthesized them and
unified them into one. What Mosquera recommends is not to produce (art) in the language of the
West, not even to produce it in native languages. He maintains that, “The Western culture was
imposed on us, now we have to evolve it. As the barbarians reinvented the Christian Faith, we
Latin Americans, Africans, and Asians have to remake Western Culture.” 253
Manuel López Oliva, along with other members of the Lam Center, also recognized that
the very notion of Third World was no longer applicable. Since the fall of the socialist bloc, it
was inaccurate to define the world using such terms. He suggests that now “the so-called Third
World has moved to replace the Second one, which demands a conceptual and operative redefinition when using the term.” Actually, López Oliva argues that the Havana Biennale
understood this matter early, and since 1994 has integrated artists not only coming from the
former Third World but also the ones that work in environments where dire, stagnant, and
dangerous, situations frame their production. The acknowledgment of a world that is more
horizontal but at the same time pervasively unequal has transformed the world map, new
coordinates mark the journey. “Poverty, ethnicity, migration, marginalization, de-integration,
identity struggle, war, environmental debacle, etc., are some of the topics that led the Havana
Biennale to have such an imprecise configuration. It becomes a “mosaic of inharmonic and
amorphous images in the labyrinth of world art.” 254
López Oliva argues that the “Poor Biennale” (as many call it) has been known and used
by other more affluent ones; in other words, Havana has influenced them. For example, he cites
Nelson Aguilar, former curator for the São Paulo Biennial (1994-96), saying that Havana and
Istanbul had played a role in the way São Paulo was dealing with art that could not be classified
in traditional genres, the ones using unconventional supports. 255 At the same time, López Oliva
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notes that since 1996 the Venice Biennial “seems to have taken Havana into account, without
saying it. When, in its exhibition spaces, creations coming from poor regions mix-up with
elements of the technological landscape coming from the rich world. They also manifested the
production of Africa, Asia, and Latin America… it seems that there is affinity, when a selection
of the Fifth Havana Biennale in 1994-5 traveled to Germany supported by the controversial
Ludwig Foundation.” 256 There, López Oliva notes how this art suffered from being seen as
having come from “beyond the ocean,” an impression created by the minor role it had in the
Venice Biennial. At the time Aquile Bonito Oliva had called it a product of the new
“transnational culture” and as a sign of a “spirit of unity” of the times present in Venice from that
edition on. Three exhibitions, all of them selections from the Havana Biennale - one in 1990
under the title Kuba OK and two in 1994 and 1997 - were supported by the German chocolate
magnate Peter Ludwig. They helped to establish a new image of the contemporary art being
produced in Cuba. Many others exhibitions joined the flock of what is now called the Global
South. Today residence programs, tour exhibitions, cultural partnerships, and financial support in
especial by European agencies such as Prince Claus Funds and HIVOS are important sponsors
for events in Latin America, Africa, and Asia, supporting the routes and networks of new global
events. They are also confined to certain limited notions of what is to be accepted in the global
art scene. 257
Llilian Llanes had envisaged these new conditions for Third World art. During a
presentation for the Milan Triennale of 1996 (under the topic, Identità e differenza, Integrazione
e pluralità nelle forme del nostro tempo, Le culture tra effimero e duraturo) she discussed the
issue. As part of a group of intellectuals (mostly working on Third World issues), Llanes
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addressed the new planetary conditions of production and the challenges of the artists working
outside the Euro-American axes. 258
Though there are great differences among Third World countries, there undoubtedly are a
great number of artists who work hard, whose spirituality is not destroyed in spite of the
environmental decay surrounding them. On the other hand, the poverty around them leads an
increasing number of artists -like many other sectors of our peoples in quest of a ‘Promised
Land’- to migrate as minorities to richer lands. These artists carry with them the specific
problems of the Third World; when they move to highly developed countries, their works
express some of these issues together with the new problems caused by their relationship to
their new context. They sometimes succeed in penetrating and integrating with the system, and
then come to be considered part of their new country's national art, which is also considered
“universal.” This is more difficult for others who simply may not want to integrate deeply.
Many of them, whether resident or not in their new countries, have contributed greatly to
developing a new awareness of the great social unbalances of today's world, and towards a new
dimension of international contemporary art. 259
Today we live in a world in which in any exhibition an important percentage of the
participants have to be from (not necessarily to live in) the former Third World. It signals a kind
of a victory for those who started back and were positioned in the early stages of the new order.
Perhaps, it is just how the system reproduces itself to adapt to the new global conditions. The
new conceptual construction has then a geographic mark, the South. But it is the Global South
because it inhabits anywhere and can be found everywhere. 260
4.2
ON THIRD WORLD CURATORS
“The Third World is not a reality but an ideology.”
Hannah Arendt 261
The label “curator” is a conflicted term when defining the practice of an art professional
in the West. Its etymology suggests an official agent to an independent entrepreneur, in areas that
range from business to medicine. What could be expected of the term “curator” when applied to
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countries outside the First World? It is common to find the term as part of the lexicon related to
people working in the arts, and in particular in contemporary art. The term is not only used in
relation to visual art events, but also for professionals in libraries, museums, galleries, film and
music festivals throughout the world.
It was Harald Szeemann who became the paradigmatic curator for contemporary art. His
exhibitions “When Attitudes Become Form” (1969) and Documenta V (1972) under the title
"Befragung der Realität – Bildwelten heute" (Questioning Reality – Pictorial worlds today) are
now part of the mythology of the art world. 262 Szeeman believed that, “the organizers of
exhibitions are ambivalent figures. In fact, they are autonomous when working back-stage of big
events, but also - in a sense - they are conditioned by the many tasks they have to perform. As
administrators, they negotiate and mediate, promoting and managing their own images. They
have the power to chose, designate, and set value.”
263
The term “power” has to be used with
caution, in this context argues Szeeman, since “power” here means above all “to make things
possible for others.” Another European curator who has had a great impact on the profession is
Hans-Ulrich Obrist, who works as a mediator, making it possible for artists to propose and
develop projects in which they work together (curator and artists, just artists, or artists and the
public) and with support of editorial houses and museums in local contexts. He insists that a
curator exists in a middle-space, in a vacuum, “when catalyzing, the curator has to disappear at a
given moment.” 264 He also believed that a curator has to help, to catapult artistic propositions
into the public sphere, because an exhibition has to have a disruptive effect.
Latin American curators are now part of the global network: Paulo Herkenhoff, Carlos
Basualdo, José Carlos Mariategui, Nelson Aguilar, Victor Zamudio Taylor, Cuauhtemoc
Medina, and José Ignacio Roca, among others. For example Roca states that, “a curatorial project
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can be defined as a series of parameters that allow ideas that are taking place in the artistic arena,
by an individual or a group, to get together in order to build a new set of definitions that give
meaning by association, juxtaposition, and accumulation, and to open up a field of meaning for
isolated art works.” 265
Actually, there are many discussions concerning the role, characteristics, and function of
a curator and a curatorial project. Some use metaphors to define a curatorial project, for example:
the exhibition as a map, in which respect John Tagg has written: “Each exhibition is like a map.
It not only separates, defines, and describes a particular place underlining its principal features or
omitting and simplifying others, but also represents a territory in accordance with a method or
projection: a set of conventions and rules under which the map is built.” 266
Others argue that a curator is a sort of meta-artist. The same Szeemann once defined his
work as that of an artist, comparing the art-works in an exhibition to colors in a palette. Many
examples come to mind, Robert Storr being the most compelling one. Contemporary artists in the
region such as Francis Alys and Raul Ferrera Balanquet, are also open about the issue. On the
matter, Julian Stallabras points out that:
Curating has always been an odd mix of the professional and the aesthetic; if it is
dominated by artists in contemporary shows, that makes a certain sense for it is only to play up
the aesthetic side to the exclusion of specialist knowledge: Damien Hirst has said that for him
there is no difference between making work and curating. Artists’ curatorial qualifications are
of a primary order, and artists’ selections and arrangements have a weight just because of who
they are. … With high art it is rather more difficult since this kind of critical dismantling has
been continuing for decades, and it is hard to know with what level of reference we are
dealing: is a work referring to something else or to itself, to rhetoric or reference, or to some
still further recursion? (For example) A shop which Tracey Emin and Sarah Lucas ran in 1993
to sell art-junk, most notoriously ashtrays with photographs of Damien Hirst stuck to the
bottom (stub out your fag on the face of that celebrated lover of cigarettes) was in one sense a
powerful curatorial statement about commerce, but it was also an actual shop which made and
sold stuff, and, as Emin says, they lived off it for six months. 267
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4.2.1.1 The Cuban Curator
Nelson Herrera Ysla defines the Cuban curator working at the Wifredo Lam Center as:
A person, who is ready to go through whatever it takes in order to get what he or she
has decided to accomplish; he/she is a person who believes deeply in the project, a person with
faith, and deep conviction, because our work has a spiritual dimension, a cultural, and a moral
purpose beyond its function and usage. For example, on one occasion visiting Africa, Eugenio
Valdes Figueroa and Magda González were stopped by a group of armed people at a point
between Lagos and Lubumbashi in Nigeria. The two curators were put on the dirt and menaced
with assault weapons pointed at their heads. They did not know what was going on, since the
driver had abandoned them. What is the value of a life in that circumstance, in that part of the
world? Finally, they were released after being robbed; fortunately they left the place unharmed.
They kept with the plan to visit the artists; that is the kind of Cuban curator I am taking about.
In Bogotá I was invited to visit an artist. The people who drove me, put me in a truck with dark
glasses and full of weapons, they used radios to communicate and had told me to prepare a
statement if we were stopped on the way. I did; the fact was that I did not know to whom I
should address the statement, to the guerrillas, to the paramilitaries, the narcos, the military? It
is hard for people coming out of Havana to think about these issues when preparing the
Biennale. Sometimes, we do not have enough money to go to a Hotel, as in Tunisia and Delhi,
and we have stayed in garages, or shared a bedroom with the guy in charge of the Cuban
Embassy; those are nice experiences and we do not make dramas about it. In fact, many of our
little adventures have helped us to understand better how things are. Behind our work as
curators there is an ethic; it is a moral issue that also supports the Havana Biennale. The
Biennale is based largely on those practices, a practice that had put us close to our object of
study and to other human beings. The work we do helps to understand us better as individuals
and to know each other better. Beyond the frame, the painting, the image, and the object there
are people and us… The problem in not knowing everything, what is happening in Costa Rica
or Panama, is an advantage; the important issue is to know and understand their culture and
their people. Because art is a way of knowledge, it is not only the objects of aesthetic
enjoyment that feed our spirit. What interests us is what is behind the work of art itself. 268
After twenty-five years of work in the organization of the Biennale the modesty shown
by some of the members of the Lam Center is remarkable. Ibis Hernandez Abascal comments on
her experience as curator for the Havana Biennale:
When I arrived to Mexico in 1992, I told them that I was a specialist in documentation
working for the Wifredo Lam Center. I informed them that I was collecting information that
would serve to select the artists for the next Havana Biennale. I knew about the responsibility
of such a task, and I was acquainted with the discussions taking place at the time around the
term curating. In some way I knew that I was working along those lines, at the same time I
knew that my work was only a fragment in a chain of facts and people that make the Biennale
possible. Today, I am part of a group that is called the Havana Curators. However, I consider
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myself only a part of something that is bigger than me, someone who gathers information and
puts it in the service of an idea, an event, and the institution.
I am concerned about our archive and documentation center because it does not have
the necessary resources to maintain the material collected, nor the means to digitalize the visual
collection. It has a great amount of information. I would like to work in that direction where is
possible to have an impact, producing reference and annotated material not only for Cubans but
for the Third World.
The stardom and success of some curators is suspicious; I prefer to be part of a team,
with the risks that it carries. I understand that the responsibility for an event such as the Havana
Biennale is not shared among us, actually the selection is not always accomplished with 100%
agreement. Sometimes we do not understand deeply the conceptual line in which we are
working. At other times, the concept is not completely defined, that is the case of the Ninth
Biennale. We do not reach our own expectations or the ones of the art world. Besides, we faced
economic problems that made complex the decision to bring or drop important artists of
collectives. That was the case with multidisciplinary groups such as NORTEC from Tijuana,
which clearly was able to make an important statement on the dynamics of contemporary urban
centers. It would be relevant to have the option to show what is happening in a border city,
where a new urban culture intertwines. Unfortunately, they did not find support and we also
could not provide it. Then, it is necessary to rework the model of the Havana Biennale to meet
the demands of new artistic practices that go beyond the traditional spaces of the museum,
gallery, and even the physical space of the city to new spacio-temporal arrangements. That is a
challenge for curators and events such as the Biennale. 269
Margarita Sánchez Prieto argues that a curatorial practice is more related to an
intellectual rather than an administrative dimension.
We have a strong dialog with curators from Latin America. For example, I share ideas
and concepts with an intellectual group in the South. Perhaps we do not agree on every single
issue as museographers and the way art has to be displayed. Nonetheless, when I go to the
Southern Cone and establish collaborations or debates with curators such as Marcelo Pacheco
and Ticio Escobar, who are well trained and with a long experience, the dialog is fluid. We
agree on how the representation system is in place; and we agree that in Latin America the
historical, social, economic, and cultural context is very important. I am a curator trained in
such ways, with a great influence on the contextual and temporal. In terms of display, as
museographer that is part of being a curator in the Third World, I like the post-industrial model
where the gallery space is full of content, where a psychological dimension is present, framing
what is exhibited. I dislike the great white cube and pristine museum model.
Becoming a curator is not an easy task, I am grateful to my collegues at the Lam Center,
especially Llilian Llanes, who brought me here and created an environment of constant
education, dialog, and debate, particularly during those first years. I had the opportunity to
travel with her and I noticed her vast visual and conceptual knowledge, not only with respect to
“Third World art”, but also World Art.
In theoretical terms, people such as Ticio Escobar, Néstor García Canclini, Nelly
Richard, Shifra Goldman, and Luis Camnitzer have influenced me; the work of Dan Cameron
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and Ivo Mesquita have also informed my own practice. In addition to the work of artists whose
writings give important clues to understand their work and the work of others, Carlos Capelán
(who functions as curator-artist) helps us a lot to foresee what can be done. Writings by diverse
authors, historians and critics such as Rudy Fox, Rosa Martínez, Santiago Olmos, and Pierre
Restany, among others are relevant for me too.
Today with the digital turn, a curator has to embrace new technologies. However, in
Cuba as in many regions of the world, economic and structural problems put us behind. The
cost of generating digital images here is high, only rarely in the case of Cuba has our art market
helped to produce such images. Actually, many are produced abroad for exhibitions sponsored
by foreign institutions or as part of international commissions (that is the case of the digital
production of collectives such as Los Carpinteros).
The Internet has been impacting our art. It is well known that Cuba is in a difficult
situation because of its proximity to an imperial power. Nonetheless, our voice and interests
through the use and appropriation of such technologies are significant. Coming out from under
the cultural and entertainment industry (Hollywood), to use those resources in counterhegemonic ways is imperative. For the last ten years, I have been writing about the importance
of generating counter-discourses that coming from the South relate themselves to the North and
the cultural centers. 270
Global curators such as Gerardo Mosquera have their own trajectories. After his
departure from the Lam Center, Mosquera undertook a series of projects outside Cuba which
established his reputation as a global curator. In April, 1995, Mosquera participated in a seminar
organized by Gerhard Haupt and Bernd M. Scherer in the House of World Cultures in Berlin.
The event (called The Marco Polo Syndrome: Problems of intercultural communication in art
theory and curatorial practice) was designed to bring a group of thinkers, critics, artists, and
curators to discuss the state of curatorial practice in contemporary art and culture at the time.
After the symposium, the magazine Neue Bildende Kunst presented the edited papers of the
symposium, as well as further contributions to the topic. 271 Mosquera’s essay was entitled, “The
World of Differences. Notes on Art, Globalization and Periphery;” it explores his entrance as a
curator on the global scene.
Mosquera sets out to define the new era after 1989, the time of globalization, and situates
the
work
of
artists
and
curators
coming
from
poscolonialism/postmodernity=ethno (global) art. He states:
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the
South
in
the
equation
The major interest that the centers experience toward the art of the periphery is a result
of the globalization processes, demographics, and decolonization. The global world is also,
paradoxically, the world of differences. This has become more internationally visible thanks to
communication-media and has simultaneously expanded within the centers themselves. 272
Mosquera understands well that the postmodern critique was a question of reordering the
status quo, introducing minor voices in the cacophony of the global. He understands how the
ethno-cultural debate has become a political space of power struggles on the symbolic as much
as on social levels.
These are revealed by assimilation, tokenism, and the rearticulating of hegemonies, the
affirmation of difference, and the critique of power, among other tensions. When the incentive
to pluralism is a basic feature of postmodernity, the implicit decentralizations remain under the
control of the centers that ‘self-decenter’ in a lampesussian strategy of change, in order for
everything to remain the same. 273
Mosquera understood the threat of falling into the trap of new-exoticism common during
the postmodern moment. He believed in the circulation of the artistic production in the axis
North-South-North. The examples that he uses are the standard ones with respect to the
participation of ‘minor’ cultures in the high cultural spheres. Jazz, the embracing of European
modernity in the arts and culture, the mimicking of economic and political systems, etc., but
what was relevant for him at that moment was to use globalization to reach the disfranchised in
order to show to a larger audience the artistic production coming from both sides of the axis. He
notes:
This pluralization would not only benefit the South; it would be enrichment for
everyone. But furthermore, what we call the international art circuit only reaches a reduced
part of the world's population. It is necessary to pay attention to the problem of abandoned
publics that constitute the majority of humanity. The difficult steps in this direction will bring
transformations in the present format of art circulation, and even of the art itself by aspiring to
a larger and active participation of communities, linked with education, interaction with
vernacular culture, the use of mass-media, etc. Perhaps it seems a bit utopian to attempt to take
on the correction of this problem. But it is, at a minimum, important to know where the
problem is. 274
153
In the local context young curators such as Dannys Montes de Oca remembers how in
mid-1990s, the shift in the artistic practice in Cuba transformed curatorial practice and the
participation of Cuban artists not only in the Biennale but also in the international context. The
work of young curators and critics was important in helping identify the changes and to promote
the process.
In 1994, I assisted in a number of exhibitions during that staging of the Biennale and its
collateral exhibitions. It was interesting to see how at such moments, during what we called the
‘special period’ (a terrible moment in which scarcity, hunger, and poverty were rampant)
something was happening when visiting the exhibitions. At that moment critics Madeline
Izquierdo and Lupe Alvarez had already talked about some sort of returning to the aesthetic
paradigm, as in contradiction to the 1980s decade when art was establishing itself at the same
level of the mass-media, addressing social and political issues in a proactive way. I was a little
skeptical about what they were saying, however, I worked on an exhibition that tried to prove
the thesis. I choose a group of artists that were mastering technique, something that referred to
the “faktura” of the piece. I wanted to underline that issue to test the supposition that an
aesthetic paradigm was striking back at Cuban art production. But I was interested not only in
traditional art practices but also in the recuperation of traditional material practices in Cuban
culture. Carpentry, plastering, weaving, and intensive manual labor, to address the issue of the
market, a dimension that was new for us after many years; I called it “survival cultural
practices” and wrote a text that presented the group. Fourteen artists, who were distant from the
social and political discourse, who were cleaning and sanitizing their work in order to address
the opening of the market in the island. That was my first contact with this group of artists of
the generation of the 1990s (which Mosquera had called “la mala hierba”). After a year
working with them, I presented the project to a call made by the Centro de Desarrollo de las
Artes Visuales (Center for the Development of Visual Arts) which was organizing the first
Contemporary Art Salon. The projects were presented before a committee of the UNEAC and
both institutions sponsored the exhibition. I was lucky and won the right to assemble my
project. 275
For Cuban art historians and critics, the year 1994 marks the beginning of a new space
for developing and establishing new figures in the Cuban scene. Because of her exhibition
proposal, Montes de Oca was invited to participate in a theoretical panel organized by the Lam
Center in 1995, to discuss her approach with a number of international curators such as Edward
Sullivan, David Mateo, Manuel González, and Jose Ignacio Roca. Later she became coordinator
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for the 2003 and 2006 theoretical event at the Havana Biennale. Today she is a member of the
curatorial staff at the Lam Center.
Other Cuban curators that had participated in the Havana Biennale are now working
outside Cuba. For example, Osvaldo Sánchez collaborated during the early stages of the
Biennale; he has been a curator in Mexico for more than a decade, as Director of the Carrillo Gil
Museum, and the Rufino Tamayo Museum for Contemporary Art. Today he is the artistic
director of InSITE (the relevant San Diego-Tijuana art project). As curator (and critic and
columnist for the newspaper Reforma) he sees advantages working in the periphery; he considers
First World institutions too conservative. Sánchez notes that:
They are conservative, and I don't think museums should be conservative. They become
that way because of distorted priorities, worrying too much about packaging. They should be
more of a stage for current art practices. Institutions are more fluid in Mexico. There's more of
a chance to change things. Contemporary art is less institutionalized. They'll let some 25-yearold create a show. I could be a museum curator and write (as a critic), which wouldn't happen
here. This helps institutions to breathe, though the situation has fragility too. It's all part of my
experience somehow. As an immigrant, I think I carry borders within me. 276
Sánchez was one of four curators who assembled inSITE2000 and was editor of the
publication of that version. Now he oversees all aspects of inSITE, along with having major
curatorial duties. His outlook, shaped by his years in the Cuban and Mexican art arena, seems to
dovetail with that of the inSite directors and Board.
Iván de la Nuéz collaborated during the second and third Biennales; he was Professor at
the Havana University from where he promoted postmodern thought in Cuba during the late
1980s. Today, he works in Spain as the Director of La Virreina, Barcelona’s Institute of Culture
visual arts center. Additionally, de la Nuéz writes for Babelia, the cultural supplement of El País
(a major newspaper in Spain).
155
The first research-curator who left the team was Silvia Medina de Miranda, who moved
out of Cuba in 1993 to pursue a new life in Venezuela and later in Spain.
When arriving in Venezuela and before my work at the Sala Mendoza in Venezuela,
one of the leading spaces for contemporary art in the country, thanks to my previous
experience at the Lam Center, Venezuelan artists opened their houses for me. Many of them
who had participated in the Biennale and whom I had met before helped me during my first
months in that country. Finally, I started to work at the Mendoza Art Center. Initially, (I
worked) in the library that used to have an exhibition project room that was not in use at the
time. Coming from what we called colloquially “cultural Cuban guerrilla war”, i.e. from the
Havana Biennale, the new challenge was not as great as it could been. The Lam Center’s
school was important because we learned how to work with few resources – actually, I passed
from having a bike to having a car, which was a great advance. If the Biennale has influenced
my work, giving me an excellent visual knowledge, impetus, vitality, and theoretical training,
the Mendoza gave me the possibility to use and explore it in an autonomous manner. I knew
the Mendoza’s status before, since I used to get the materials of artists and institutions when
working at the documentary section in Havana. My first opening was a success. I showed work
by Cuban photographers Ramón Grandal and Tito Alvarez, among others. For ten years and
with help of my artist friends, I organized many exhibitions. With Ariél Jiménez, Director of
the center, we recuperated the presence of ceramics and graphic work for the gallery. Sala
Mendoza used to be important for its support of the “arts of fire,” to the point of converting
Venezuela into the capital of such practices in Latin America. For years, Venezuela organized
the prestigious “Bienal Barro de América” (an international ceramic and fire-related art event).
Ceramics and crafts were embraced by us during those years, I remember using topics
from the debate on “tradition and contemporaneity” in our discussions, texts, and exhibitions. I
also kept collaborating with the Lam Center. I was not able to travel to Cuba because of the
restrictions on exiles; however, I worked the selections from Venezuela for the Fifth Biennale
in 1994. I always have been working with and for Cuba and the Lam Center.
At the departure of Ariél Jiménez of Sala Mendoza, Cecilia Fajardo, a great critic and
curator, arrived; she was finishing her doctoral dissertation on Bedia and Capelán and I was
able to help her since I was acquainted with their work and had met them both in Havana. We
had a great connection and empathy. With her, and her international spirit thanks to her
childhood in the U.K, I developed the international project of Sala Mendoza that at the time
was only showing local and some Latin American artists. I organized a series of exhibitions,
keeping track of ceramics and work on paper in the gallery space I rescued from the library. At
the same time, the library started collecting documents on contemporary art. I recall using
information gathered during the international symposium on Art Magazines we put together for
the Third Biennale. As curator I have always been connecting stories.
After many years in Venezuela, I moved to Spain where I have been working as an
independent curator and gallery manager in Madrid and Barcelona. I keep in contact with the
Lam Center, sending materials of artists I believe are of interest and names for the theoretical
events and collateral exhibitions. 277
156
Other former members of the Lam Center include Magda E. González, who worked there
for more than a decade, and now works as an independent curator organizing exhibitions in
Cuba, North America, and Europe since 2000. That is also the case of Eugenio Valdez Figueroa,
who used to research Africa for the Fourth and Fifth Biennales. With the creation of the Ludwig
Center for Contemporary Art in 1994-5 in Havana, he moved toward the promotion of Cuban
artist abroad. Today lives and works in Cuba and Brazil, for the Daros Foundation, promoting
Latin American artists, organizing exhibitions and writing for international magazines.
4.3
THE ROLE OF THE ACADEMY: ART CRITICISM, THEORY, AND THE
ARTIST
“Our work was in tune with the most advanced thinkers of the moment to the extent that art theory was juxtaposed to
contemporary thought and artistic practice. It was because of that rigorous approach in theoretical and artistic praxis and the close
relationship among artists, critics, and scholars that the visual arts became the vanguard within Cuban culture.”
Magali Espinoza
Magali Espinoza has been a long-standing collaborator of the Havana Biennale. Formerly
a professor at the University of Havana and ISA, from mid-1970s to the late 1990s, she has been
active in the discussions and debates about the New Cuban art and the generations following.
She notes how Cuban artists and cultural agents have interacted with major art theories and
concepts, especially during the last three decades, a period when what was called New Cuban
Art emerged. She works particularly with the 1980s generation. Recently Espinoza has become
an independent scholar and cultural consultant, focusing her interest also on the 1990s
generation, the so call “mala hierba” (weed generation), a title given by Gerardo Mosquera to
refer to those artists (the generation following the 1980s) that as wild weeds grew out of any
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crevice and fissure in the system. 278 Espinoza comments on issues such as the influence of
postmodern and postcolonial theories on the framework of the Marxist-Leninist Cuban
theoretical model. She explains how before the era of glasnost and perestroika, Cuban
intellectuals (usually trained in the Soviet bloc) appropriated not only the official rhetoric, but
also intermingled with the progressive thinking of the time. Simultaneously, she comments on
how the dissidents, artists and scholars in exile (resulting in the migration of a large part of the
generation of the 1980s), the Cuban art market, and the new socio-economic context have all
affected and transformed Cuban thought, art practices and thus it events such as the Havana
Biennale.
At the moment of the exodus of many of the artists of the 1980s generation (some of
whom had fought the Biennale from abroad, in part because it moved the market for Cuban art
back to the island), the country was going through deep changes in its economic, social, and
political structures. Actually, new rules with respect to travel in and out of Cuba and the
changing regulations with the U.S. have affected the art market. By 1993 the dollar was legalized
to control the contraband, a control market of goods and services emerged. Art was caught inbetween.
Today, Havana City is full of art galleries. Many are managed by, or have as their name,
Cuban artists living in Cuba (Kcho, Los Carpinteros, Roberto Fabello galleries, etc). This has
created a class division among artists. It is evidence of a global business class in with which
contemporary and commercial visual artists from all denominations are aligned.
MAGALI ESPINOZA. Unfortunately, private galleries do not have a real calendar of
exhibitions; additionally, they do not have a presence in the public sphere. Galería Habana, for
example, that for long time did a consistent and important job, is now under siege by the
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proliferation of many art spaces in the city. (However, it was used consistently by Tania
Brugera during the Tenth Havana Biennale, March-April, 2009)
Undoubtedly, the market is important (for the survival of our artists); what is not
working here is that it is taking attention away from the most advanced and interesting of our
art production; it exists without a program. Today, artists have become part of the system, a
circuit approved and supervised by the state -since it is also very profitable. The thing is that
the state has, supposedly, to promote the development of our art. The 1980s was a moment in
which coherent cultural policy and cultural institutions were established in a complex system
of support, in fact the ISA and in a sense the Havana Biennale were founded out of that model.
I was professor at the philosophy department of the Havana University from 1974 to
1987, the year that I moved to ISA to be part of an exciting project. The Art Institute was
founded in 1976 by the Ministry of Culture, and while we delivered the most orthodox Marxist
theory, the pedagogic model was without a doubt Western. I worked there from 1987 to 1997.
What is important here is to understand that the Revolution created extraordinary institutional
structures that are still a model for Latin America and the Third World.
As pioneers, these structures are important, however, in their implementation and
functionality they have had many irregularities. Those problems have deeply affected the core
thinking of Marxists aesthetics with respect to what has to be done in the Third World. Here
Cultural Studies and Visual Studies, for example, are not part of the academia. They have been
developed by independent specialists close to the world of art and with proximity to ISA rather
than to the University. That is the case of Gerardo Mosquera, Guadalupe Alvarez, and me.
During the late 1980s and early 1990s we developed a curriculum in aesthetics that put
together aesthetic traditional thought, the sociology of art, anthropology, and folk studies.
Today we realize that it was clearly working in a framework of Cultural Studies.
The aesthetic that used to be thaught at the University was the Kantian one. The first
curriculum designed for the visual arts, after arduous work, started in 1992. It explored topics
related to the postmodern discourse, popular culture, aesthetic values, and media specificity. It
departed from the international tradition based on the use of the object, in order to go toward
the study of society. Actually, at ISA we in the Aesthetic Department were working with the
Art History Department. The work of Gerardo Mosquera as curator and art critic, without
being a theoretician per se, became a reference for the study Cuban and Caribbean art. I
explored that issue in a book I edited with Kevin Powell entitled, ‘Pensamiento Crítico en el
Arte Cubano’ (Critical Thought in Cuban Art, 2006), which is a collection of essays. The idea
was to establish a dialog among a series of texts and authors that were part of that moment in
our art.
It is worth mentioning that in 1979 at Havana University the Department for the
teaching of Marxist-Leninist Theory was created. Historical materialism and dialectics was the
core of our training; with other young scholars at the time, Jorge de la Fuente and Madeline
Izquierdo, we created the aesthetic bases for teaching of new artists, art historians, and critics
at the Havana University. We used to use Eastern and Western authors such as Stefan
Morawski, Moses Samuel Louis-Cagan, and postmodern thinkers such as Peter Berger, Jurgen
Habermas, Jacques Derrida, and even Fredric Jameson. Postcolonial theory as it is known in
the West would enter later on, during the mid 1990s. People such as Desiderio Navarro,
founder and editor of the magazine Criterios, would be fundamental in this purpose.
159
It was a particular and special phenomenon. While an institutional net existed, it was a
phenomena created by individuals. Here nothing exists outside the institutions; here we did not
have alternative spaces, since we were the alternative.
Two institutions have become really important for our own art world. They have
created contacts between worlds; they are the Casa de las Américas and the Havana Biennale.
Thanks to these institutions, and let’s talk about the role the Lam Center has played thanks to
the Biennale. Thanks to it, we have had the opportunity to encounter, first the work and
thought of the most advanced Latin American artists, art critics, curators, and visual theorists,
and second, to contrast that with our Eastern Marxist-Leninist formation. Many of us had
traveled to the East to be trained. I did my doctorate in the Soviet Union between 1982 and 87;
I graduated from the University of Kiev. Orlando Suarez Tajonea, head of the Aesthetics
Department at ISA, studied in Moscow. In other words, the fact of being trained in such a
tradition, being foreign to it at the same time, helped us to look for the most heterodox. We
used to read Evald Ilyenkov and Kovni, two authors that were banned and marginalized in the
Soviet Union at the time; at the same time we grew up reading José Martí, Fernando Ortíz, and
Benitez Rojo, etc. 279
We were able to do what was forbidden to the Soviet people, since we were outsiders.
We worked under Western values one way or the other, while Cuba had closed the possibility
to work with Sartre, for example, the rest of the Western theoretical line was present at ISA.
What is interesting was the fact that ISA, being an art school, was more concerned with
conceptualization than with art practice per se (the presence of people such as Luis Camnitzer
was important). We based our work on the comprehension of the history of knowledge, not its
analysis and interpretation, since we were training artists, not philosophers. That is why theory
plays an important role in the artistic practice in Cuba from the 1980s on. The ‘new Cuban art’
was a process that was nurtured and reached maturity in that decade. It did not start as an
ideological movement; however, the art practice became an ideological proposition, it acquired
consciousness through time. Art criticism and aesthetic discourse played an important role also
in the process of self-recognition. The work of Mosquera and many art critics of the time, such
as the artist-critic Antonio Eligio aka- Tonel, Iván de la Nuéz, Lupe Álvarez, and Madeline
Izquierdo are relevant also. Many came from history and philosophy, as was the case of
Wilfredo Prieto and Gustavo Pita, who founded the magazine Albur and established a
relationship among disciplines and people that were trained in the Soviet Union. Albur became
a model for cultural studies. It was directed by Iván González Cruz, and its artisan character
merged people from all areas: artists, poets, philosophers, sociologists, and aestheticians,
among others. Albur published original translations from Eastern European texts that were
highly relevant for the aesthetics of the time. It circulated in the second part of the 1980s for
four years.
Figure 32. Covers of the magazine Albur (late 1980s - early 1990s)
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Cultural and art magazines have had a fundamental role in the development of
contemporary Cuban thought. Magazines such as Pensamiento Crítico, Albur, Criterios, and
Lo Que Venga (with only two editions) have helped artistic and theoretical practice over time.
On the other hand, during its ten years of publication, the magazine Arte Cubano, which is an
official organ, has shown an irregular content. Perhaps, it is because of the particular historical
circumstances it had to deal with.
Many of those magazines do not exist anymore, for example, Albur was substituted by
Credo, now published in Spain. These magazines put together not only the local and
international critical thought, but also particular artistic productions. The core of all this was
ISA.
Figure 33. Covers magazine of Arte Cubano (2004-2006)
4.3.1.1 Artistic practice and cultural theory
It is clear that the theoretical strength of the Cuban scene was informed by its own
history, in which a colonial and postcolonial awareness played an important role during the early
and mid 1900s, and later by a series of individuals who, thanks the Revolution, were able to
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exchange ideas at symposia in Cuba and through academic training not only in Eastern Europe
but also in Latin America (in some cases in China and some countries of Western Europe).
Simultaneously, a number of magazines and cultural publications that, while supported by the
state were not necessarily official, became forums for new ideas. Through them it was possible
to circulate and update the flow of ideas and concepts coming from East and West. Cuban artists
were influenced by this flow; the Havana Biennale was nurtured by their influx and by the
people and thought carried by them. Since the beginning, the Biennale presented not only
conventional art in Western terms but also radical-to-the-edge notions and proposals. As a result
of the environment, the Biennale ventured to show popular manifestations such as the Chinese
kites, wood carvings and assemblages from Africa and Latin America next to installations,
photography, and performance art. This cultural universe had indeed a conceptual background in
the theories of the time.
Cultural studies became central in the discussions that affected the curriculum at ISA and
finally in the work of Cuban artists. From mid-1980s the presence of foreign perspectives (such
as Luis Camnitzer, Javier González, and the various visits of José Luis Brea, among other
thinkers) at the institute created a forum for debates about cultural studies and even introduced
an edge into visual studies. Postcolonial thought arrived to support such debates: ISA faculty
started to study it in addition to Latin American postcolonial theory and the subaltern group of
scholars created at the beginning of the 1990s, authors such as Said, Spivak, Bhabha, Appadurai,
among others. 280
In that context, the second Biennale (1986) became focused on the Caribbean. It evolved
an Atlantic connection that was addressed during the Fourth Biennale (1991), where the topic of
neo-colonialism would close a cycle. The Third Biennale (1989) explored the topic of “Tradition
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and Contemporaneity” bringing together for the first time artists from three continents. This led
to the Fifth Biennale (1994) which became the first international one, opening the event to new
theoretical explorations in a global context where the post-colonial would surface.
The Caribbean as a place for generation of new cultures would be central also in the work
of Gerardo Mosquera, who, informed by Antonio Benitez Rojo and Edouard Glissant’s
archipelago concept, would expand his reach, becoming then the first global Cuban curator. It
was the Caribbean where many theories of resistance and action materialized; from the Haitian
Revolution to the writings of Martí, Fanon, and the music of Bob Marley, there was a space for
Cultural Studies to develop, and where many Latin Americans found also a foundation. The
work of Stuart Hall, coming from Jamaica, has been central within the British school, while
others such as Paul Gilroy and his concept of the “Black Atlantic” have followed. For the
Havana Biennale, the pretext to put all these notions together in the 1980s was the postmodern
response to regional identity and positioning. In early 1990s it was the proximity of the
celebration of the 500th anniversary of the encounter of the new world and the old world and the
emergence of the postmodern debate which were relevant for the voice of the difference.
MAGALI ESPINOZA. In Cuba there is a recognition that the artistic praxis and cultural
theory are more advanced than social theory, at least in the past two decades. The social and
philosophical discourses are weak; meanwhile the cultural and artistic have grown. It is
interesting to see how the art history departments are doing much better than the philosophy
departments on the island. It was different during the 1970s. It is also worrisome to see how
classes on the history of philosophy and science have been taken out of the curricula and are
being replaced by classes on contemporary thought, regarding historical and cultural contexts.
During the 1980s we were able, at the ISA, to divide and give relative weight to every
historical moment in our classes on the history of knowledge, taking care and being distant also
from the dominant Marxists rhetoric of the time. We were able to teach one entire semester on
the history of contemporary thought, something that was unheard of in the country. Our work
was in tuned with the most advanced thinkers of the moment to the extent that art theory was
juxtaposed to contemporary thought and artistic practice. It was because of that rigorous
163
approach in theoretical and artistic praxis and the close relationship among artists, critics,
scholars that the visual arts became the vanguard within Cuban culture.
It is only when looking at the most important cultural festivals in the country that we noticed
the strength the visual arts have over the rest of expression, in theory and praxis. Even the
famous Festival for the New Latin American Cinema does not organize theoretical events, the
literary fairs and encounters are more of social than critical (with exception of those organized
by the Casa de las Américas). During the 1970s we counted with a rigorous group of play
writers and directors but even it cannot be compared with the visual arts. Individuals and
collectives have been coming to Cuba from areas such as philosophy, sociology, art history, art
theory, etc., to debate about visual culture and the contemporary art of the island and the
Global South for more than twenty years now.
That theoretical strength has contributed to the Havana Biennale becoming the central
forum for discussion and debate in the region. While the Biennale has been irregular in content
and performance, this it is because of the historical and economic context affecting it. It is also
clear that the Biennale has become a mediator for all these possibilities. Structured on a rigorous,
almost scholarly model, the Biennale in its second phase corresponds to research projects in
which the theoretical, historical, and empirical are brought together. At the same time, it has
become a node in a larger network where the local, regional, and global gather.
According to Espinoza, the new Cuban art movement did not have a manifesto. “It has
built its own consciousness in its artistic practice.” She argues that its consciousness did not
come first, as in the avant-garde movements such as Surrealism or even Suprematism. The
Revolution created spaces for art that allowed the confluence of such dynamics. In addition, it
allowed the possibility of bringing artistic practice, art education, promotion, and the market
closer together. It is the Revolution which creates this movement, but it is the movement which
establishes a consciousness that modulates its products according to a critical production and
evaluation of the process. Artists considered themselves not only part of the process but its
critical consciousness. It is indeed a contradictory process that allows the movement to evolve.
However, it reached its apex when the fall of the Soviet bloc lead to the ‘special period’ and the
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global age arose. That is when many artists and intellectuals decided to leave. They were the
basis of the movement, so their departure led to a moment of crisis in the Cuban scene.
In sum, the new Cuban art of the 1980s, and what followed, was an organic phenomenon
that originated from a critical consciousness and a cultural policy established by the Ministry of
Culture during the late 1970s. These produced a rich context where proximity to among each
other, and the quick appreciation of their work in the West, made their artistic and intellectual
production appealing to new audiences. However, there was an exhaustion of that consciousness
during the first half of the 1990s. The fact of the migration of the members of the generation of
Volumen Uno and the estrangement of figures such as Gerardo Mosquera and Osvaldo Sánchez
produced a change in the local scene. 281 In the international context, Mosquera organized
exhibitions that exposed that generation to the new glo-cal (global and local at the same time)
scene. That was the case for exhibitions such as Los Hijos de Guillermo Tell (The Sons of
William Tell, 1991) and Ante America (Regarding America, 1993-94), which played an
important role in the placement of not only Cuban artists but other individual artists who were
participating in the Biennale and whom Mosquera knew quite well. 282
MAGALI ESPINOZA. Gerardo Mosquera organized these exhibitions. We have to remember
that he was the theoretical inspiration for the movement. He was the one that from an art critical
perspective understood the impact of such production. Many of us, much younger maybe, did not
understand the repercussions that the movement would have on Cuba and the rest of Latin
America. In addition, he showed a path to follow that was hard to understand at first. Art
students nowadays receive all this information as part of their training. We did not have the same
fortune back then, we had to build it ourselves. Many of the artists and thinkers who were active
during the late 1980s migrated. They are still thinking of Cuba from a diasporic position that is
the case of Iván de la Nuéz in Spain, Osvaldo Sánchez, and Rafael Rojas in Mexico, in addition
to a number of artists that made up that group.
This new Diaspora is less reactionary than the first one. This one has lived the
Revolutionary project and is the offspring of its venture; they think Cuban with cold feet and talk
about the process in productive ways, always from a critical stance. During the 1990s the arts
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changed from an open social commentary to a more intimate approach, where art is at the center
of the artistic praxis rather than a vehicle for social critique.
It is my personal opinion that there is a group of artists who continue with the first critical
posture, although it is today centered in a personal perspective. The Frankfurt School teaches us
that in order to generate a positive critique it is necessary to have critical distance. I believe that
some Cuban artists keep that distance today in their personal projects -that is the case of Tania
Brugera and Rene Francisco.
There is another group of young theorists which are working from the inside out, and
from the 1980 new Cuban art. They include Andrés Issac and Jesús Sánchez who do so from a
thematic perspective, not in the historical and chronological fashion as we used to assume the
phenomenon. The results of these new observations give us new entrees to our particular
universe. Elvia Rosas edited the first document on the subject and filled a vacuum. Many of us
are following this trend.
In 1999 Luis Camnitzer edited his book New Cuban Art. However, it has not circulated in
Cuba; in fact, it is a book with many inaccuracies. He is an artist and thinker who played a very
important role in the development of our artists, mainly with respect to international
conceptualism. He helped us to discover neo-expressionism, and has helped to circulate
information and artists for many years.
During the 1980s, the movement had a capacity for self-consciousness, but in the 1990s it
has weakened; it did not disappear but it changed. Today, artists do not work in terms of a
movement; they work to make comments at the interior of the art practice itself. It is full of
cynicism, concealed metaphors, if you want. There is a new ethic among the new Cuban artists.
There is a new attitude that talks about what contemporary art is today, anda a group that
follows the previous generation with a strong critical consciousness. There is another group that
is close to them, but who have a certain pessimism, some talk about a crisis. I believe that each
artistic process has its own internal dynamics. At the beginning, during the 1980s, the
discussions happened inside the Havana Biennale. Nowadays the discussion takes place more
outside it, especially, on the periphery of the Biennale, however, it happens because of the
Biennale. That is why the Cuban case is contradictory. It is the institution which promotes the
great events, recognizing the vitality of our culture. At the same time, it created its double, one
that consumes it from within, draining it of sense.
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Figure 34. Theoretical base
4.4
A GENDER DIMENSION?
The Revolution brought to the fore the work of several women, who since the 1960s have
participated actively in the administrative but especially in the cultural dimension of Cuban life.
Among them were/are the writers Olga Andreu, María Maya Surduts and Wanda Garatti;
officials in cultural institutions such as Vicentina Antuña (the National Council of Culture),
Edith García Buchaca (the Partido Socialista Popular / Socialist Popular Party liaison to the
Council), Marta Arjona (PSP member, head of visual arts at the Council, and artist), Haydeé
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Santamaría (head of the Casa de las Américas and wife of Armando Hardt Dávalos), Celia
Sánchez (Castro’s mistress and confidant), Alicia Alonso (Director of the National Ballet),
Marcia Leyseca (Vice Minister of Culture and later Vice President of the Casa de las Américas),
and Beatriz Aulet (former Director of Visual Arts at the Ministry of Culture). 283 The Lam Center
follows the same dynamic. While for the people working there it does not seem to be an
important issue, it demonstrates a degree of success in terms of the defeat of the gender divide in
a society when all others in the Caribbean basin and Latin America had serious problems with
respect to the participation of women in public life.
This poster published by OSPAAL (as an insert for the Tricontinental magazine) shows
the role of women on security, industrial, and rural work. Fidel Castro’s speech during the
Cultura and Desarrollo Conference in 1971 proposed to the Cuban people an emphasis on such
areas of development when Cuba changed its economy in a series of five years plans (in the
fashion of the Soviets in the late 1920s). It was produced under the sponsorship of the Federation
of Cuban Women (Federación de Mujeres Cubanas, FMC), which was founded in August, 1960,
to promote gender equality and the full integration of women into the economic, political, social
and cultural life of Cuba. The similarities with the images of this type produced by the Soviets on
the building of a revolutionary Russia are remarkable. 284
168
Figure 35. Two Basic Tasks: Production and Defense, 1973
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Looking at the history of the Havana Biennale, it is clear that the participation of female
administrators, researcher-curators, academics, scholars, and artists has been prominent. The
curatorial team consists, overwhelmingly, of female rather than male curators. It is true that
during the first phase of the Biennale (1984-1991) the key decisions were made by Llilian
Llanes, Mosquera, and Herrera Ysla. But soon, the work was divided and the decision making
process included the whole team in a horizontal and gender-blind way. Hilda María Rodríguez,
Vice-Director (1999-2000) and later Director of the Lam Center (2001-2004), comments:
I do not think we had a predisposition with respect to the presence of women in the
Biennale. If it exists, it has happened organically. I believe that it is the result of a social policy
rather than an agenda within the Biennale itself. It is a coincidence that the direction of the
Lam Center has been, for nineteen out of its twenty-three years, under a female. What is clear
is the fact that in Cuba the gender divide does not exists as pervasively as in other countries.
Here the capacity women have to deal with any issue is well known. In addition, the presence
of female artists in the Biennale, almost 35% - has been a product of their work, not ours. We
only recognized a trend in artistic production; I do not think there is any sort of bias with
respect to them. Nonetheless, I believe there is a lack of balance between gender productions
(which is still lower in female artists even today). It is necessary to have a consciousness of
their presence. We understand that there is a prejudice in some parts of the world toward
female artistic production. We have not pushed any agenda. Perhaps, it is because we are the
result of this Revolution in which at least, rhetorically, that issue is not so visible here. We do
not apply any mathematical formula for female participation, nor do we do that for countries,
ethnicities, or other genders. 285
It is worth mentioning that Llilian Llanes was the first and only director of an
international biennial for many years. Catherine David was the first woman to direct the
prestigious Documenta in 1997 and it was not until the 51st Venice Biennale, in 2005, that female
curators were appointed. Actually, Rosa Martinez and María del Corral invited Llilian Llanes to
be a jury member for the national pavilions in Venice. Geeta Kapur was also invited to be a jury
member for the international exhibitions. In this sense the Cuban standard has been extended to
other regions. In Latin America, the presence of female administrators, art historians, art critics,
and curators is a common phenomenon. Perhaps it is the result of the colonial experience where
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the arts and culture were associated with leisure for the elites and detached from the political
realm, where men had a privileged position. Female participation in the arts was accepted in the
past, it is now reinforced by the feminist movement that impacted the art world in the 1970s.
Academics have also been part of the event in terms of female presence. Cuban figures
such as art historians Adelaida de Juán, Graciela Pogoloti, Yolanda Wood, etc., and more
recently Magali Espinoza, Madeline Izquierdo, and Lupe Alvarez, have had a great impact on the
development of critics, curators, and artists in Cuba and, and by extension on the theory and
history of Cuban art. The participation of scholars from Latin America, such as Rita Eder
(Mexico), Aracy Amaral (Brazil) and Nelly Richards (Chile) among others, in addition to other
international figures such as Geeta Kapur (India), Rosa Martinez (Spain), Rhana Davemport
(Australia), and Rachel Weiss (USA), etc., has been important, as has the interest and support of
feminist scholars such as Lucy Lippard during the early years of the Biennale. At the core of the
female presence, however, is the powerful production of Cuban female artists such as Ana
Mendieta, Consuelo Calderon, Marta María Perez Bravo, Belkis Ayón, Sandra Ceballos, Sidel
Brito, Carmen Cabrera, Tania Brugera, etc.
Nonetheless, a close observation of the artists participating in the Biennale, in general
terms, demonstrates that the number of women do not reach 40%. A comparative study of all
biennials events would be important, to measure the Havana Biennale against the changes that
the art world presents in terms of gender representation after the feminist and gender revolutions
of the 1970s and 1980s. The data in the case of the Havana Biennale only represents the open
policy with respect to gender issues in the political practices of the Island.
This diagrams show how the presence of female artists in the Biennale has been
increasing from the first and second Biennales with only 22% of female participation. From 1989
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(the coming of the global age) to 2006 – Biennales 3 to 9 - the number has increase up to 28%
total, an increase of six percentange points.
Figure 36. Gender participation in the Havana Biennale
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4.5
ON NETWORKING
Right from the beginning, the Havana Biennale was based on the revolutionary vision of
building international solidarity and promoting the socialist movement worldwide. At the same
time, it originated in what Cuban scholar Desiderio Navarro calls “the sharing worldviews of
Wifredo Lam and Nicolas Guillén,” which, he suggests, are based on the idea of a cosmic
unity. 286 Gerardo Mosquera, when discussing the life and work of Wifredo Lam, has also built
on this idea. Mosquera, in a text published in relation to an exhibition of Lam’s work for the 23rd
São Paulo Biennial (1996), argued that this universal-view is the reason why Lam’s
representations are anti-taxonomic. 287 Such an approach breaks the bipolar, oppositional way of
thinking, which supposedly has condemned Latin America’s own modernization to always
falling short of its ideals. Making a reference to the modernist debate, Mosquera adds that,
although Lam's Africa comes from Paris - as did that of the other modernists - it becomes the
representation of a different cultural experience. Possibly connected to a Caribbean subjectivity,
it was embraced by some of the surrealists (including Breton), and appears within the
“Negritude” movement articulated in the work of Caribbean intellectuals such as Aimé Césaire,
Eduard Glissant, and Antonio Benitez Rojo (and is even present in the writings of Franz Fanon).
The moderns looked at the primitive trying to distance themselves from their own cultural
framework, in order to have a critical response to it; they wanted to transform their experiences
of living in the Europe of the great wars and find a new pure state in the tropics. Lam, on the
other hand, reaffirmed his paradigmatic condition, approaching his Afro-Cuban-Chinese
background. Mosquera, a modernist critic himself, insisted that Lam’s goal was to build his
identity from the inside, and represent the ethos of such a culture in the form of a new kind of
internationalism within modernism.
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Nevertheless, it is clear that co-optation menaces all cultural action based on syncretism the failure of the politics of identity is an example. Syncretism is, for many of the cultural critics
of Latin America, our way to be in the world. 288 For others, it is the simplest definition of Latin
America’s postmodernism. The challenge is to see who retains control of the changes and
articulations. 289 Mosquera, like the others involved in structuring the Biennale, knew the
problems of establishing merely ethnographic approaches. That is why they became “participant
observers”, a practice that inverts the classical concept of critical distance, and what is derived
from the term candomblë in the work of Brazilian anthropologists. 290 This notion reverses the
way the Frankfurt School understood positive criticism based on such “critical distance”,
establishing zones of contact where knowledge is produced in a new fashion. If the Havana
Biennale could be defined under this approach, one of proximity and participation, it could be
understood, at least initially, in terms of the concept of syncretism. “There is no real syncretism
in the linking of non contradicting antagonisms; syncretism is a strategy of participation, a
resignification and pluralization against hegemony.” 291 Syncretism, in this sense, was used to
stress Western features that were at the same time integrated by the communities of the new
world under colonial policies. Here we find the real subtext of the event, one that recognizes its
polysemic and mimetic character, but always under circumstances of uneven power relations
with respect to the art world. The Havana Biennale is still a biennale in the best Western tradition
of the world expos and cabinets of curiosities, but organized and located outside it. 292
The double isolation (insularity and blockade) of Cuba led to social convulsion and
conceptual challenges; the fact that it is part of the Caribbean tends to unite the region through
proximity and shared cultural identity. Edouard Glissant and Antonio Benitez-Rojo consider the
region paradigmatic. 293 For Mosquera the Caribbean is a universe - an idea of mestizage,
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diversity, transculturation, porosity, migrations, and open interchange. For Nelson Herrera and
Roberto Segre, Havana, is the Western City par excellence; it is a node, a social and physical lab
in the cosmic network. Like many peoples of the Caribbean, Cuban subjects could not maintain
their ethnic purity due to the transoceanic gap (the middle passage). Africans and their
descendants participated actively in the processes of creolization and mixture, becoming sources
of the new cultures and nationalities in the Americas. As explained by Paul Gilroy’s Black
Atlantic, many areas were kept necessarily opaque in a sort of modernity of catastrophe. Now,
however, they are visible through popular culture. 294 After the first two staging’s of the Biennale,
its organizers understood and embraced the popular versus the individual. The Havana Biennale
started opening up its own space. “Kitsch” was not a Greenberg term to define bad taste
anymore. 295 It was now embraced by the Biennale as one of its battle flags. Luis Camnitzer
posed it in these terms:
Kitsch is not only “‘made in the U.S.A.” - it has also become an intrinsic part of Cuban
culture as a byproduct of colonization, the “ersatz” both popularly accepted and generated as
one of the responses to imposed culture. Despite the concern of the government for what some
see as a debasement of culture, there has been no organized drive to eliminate kitsch. It has
been syncretized in artifacts used in the Afro-Cuban rituals of Santería, appropriated and
revitalized in some folk art and anonymous contributions, or used as an inspiration for highculture products. It is also an occasional and accidental byproduct of recycling. 296
Networking also has another dimension, one connected to the flow of capital and people
through the routes of the globalized economy. The Biennale has generated a market scene and a
flow of peoples. This has been widely discussed in reports and articles, which in many cases
attack the Biennale as an economic platform for Cuban artists, and by extension the Cuban state.
As it will be shown bellow, it cannot be denied that there has been a good business not only for
certain Cubans, but also for collectors and institutions outside of Cuba. In the case of Cuba,
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Cuban-Americans who were allowed to go back (during one of the windows of relaxation of the
blockade), to visit or invest, have positioned themselves to open up the Cuban art market
The real legacy and asset for its own future is the network created around it. The
Biennale not only connected the Cuban cultural establishment with the larger art world, it did not
only situate the Biennale in the global picture, but it went beyond.
4.5.1
The Question of Solidarity
A striking feature of each staging of the Biennale is the degree to which it recognized the
collaborative dimension of the project. In every single one of the nine catalogs it is possible to
find a long list of names of individuals, collectives, and institutions that have collaborated in one
way or another with the Biennale. This collaborative dimension is emphasized by the institution
and the curatorial practice itself.
Nelson Herrera Ysla comments on the network of institutions and peoples that supports
the efforts of the small group that develops each event.
We structured a network of public relationships, very tight, that has helped us to
exchange material help, or at least, get attention from big art centers and institutions of the art
world that otherwise would not pay attention to us. At the same time, that has made of us some
sort of global agents, with a certain status that for Cubans would be difficult to reach in other
ways. These networks help us to interact with institutions such as the Arab Institute in Paris,
The Asian Studies Center in the West Coast in the United States, the National Gallery in
Kingston; The Museum of Fine Arts in Caracas; the Ministry of Culture in Colombia, etc.
These relationships are fundamental to getting information, access to art works, resources,
partnerships, etc.
Writing constantly to art critics such as Alvaro Medina or Damian Bayon (both living
in Paris during the 1980s) helped us at the beginning to open our eyes with respect to what was
happening in the major centers. The Latin America Diaspora of artists, critics, intellectuals, and
writers also has been essential.
However, we try to base our work on the production of local knowledge, local critics,
curators, writers, researchers, cultural officials, and artists who work to understand their own
production locally or even their production in the context of the globe. Those visions are
always welcome. 297
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Hilda María Rodriguéz comments on the issue:
Solidarity is why we have been able to do and achieve so many things. Friends from
everywhere make possible the Biennale, the theoretical event, the catalog, etc. Thanks to the
will of many who have helped us to produce not only the publications but also exhibitions, we
share the same views and walk the same paths. The Havana Biennale is much more than a
complex event, it is more than an issue of interest, it is a collective will.
Regardless of its quality and its crisis, the Biennale has called upon many people and
institutions. At the same time, it has addressed many troubling situations, raising a potentiality
that, in the end, is why it happens. It is in this conundrum of people, things, time, and space
that the Biennale thrives. Thanks to the network we have developed, which expands every
time, we bring new artists and invite new institutions to be part of this adventure. Thanks also
to a series of individuals who believe in the Biennale project, we have been able to have a great
amount of artistic material, allowing us to have a complex and open understanding of what art
is today. Although we cannot remove ourselves to that world of art promotion and circulation,
we have the privilege of access to information from multiple sources ever since the creation of
the Lam Center. Thanks to our dedication, study, communication, and overall respect toward
others we have been able to do the Havana Biennale. It is because of the will of curators,
gallery agents, art critics, cultural agents and officials, and, most important, the participation of
the artists, that this Biennale is possible. Tolerance, acceptance and understanding for our
particular conditions also have contributed to the success of this event. Any biennale is an
expensive event, we could talk about events that have in their budgets millions of dollars. The
Havana Biennale has never had more than tens of thousands, maybe a couple of hundred
thousand, in its pocket. Other forces come into play when the Biennale needs them the most.
It is true that the Havana Biennale is part of Cuban cultural policy; however, regardless
of the many individuals interested in doing it, our own reality many times has been an obstacle
to doing what we are called to do. Nonetheless, people like us who have spent their lives
working, researching, promoting, and circulating the symbolic production of Latin America,
Africa, Asia, and the Middle East, are behind the Havana Biennale. Many know that what we
all have done here is important. Our attitudes and thoughts correspond to those of the people of
the territories of the Third World. That is why we have invested all in traveling, meeting,
studying, inviting and organizing a forum for their artistic and theoretical work. They are there
for us, just as we are here for them; they have accompanied us in this time travel.
After the Ninth Biennale it is time to evaluate its functioning again and see if there is a
new direction, another path to follow. The Biennale does not work as a recipe, in fact, there are
so many possibilities, and actually there are as many art projects it has not shown as the ones it
has been able to show. Only the ones working inside its organization can attest to this. What is
true is that as a cultural project the Biennale is under logistic, material, political, and cultural
prejudices and floods; additionally, it has been under a material crisis for a long time. 298
The next figures are intended to map the connections the Wifredo Lam Center had
created over the years in the developing of the Havana Biennale. It has established a network
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of support and interaction with individuals, groups, and institutions outside Cuba, which
functions as the bones and flesh of the Havana Biennale. More than two-hundred institutions
and almost a thousand people around the world have interacted with the members of the
Havana Biennale during the research phase (not counting the more than three thousand artists
participating), the exploratory journeys and the Biennale itself. The data for this map was
gathered from interviews conducted with members of the Wifredo Lam Center and using the
credit pages and articles, of the nine editions of the event. Note that some lines are stronger,
they underline the continuous flow of communication, as well as the exchange taking place
between institutions. Thinner lines show connections that support a particular Biennale or
exchanges that did not last. As complex as the visual model looks, it does not reflect the travels
or the multiple interactions the Wifredo Lam Center has been involved in during the two and a
half decades of work developing the event. It would be necessary to produce maps for each
area of the world, in order to have a clear picture of the complex interweaving along the years
of the Biennale. 299
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Figure 37. Network of Institutional and individual nodes (1984-2007)
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Figure 38. Network of Institutional and individual nodes (with map)
180
Figure 39. The Network of Institutional and individual nodes
The global network (names)
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4.6
THE BIENNALE AND CULTURAL TOURISM
Has the Havana Biennale become a tourist destination? Is the biennial model a direct heir
of the World Expo, meant to become a site of trade and display of power? During an interview
with Abel Prieto, the Cuban Minister of Culture who followed Armando Hart Dávalos (after
resigning his position in 1996), he states that: “We do not demonize the market.” 300 He argues
that one of the dilemmas for the artists of the South in the contemporary cultural world is the
way in which the legitimizing cultural circuit is attached to the market for art. “I believe that the
Havana Biennale, as well as the Havana Book Fair and other cultural events like these in Cuba,
Latin America and in countries like ours, are trying to consolidate other legitimating circuits
outside the ones established by the hegemonic countries.” 301 Prieto considers that cultural
marketing and cultural economy are tools to promote and develop cultural production and the
well being of artists and their communities.
What is important, according to the Minister, is “not to compromise, which could
undermine the way cultural policy is written.” 302 What is important to him is to protect new
production and the spaces of experimentation and training, such as the system of art education in
Cuba established at the beginning of the Revolution, reinforced during the late 1970s, and
updated in 2003. Before 2003 there were only three art schools (ISA, San Alejandro, and the
University of Havana) while today there are seventeen new provincial art schools. They graduate
around three-hundred new art professionals each year. These “art professionals” work not only as
visual artists in the local and international scene, they also work in the cultural industry at large,
as graphic, stage, and industrial designers, in the protection of the cultural heritage, or as
craftsmen and educators in the school system, etc. 303
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Figure 40. Abel Prieto, Cuban Minister of Culture
To maintain the flow of new professional artists in the broken economy of the Island
there have been changes in the general system that permit some individual business and the
development of a larger sector of service industries (tourism in particular) in which these new
graduates have a place to grow.
During the late 1970s, Cuban officials realized that the tourist infrastructure was
suffering as a result of abandoning a system that it believed was bourgeois and degenerate.
Measures were taken then in order to stabilize and maintain it. By late 1980s, the economic
pressures of the decaying Soviet Bloc created a stimulus to start re-building and up-dating the
old hotels and tourist infrastructure, as well as the colonial heritage. In an article entitled, “Art,
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Emigration and Tourism: works by Cuban artists in last spring's Fifth Havana Biennial”
foreshadowed the country's current massive exodus of boat people. It was published in Art in
America in 1994, in it Kurt Hollander stated: “Perhaps the best example of the new Cuban
pragmatism is the tourist industry. For the last couple of years, tourist development has been
seen by the government as the principal hope for economic revitalization.” 304
According to Cuban statistics, as early as 1993 tourism generated $700 million, several
times the income derived from the sugar harvest. A wave of investors and foreign capital arrived
following a package of "free-market incentives to invest in the island, including majority
ownership of many of the hotels and resorts that are being constructed all over Havana and along
the beaches, most of them aimed at the luxury trade. The new proprietors and management teams
are not being held to any labor restrictions and can thus fire workers, a first in Cuban
revolutionary history.” 305 This became relevant for the Cuban economy because it represents the
only real area for investment that could attract external capital and create wealth in the short
term. “The 1997 Cuban Economic Resolution spells out the necessity to develop hard currencyearning sectors of the economy to finance other important activities, making explicit the role
tourism could play in the country's economic future.” 306 According to the projections, to achieve
this the administration set a goal: to attract more than two million tourists by the year 2000 in
order to earn more than US$2,600 million from the tourist trade. Tourism in Cuba, in ten years of
sustained development, has been converted into the most dynamic sector of the Cuban economy.
By the end of the 1990s, 43% of the balance of payments was met by tourism. Tourism
had gone from being an incidental source of income to becoming a structural factor in the Cuban
economy. It is rare that such change in the economic structure has occurred with such success
and in such a short time. A decade and a half ago the statistics suggested that “the sugar industry
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provided between 70 and 75% of the income of the balance of payments, while the tourist sector
accounted for only 6%. Cuban Tourism Minister (an appointment created in 1994) Ibrahim
Ferradaz observed that ‘in the last ten years, the sector multiplied its gross income eight-fold; the
number of visitors multiplied by five, the number of rooms in tourist establishments tripled, and
the number of jobs in the tourist sector doubled.’” 307 This achievement can be attributed to the
flexibility and adaptability to conditions that the regime has shown since the mid 1970s. 308
In 1994, “Fidel (Castro) outlined a set of economic measures, including an immediate
crackdown on macetas, those people who stockpile houses, cars and appliances, or who
accumulate large sums of money.” 309 Artists were also affected by the measure since all bank
accounts over 10,2000 pesos (around US$3,2000 at the time) were appropriated if the owner
could not demonstrate that the money was legal. That meant that the money was not coming in
the form of remittances (‘remesas,’ money sent by relatives in the U.S.), or as part of an illegal
market (actually, any trading in foreign currency for decades was forbidden) such as selling of
products or having a small business such as a family restaurant, the so-called Paladares. Artists
involved in the trading of their work on one-to-one bases were also affected by the measure. A
tax levied on any cultural activity that produced revenues as high as 60%. 310
Nonetheless, the new measures brought new investors to Cuba, enjoying privileges and
ownership over their investments. These investors come from Spain, Germany, Canada and other
First World countries as well as in partnership with Cuban exiles interested in investing in the
tourist industry. “In the official newspaper Granma, the only ads are those for tourist hotels and
resorts, while in every issue there are at least one or two articles on new joint ventures. Such
recent developments have generated a system of tourist apartheid in Cuba: privileged enclaves
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within an otherwise impoverished island, wherein most of the hotels, the resorts, several beaches
and the majority of international restaurants are for tourists only.” 311
The 1994 economic measures also open the country for the art market. Art entrepreneurs
such as Cuban exile Manuel E. Gonzalez (former director of the art program at the Chase
Manhattan Bank in New York City) who during his tenure continued David Rockefeller’s
tradition of collecting Latin American art (with particular interest in the Cuban scene) returned to
Havana to invest in art during the late 1990s. According to Gonzalez, he taught the organizers of
the Havana Biennale basic financial management skills, “my role was peculiar, it was like
Capitalism 101 –how to underwrite an exhibition, because they had no idea… how to get the
whole thing underwritten either by cash contribution from embassies and corporations or by
trade between hotels in Havana and the Biennale.”
312
Cuban art became a commodity for the
global art market from the Fourth Biennale onwards. The number of reported American visitors
grew from dozens in the Third and Fourth Biennale to few thousands during the Seventh and
Eighth Biennales, and with them a local market emerged. In addition, serious collectors also
have conquered Cuban land. The Ludwig Foundation was the first, in 1990 supported the famous
Cuba OK, exhibition that traveled to Germany, later it would co-sponsor the 1994 Biennale, and
finally in late 1994 it opened a branch of the Foundation in Havana. Today, it promotes
contemporary Cuban Art and has become an agent for European audiences and institutions.
The Ludwig Foundation for Art and International Understanding was established by Peter
Ludwig (the German chocolate industrialist and art collector) in 1983. It was created with the
income from the sale of 144 illuminated manuscripts from his collection to the J. Paul Getty
Museum in California (for an estimated price of forty to sixty million dollars). A scandal arose
since the city of Cologne (Germany) expected Ludwig to donate the manuscripts to the city
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museum. “The first task of the Foundation was the promotion of art from the GDR, the Soviet
Union, and later Bulgaria, all countries where Peter Ludwig has or is suspected of trying to
establish a favorable climate for his chocolate business.” 313 Ludwig, who died in 1996, used to
negotiate his acquisitions with the state art trading agencies, in the case of Cuba, with the Fondo
de Bienes Cubanos. Prices then were not fixed by artists or agents but by bureaucrats and
officials without knowledge of art value. 314
As shown in a recent documentary piece on the Cuban art market, produce by
independent film maker Natasha del Toro, entitled Rough Cut: Cuba: The Art Revolution
(Frontline World, PBS on view, September 14, 2006), the success of the art market is based on
the notion that:
Cubans with artistic talent are handpicked and sent to extremely rigorous schools that
are fully subsidized by the Cuban government. Only the best make it to graduation. But even
those who don't make it through get a solid - and free - art education along the way, which is
probably why you find such good street art in Cuba. Although there are great artists throughout
Latin America, the travel embargo makes Cuban art scarce and consequently more exotic. This
drives up demand - at least for Americans. 315
The documentary focused on the work of Los Carpinteros (Marcos Castillo and
Dagoberto Rodríguez), and explains how the new, Cuban art market emerged from the ‘special
period’. The documentary does not go into the success of the 1980s generation. It mentions the
1994 Havana Biennale as the center from which the new generations of Cuban artists have
achieved international recognition and became part of the boom in the tourist industry. In the
film, Dan Cameron (Curator of the New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York) comments:
“There was this kind of frenzy in the terms of buying up Cuban art. Before you left Cuba, what
you did was to cast a roll of several dozen of hundred dollars, and you just kept that in you
pocket, and you just pulled of a couple of hundreds here and there when you entered the studios
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of an artist you thought was doing, you know, good work.” 316 In another sequence Noel Smith,
curator for Latin American art for Christie’s auction house explains how a sculpture of Los
Carpinteros can reach US$40,2000 to US$60,2000 and a large drawing is in the range of
US$20,2000 to US$25,2000. Pieces by the collective are part of the collection at the Museum of
Modern Art in New York and many art museums in the United States and Europe.
The Cuban government was challenged to balance tourism against its other social goals
since tourism has its own dynamic connected to economic and leisure activities in the Western
World. “The existence of high and low seasons keeps the sector from operating efficiently. VicePresident Carlos Lage (who was forced to resign in March, 2009) has referred to this problem,
pointing out that it increases the costs of operation and reduces profits. This seasonality has been
caused, in part, by the image of Cuba as a land of sun and beaches, instead of as a diversified
country with many natural and cultural attractions.” 317 However, the close alliance of every
productive and major sector, including culture, with the newly created Ministry of Tourism
(1994) has established a variety of events covering the entire calendar. Thus there are cultural
events spread throughout the year. Actually, the Havana Biennale is supposed to be held always
during March and April (every two or three years), and connected to other events, such as the
Havana Film Festival, which is always at the end of the year (the film festival is closed to
celebrating its 30th anniversary and ICAIC its 50th as the first cultural institution of the
Revolution).
According to ICOMOS (International Council of Monuments and Sites), cultural tourism
is “that form of tourism whose object is, among other aims, the discovery of monuments and
sites. It exerts on these last a very positive effect insofar as it contributes - to satisfy its own ends
- to their maintenance and protection. This form of tourism justifies, in fact, the efforts which
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said maintenance and protection demand of the human community because of the socio-cultural
and economic benefits which they bestow on all the populations concerned.” 318 More broadly,
cultural tourism is defined as concerned with a country or region's culture, especially its
architecture, history, environment, and arts. It focuses on traditional communities who have
diverse customs and social practices, or other types/forms of culture. It includes tourism in urban
areas, in particular cities with historic and cultural value, or large cities where cultural facilities
such as museums and theatres are available. That is the case for large art events such as art
biennials and art fairs, which are connected to the historical presence of the World Expo and
World Fairs, mobilizing great numbers of people during the spectacles of the modern era. It is
clear that cultural tourists spend substantially more than standard tourists do. 319 Tourists that
classify themselves as “cultural tourists” as in the case of Americans traveling abroad, and in
particular to countries such as Cuba, seem to have a significantly higher income than the average
tourist and to spend more money on local products than the average tourist. 320
The biennial phenomenon is connected to the establishment of a circuit of global cities
that put in motion global capital and, for instance, international cultural tourism. That is why
Havana, being located slightly off the main routes of the art world, is so attractive for the ever
expanding flow of capital and tourism. During the 1990s, dozens of new biennales were
established. This world-wide growth in bienniales has provided the most obvious evidence of the
radical changes which have been taking place in the global economies of contemporary art
practice since the collapse of the Eastern Bloc. Commenting on the issue, John Byrne argues:
Globalization has, as in many other areas of social relations and endeavor, both
homogenized and fragmented engagements with and responses to the “art world.” This has led
to a kind of new, postmodern “International Style” of works which, despite their differing
quality, simply appear to be the same in any kind of location. In response to the blandness of
such “airport art,” many Biennials have recently sought to encourage a direct “engagement”
with the “cultural specifics” of their location… However, in spite of this polarization of the
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contemporary art world into the glibly general and the impossibly specific, many artists have
begun to produce works which are intentionally “de-centered” - dispersed over time, space and
location - simultaneously denying the possibility of their works post-biennial absorption into a
globalize economy of commodified art objects and further de-stabilizing the traditional
relationship between artist and artwork.” 321
It is difficult to track art biennials, since many just reach few editions before
disappearing. Specialized publications list from of a couple dozen to five hundred of such events
around the world. They are almost always connected to the emergence of new urban centers; it is
believed that is true particularly in the World in Development. 322
Figure 41. Distribution of Art Biennials by World Areas
The figure presents a visual distribution of biennials around the world. As of 2008, from
a list of thirty international established events (with more than three editions each), it is clear that
the phenomenon is still a Western one with an increasing Asian growth, especially during the last
decade.
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Usually, a biennial is a survey of a large group of artists coming from several countries or
regions who contribute a few works each to an exhibition that uses a museum, a group of
museums, galleries, or a different venue adapted for the purpose. The most important of all is the
Venice Biennale (1895), which created an inner city for the display of works in the fashion of a
World Expo (nations had to buy the right to being displayed and build a national pavilion). For
many years, the biennial was part of an agenda of the nation building process, based on the
Western nation-state model. Today the biennial has followers and detractors and there it is
possible to find several models which are interacting in simultaneity, always changing our
understanding of what art is (in part they are based on the novelty and originality forces
established by modernity). Hans Belting has commented how:
There are cultural spaces, where the so-called history of art cannot end because, from
our perspective, it (art history) has not happened yet…. That has not changed, even though we
are confronted with contemporary art of non-Western origin, for which new biennials are
mounted, from Istanbul to Sydney and Seoul…. An art “outside of” ordinary art history, thus
also outside of the Western art scene, could be encountered in forms which one does not
identify as art, just because they negate our concept of art -forms that one wants to understand
too quickly with Western aesthetics, which will only lead to misunderstanding. 323
It is also relevant to add that the contemporary biennial phenomenon started at the
moment in which authors such as Belting and Danto were publishing their famous theories on
the “end of art” (Hans Belting, Das Ende der Kunstgeschichte / The End of Art History and
Arthur Danto’s article “The End of Art” both in 1984) - the year of the first Havana Biennale.
Art biennials are today in competition to become victors for the contemporary art world
in their regions, to attract as many tourists, collectors and investors as possible – many times
overriding the canon of art history. It is relevant to study the evolutionary path of such events.
On the one hand, Venice is perhaps the exemplar of the “biennial as prize distribution, artworld
validation” model, which has changed little since its creation in 1895. At the other end of the
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spectrum lies the new “biennial as art infrastructure,” which deals with positioning of new
cultural centers and/or urban renovation – even thought they are outside the mainstream. There
are the Asian and Middle Eastern biennials, like in the case of the Sharjah Biennial in Dubai, and
the Asia Pacific Triennial in Brisbane, which are using their events as a way to build cultural
institutions with world-class collections in Asian, Middle Eastern and international art. Others
such as the Liverpol Biennial tend to be more concerned with urban renovation and local
histories. 324 The rest of the biennials lie somewhere in between these two extremes, since many
of these events are tied to urban renewal and/or infrastructure updates in the mega cities of the
globalized world. The Havana Biennale is located somewhere in the center of the spectrum,
where it addresses both sides. Biennials then become a quasi brand like event, “every country
thinks they need one, but very few have a distinctive enough offering to bring to the world.” 325
In summary, all are still entangled in discourses of internationalism and cosmopolitanism.
The figure intents to map the emergence of international art biennials in the past two and
one-half decades using as the starting year 1984. The Havana Biennale (on top) functions as a
time line, to compare the periodicity of events and their juxtaposition in annual calendars. Of
thirty international biennials listed, only four were created before 1984. Many important events
such as the Cairo Biennial, the Medellín Biennial, the Paris Biennale (in existence before 1984)
or the Biennial at Johannesburg (which counted only two editions) are not listed because they are
not functioning today. Other national (or local) biennials, such as the Whitney Biennial, are also
not in the list. The Senegalese Biennial at Dakar started in 1966 as a local event, it was not until
1992 that it became an international (Pan-African) biennial; it is listed from 1992 on.
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Figure 42. Current Biennials
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Figure 43. Cultural Tourism in Havana
The Havana Biennale exemplifies such a phenomenon, and from the mid-1990s it has
become another destination for cultural tourists. The changes experienced by the event have been
remarkable during the second half of that decade and so too are the new challenges of today. It
can be connected also to the optimism of global markets, the loosening of the grip of the U.S.
Blockade during the second term of the Clinton Administration, as a result of the support by part
of the United Nations in ending such blockade, and the reanimation and opening of Cuban policy
and economy with respect to ownership, foreign investment, travel, and social control. However,
in the article “Havana, Biennial, Tourism: The Spectacle of Utopia” written by Dermis P. León
and published by the Art Journal in 2001, the author, a Cuban exile, expresses her concern about
the changes the Biennale has experienced during the years of globalization.
When I returned to Cuba to see the 1997 Biennial, I became aware of dramatic changes
that were transforming Cuban society. A new Habana Vieja (Old Havana), the historical center
of the city, had reemerged through restoration, and displaced the experience of marginality and
abandonment that I had known as a child growing up in the city… These changes were
reflected in the Biennale itself. Along with contemporary Cuban art, whose profile was
continuing to rise internationally, the Biennale itself had become a tourist attraction. Its
exhibitions and parallel independent events now encompassed more districts of the city, such
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as El Vedado. And for the first time, entrance to these exhibitions had to be purchased. Without
a doubt, the Biennale had discovered that it could be more than ‘an alternative space for the
familiarization of that artistic production so rarely seen by and spread among the main
international scenes.’ It had discovered that it could be a force for cultural tourism. In the 2000
Biennale, for instance, foreign visitors had the opportunity to select, and pay for in dollars, a
variety of ticket packages that granted them access to exhibitions, activities, and
publications. 326
The author visited the Biennale from her new home, New York City, and explains that a
sudden interest had risen among art goers and the inner circle of the art world in the city to
experience maybe the last of the Havana Biennales. Besides, Cuban art was in the best shape in
terms of investment, according to the number of pieces being collected by institutions in the U.S.
and by private collectors. The 2000 Biennale was in addition an art spectacle when a group of
MoMA officials, and with them a number of American collectors stepped into the Wifredo Lam
asking for guidance to buy pieces for MoMA’s collection. Nelson Herrera directed them to the
Casa de las Américas which was holding the first Cuban Art Open Auction, with the aim of
building a new section for the Children’s Hospital at Havana city.
León also recognizes how:
The administrators of the Biennale understand that in order to survive in the precarious
Cuban economy, which is now subject to the rhythm of the international markets, it is
necessary for its art to address global themes, spiced with a hint of local exoticism. Cuba no
longer has the same leadership role in Third World culture or the economic resources that it
had in the 1980s. In the era of Istanbul, Johannesburg, Kwangju, and the countless other
biennials that keep critics, curators, and artists hopping from plane to plane always seeking
novelty, the Havana Biennial must offer something more than Third World art. The novelty it
has offered thus far is a ‘critical’ Cuban art that calls the concept of a socialist utopia into
question. And of course Havana itself is an attraction, softly radiating the exoticism of an old
city emerging from the ruins. 327
The Ministry of Culture, along with many other institutions in Cuba, has realized that the
only way to keep going with the amount of events they organize, is to establish a new direction
in terms of economic viability. That is why changes in the administrative dimension of the
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institutional part of the system has taken place recently. Rubén del Valle Lantarón became the
first director of the Wifredo Lam Center who has not come from the core group created by
Llanes in the 1980s and 90s. Del Valle Lantarón’s profile is more one of a cultural official who
experiences the connection between art and the market.
RUBEN DEL VALLE LANTARON. (Art historian, cultural officer. Director of the Lam
Center 2005-2007, Director 10th Biennale) “My professional carrier has been developed in the
Ministry of Culture. I have worked in management, administration, promotion, and circulation
of the arts. I started in the Cuban Book Institute, as Assistant Director, director of publications,
and later as Sirector of the editorial Gente Nueva. I worked there with Manuel González who
was president of the CNAP, Vice Minister of Culture, and Vice-President of Cuban radio and
television. His sensibility, intelligence, and patience with me were fundamental in my
training… During the late 1980s and the first part of the 1990s, we had a great editorial
production. However, the ‘special period’ hit us hard, and our development was seriously
challenged. In 1994, new laws were established that brought a series of changes of a social and
ideological order. A new wave of thought came to challenge the establishment and a new flow
of publications brought new perspectives on the economy, religion, civil society, participation,
and democracy. The arts participated also in such debates.
New events such as the Havana Book Fair were transformed from a local event into one
of an international order. That event became the cornerstone for a new cultural policy that
embraces cultural industry and cultural tourism. In the Cuban state, production and
commercialization are one. In the editorial Gente Nueva, we grew from twelve titles to a
seventy titles per year; and from two-thousand to one-hundred thousand units each. The
Havana Book Fair is not longer an event only for the intellectual community; it offers spaces
for everyone. Working there gave me the possibility of understanding the new direction that we
have to take in the cultural sphere…
What I learned from those experiences was that cultural promotion is essential to
developing any artistic practice. Later, I was sent to the CNAP as Vice-President and being
there I was ask to help during the Eighth Havana Biennale. In that opportunity I have had the
chance to learn about the event’s production, that it is a heavy burden. Additionally, I
interacted with the team, whom I did not know before. I noticed how these curators, who are
world-class, were not fixed to a hierarchy or intellectual constructs. They work in all
dimensions of the event; I discovered the ‘mística’ of the Havana Biennale. I never thought I
would work with and for them as Director of the Lam Center for the Ninth Biennale.” 328
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Figure 44. Rubén del Valle Lantarón
The Ministry of Culture needed an agent who could integrate the new model of
promotion and self-sufficiency on a new scale. The work of the director is to orchestrate local,
national and international resources to make an event like the Biennale a success story. To do
that in the Cuban context is not an easy task. After the dropping of financial support by the
European agencies in 2003 - in particular by the Prince Claus Fund for Culture and
Development, HIVOS (Humanist Institute for Co-operation with Developing Countries), and
AFAA (Association Française d'Action Artistique) which is associated with political and human
rights issues, the Biennale was in jeopardy. “According to official announcements, the biennale
was saved because the Cuban government stepped in with 156,2000 U.S. dollars from its own
funds, supposedly the entire budget.” 329
The new environment of work has not changed since then and for the Ninth Havana
Biennale external financial support was not available. The only item financed by a European
institution was the Catalog, del Valle recalls:
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The rest of the Biennale is produced with one million pesos, which covers the costs of
the Lam Center, and its seventy-three employees. For the Biennale the Ministry supplies an
extra 230 people, workers from different cultural institutions, all covered by the CNAP. The
budget for the Ninth Biennale was 150,2000 US Dollars ($150,2000 CUC), what is
insignificant compared to any other event of such a nature in the art world. How do we supply
the rest? Well, we call all our friends in Cuba and abroad, Havana becomes a great community
where affect is trafficked. Llilian Llanes used to say, ‘You can have all the money you want,
but without spirit that’s nothing.’ That is our great resource, love, passion, and affection. 330
For the Tenth Biennale the finantial changed significantly, in addition to the annual
budget the Ministry of Culture gave &164,2000 CUC (U.S.$ 200,2000), in addition the Agencia
de Cooperación Española through a series of other cultural institutions gave, acordint to official
sources, around $250,2000 euros. The 2009 editions, which also celebrated the 25th anniversary
was indeed an epectacle. Cultural tourist from Europe and North America assisted again in the
thousands, and Cuban art was high in the market agenda. As a global phenomenon, art and
tourism are connected for the good or the bad. Gutierrez and Gancedo in a study on Cuba and
tourism, concur.
Cuba is not looking at tourism as some sort of short-term solution that exploits people's
curiosity about the island. Nor does it see tourism as "a necessary evil" in the heart of a
socialist society, explanations sometimes given by those confused about the impressive
dynamism of the Cuban tourist sector. Tourism in Cuba is a strategic development associated
with creating a new concept of sustainable tourism from the vantage point of its ecological,
economic, cultural, and social dimensions. 331
Art biennials are today part of the expanding economy of cultural tourism. From that
perspective biennials demand spectacle, investment, and of course, size. Most of them are part of
urban plans and/or political and cultural agendas pursuing more than the altruistic dimension of
art promotion. These events are grandiloquent by nature and include a dimension of political
participation and economic support (by public and private funds). So, size does matter in a
biennial, downsizing is a difficult task for the usual and obvious reasons; it affects visibility,
funding and prestige.
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The case of the Havana Biennale is just a chapter of that story that is consolidating new
routes and paths for the art produced not only in the cultural centers and the traditional set of
countries of the developed world – one that enables the flows of cultural agents to cross the
crevices and interstices of the hegemonic circuits constituting what is now call Global Art.
Figure 45. The Tenth Havana Biennale. An espectacle.
4.7
ON CUBAN ARTISTS AND CUBAN ART
Today it is possible to find many books, essays, articles, and catalogs exploring the
phenomenon of Cuban Art and its participation in the new global scene. To cite just some, Luis
Camnitzer’s New Art of Cuba (1994), Kevin Power’s While Cuba Waits (1999), and Holly
Block’s Art Cuba (2001), explore in several ways the rise of the various generations of Cuban
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artists since the late 1970s to mid-1990s. Cuban art is now included in important collections and
by extension, in mainstream narratives. Some others texts are forthcoming, addressing different
aspects of the Cuban artistic production in the past three decades. 332 There are also dozens of
exhibition catalogs that present long and short essays on different artists and some aspects of the
art practice on the island, the most important of which is Revolution of Forms: Cuba’s forgotten
art schools by John Loomis (1999). In addition, there are collections of essays published in Cuba
about different aspects of art and critical theory during specific moments on time. Some of them
were produced directly from the Lam Center. 333
Those volumes provide a useful context for the main purpose of this study: to examine
the institutional, collective, and individual practice of the people involved with the Havana
Biennale, above all, the members of the Wifredo Lam Center, in order to explicate the unique
nature and achievements of the Biennale.
Gerardo Mosquera, discussing the presence of Cuban Art in the global scene argued that:
The peripheries took European modernism but almost always used it as a means rather
than an end. Modernism was put to function for a particular agenda concentrated on the
construction of identities and social and cultural criticism. In Latin America, modernism's role
is notable in this sense and in the negotiation of the heterogeneity of its societies. Latin
American modernism adopted popular culture and the contradictions of a fragmented
modernity. Wifredo Lam, for example, was the first visual artist who intended to take
advantage of modernism as a space to affirm and communicate Afro-American meanings.
The peripheries’ appropriation of modernism, more than completing its particular
agenda, signified a pluralization and complexization of Modernism itself. The saxophone can
be a metaphor for this. It is the modern pr, as an unexpected vehicle paradigmatic of the AfroNorth-American sensibility. 334
Mosquera situates this debate on modernism in marginal art, in terms of the postmodern
critique, which has been examined by others before. Among them, Thomas McEvelly in his now
famous essay “Doctor Lawyer Indian Chief: ‘Primitivism’ in 20th Century Art' at the Museum of
Modern Art in 1984,” published in Artforum in 1984. There were early critiques, such as Terry
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Smith’s “The Provincialism Problem,” in Artforum in 1974, which addressing the same issue.
This confrontation with the high church of modernism (the Museum of Modern Art) and one of
the most powerful men in the art world, established a new group that would support the creation
of globalism in art. Articles like “Doctor, Lawyer, Indian Chief” became landmarks and models
for future critiques of Eurocentric practices in art history, curatorship, and art criticism. They set
out the concerns of the critic interested in implementing a postcolonial globalism in art practice.
McEvilley’s lecture “History, Quality, Globalism” (1995), like his article titled “Arrivederci,
Venice: The Third World Biennials.” points out to the new centers where this globalism was
most likely to be practiced in curatorial and creative efforts. After the publication of this
historical article in Art in America, on the first South African and Estonian biennials, other
pieces followed, opening up space for debate and critical discussion. 335
Mosquera argues that the expansion of Third Word artistic practice could not only helped
to break Western monism, but also could yield structural changes.
A notable case is the so-called new Cuban art. Indebted to the widely available free
artistic teaching and the social dynamic of the country, young people of all social groups were
trained as ‘cultured’ artists and simultaneously continued links with their ways of origin. In
their work is produced a construction of the avant-garde from the popular. It is not the
vernacular participating in the ‘cultured’, rather it is making it in a manner qualitatively
different. It is evidenced by artists who structure their work based on the Afro-Cuban
cosmology of their family context, a cosmology which they actively embody. This entire
phenomenon encompasses a change in meaning. José Bedia, for example, would be doing postmodern Congo art. 336
Mosquera refers to the more global and in a sense main-stream aspects of Cuban art in
relation to the new art history, which was itself a product of the postmodern critique.
For former curators of the Havana Biennale such as Hilda María Rodríguez, the event in
itself has been important, however, Rodríguez sees the phenomena in relation to Cuban cultural
policy and environment from the late 1970s on.
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For the Cuban artist, the Biennale has been important. The presence of Cuban art has
also been important for the Biennale. An exchange has taken place, however it is relevant to
mention that the Biennale was designed no just for Cuban artists and Cuban Art; its structure
always has been directed to the artists of the so-called Third World. The São Paulo Biennale, is
connected to the modern tradition and is linked to the creation of the Museum of Modern art in
São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro and to the promotion and creation of Brazilian art and its
inclusion into the main stream. What happened in Venice and São Paulo made us think that
Cuban artists should indeed be present in several ways in the event, but not be at the center of
it.
That is an explanation for the emergence of the collateral and parallel exhibitions that
after 1994 became major attractions during the Biennale. The interest shown by foreign critics
and later curators would change the balance of the Cuban representation in the Biennale at the
time of its opening up to other artists, during the second part of the 1990s. These exhibitions
are where Cuban artists have a space to consolidate their work -outside of the Cuban circuit.
They are a place of confrontation, and also a place of contingency and divergence for those that
cannot be part of them for one reason or another. The conceptual trends also reach these
exhibitions; they are not necessarily organized by the central group but many times they have
to respond to the main theme, or at least have been recognized by the institution (the Lam
Center, CNAP, Ministry of Culture) as part of the Biennale universe.
It is undeniable that Cuban artists have benefited and Cuban art has become better
positioned but not only because of the Havana Biennale. The Biennale is just a circumstance
among the complexity of the Cuban cultural scene, and because of the way the art world has
responded to it. For those who have participated, it has been a platform; at the same time it had
been a portal for new practices, debates and friendships. All these will work to launch the ones
to come.
Many have come to see, participate, collaborate, and interact. That happens in the
Biennale itself. As a matter of fact, a number of new events have been created and happened
since 1989. Many have mimicked Havana’s model. Because of its pertinence, the model has
been repeated and copied, opening spaces for Cuban and Third World artists who have helped
in the consolidation of the global scene. 337
The positioning of Cuban art and artists in the global scene is the result of a series of
facts. It is worth mentioning the role of art education in Cuba. The creation of the system of art
schools and its continuity through time are part of the phenomenon. In addition, the international
participation of Cuban artists and the local art events have played a role too. It is clear that the
protagonists here are the artists who have matured during the process; they are now part of the
system, feeding back to the art schools and art events. It has been an endogenous process for the
artists and their social environment. It is true that for Cuba, the symbolic dimension is important
and that artists have been treated with care, in spite of Cuba’s stringencies and its isolation at
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some moments in its recent history. Perhaps that fact has influenced the nurturing of a symbolic
production where the Cuban reality is present at all times. In addition, it seems that there is little
confrontation between generations. If a younger artist has things to say, there are no
preconditions excluding him from the main scene. This openness has generated a constant
renovation, injecting new blood and quality into the system. In Cuba there are many artistic
manifestations that are worthy of exploration with or without the Biennale. Cuban art is a
permanent laboratory that invites all to inspect it.
For younger members of the Lam Center, those less tied to the archeology of the event,
the Biennale is part of the Cuban cultural-scape, where it has an important role promoting the
new generation of Cuban and international artists.
Dannys Montes de Oca, a researcher active in the Cuban art scene as a critic and curator
notes that, with respect to contemporary Cuban production art:
I could argue that the ‘art market’ is not a national, but an international phenomenon.
Cuba has been part of the international modernist avant-garde since the 1920s and connected to
international modernism since the 1970s. Our art has always had an ideological, dimension
locating it in the front line in Latin America. Comparing Cuban Art with that of the Socialist
Bloc, ours was called elitist. There was no way to compare it with the one produced in the
1980s. Today there is a group of artists with an ethical stand and a radial sense that makes them
work in social and political terms. However, there is another group that has been homogenized
and that can be considered avant-garde, along with those who are not. We are in a moment of
total confusion. Important art spaces are now displaying works that before could not be shown
there. Today there is a jet-set that is confused and lives along with the real avant-garde.
Perhaps this is a moment of total obsolescence and plurality, the moment of an opening
up of practices before the market. That is the sense which I point to the term “homogenized.” A
place where many things live along with others and where competition (between those more
sophisticated in terms of conceptualization and others that are only experimenting with certain
aspects of past vanguards) is taking place. Those are the ones I do not consider worth
exploring. 338
On the same lines, Magali Espinoza comments that:
Nonetheless, there is a solid group of artists with a strong self-critical consciousness.
There are other groups that orbit the first one, and there is a pessimistic tendency that talks
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about a crisis in Cuban art. I believe that each artistic process has its own internal dynamics.
The 1980s were a moment of intense production in Cuba. Now, in the debates taking place in
and out the Biennale and especially outside it, many are questioning the role of the event in the
Cuban scene. Today there is a group of artists that continues with the precepts of what Cuban
art is and has been. They include Ana Lia Amaya, José A. Vincench, Saidel Britto, Duglas
Perez, Pedro Alvarez, and Luis Gomez. 339
It is important to underline how the visual arts became a state issue central to the cultural
discourse on the Island during the 1990s, largely because of the distribution and exhibition of
Cuban art in international circuits. This was possible thanks to the relaxation of the embargo
rules for the arts passed by the U.S. Congress in 1988. Art could be traded under the label
“information materials.” According to Sandra Levinson (Director of the Cuban Art Space at the
Center for Cuban Studies in New York City), “the official description of ‘informational’
materials, did not include original Cuban art.” 340 With the support of critic Alex Rosenberg and
managed by the National Emergency Civil Liberties Committee the Center brought a suit against
the U.S. Treasury asking that the sale of Cuban art in the U.S. be legalized. Its success allowed
curators, collectors, and artists to start a productive relationship, going back and forth. Later,
when the Cuban government permitted the use of dollars for economic exchange in 1993, this
again created a spiral of transactions. In that way Cuban artist became assets to the Cuban state,
and they did not have to leave the island in order to benefit from this new trade. 341
The Biennale has been at the center of the Cuban art scene since its creation in 1984. It is
not possible to talk about new Cuban art without also mentioning the role the Biennale has
played.
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PART THREE
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5.0
MAPPING THE WORLD
“Foreigners who came to Cuba in the 1960s to taste the exotic fruit of the Revolution didn’t talk about what was
happening. Instead they fantasized a ‘what should be’ that was basically a paternalist and neo-colonial design, making us raw
material for the West’s cyclical demand for Utopias.” Osvaldo Sánchez 342
This chapter describes the nine editions of the Havana Biennale. It also continues the
chronotopi, presenting an image from the outside and using as its source the press releases,
reports, on-line chronicles, and published articles in the international and regional art press on
the Biennale.
Basic statistical information about each edition, dates, venues, number of artists,
countries, academic events, and parallel events, provide data on the coverage and reach of the
event. Some of the key artists in each biennial will be discussed (if relevant) but the focus is,
above all, an exploration of the academic debates and impact of the event on the international art
world. A series of graphics have been developed to present a qualitative and synthetic image of
the Biennale. Figure 44 and 45 summarize the Havana Biennale’s history; the first one presents
information on the conceptual themes and symposia, following by a synthetic description of the
curatorial projects, curators, and participants in the academic events.
Additional graphs
(sometimes in couples to establish a comparative and evolutionary process) present the
percentages of countries, per world area, participating in each edition. Maps of the city are
provided to locate the venues used actively for the Biennale through its history. A
comprehensive list of the artists, countries of origin, areas of the world, and biennial in which
each participated is attached as an appendix to this work.
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Figure 46. The Havana Biennale, general information and symposia
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Figure 47. The Havana Biennale, curatorial projects, topics, and participants
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Figure 48. Total countries participating, 1984 - 2006
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Figure 49. Havana Biennale exhibition venues (map)
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5.1
THIRD WORLD ART
“The Havana Biennale sought to provide Latin American artists with an alternative arena where isolation could be
broken down and where, through exchange and comparison, a collective dynamic might emerge.” Luis Camnitzer (Art in
America, December 1984)
First Havana Biennale / Dates: May-June, 1984
Artists: 715 artists and about 2.2000 works. 35 countries participated.
Prizes: Wifredo Lam Prize. Arnold Belkin, Mexico
Painting: Joaquín Torres García Prize. Carmelo Arden Quin, Uruguay
Mention. José Carrasquel, Venezuela
Candido Portinary Prize. José Gamarra, Uruguay
Mention. Ana Eckell, Argentina
Orozco-Rivera-Siqueiros Prize. Carlos Alonso, Argentina
Mention. Adolfo Patiño, Mexico
Emilio Petoruti Prize. Horacio García Rossi, Argentina
Mention. Fernando Barata, Brasil
Drawing: Flavio de Carvalho Prize. Alirio Palacios, Venezuela
Mention. Ever Astudillo, Colombia
Armando Reveron Prize. Roberto Fabelo, Cuba
Mention. Aníbal Ortiz Pozo, Chile
Graphic Art: José Guadalupe Posada Prize. Branco de Oliveira, Brasil
Mention. Balthazar Armas, Venezuela
Antonio Berni Prize. Omar Rayo, Colombia
Mention. León Ferrari, Argentina
Pothography: Martín Chambí Prize. Fernell Franco, Colombia
Mention. Fernando Chaves, Brasil
Tina Modoti Prize. Rogelio López Marín, Cuba
Mention. Calos Rivodó, Venezuela
Especial Mentions
Elsa Morales, Venezuela
Orlando Sobalvarro, Nicaragua
Grupo Solidarte (Mexico – El Salvador)
National Prizes:
Painting. Amelia Peláez Prize. Tomás Sánchez
Mention. Eduardo Rubén García
Drawing: Rafael Blanco Prize. Gustavo Acosta
Mention. Antonio Eligio (Tonel)
Graphic Art: Francisco Javier Báez Prize. Gilberto Frómeta
Mention. Pablo Borges
Photography: José Tabio Prize. Mario García Joya
Mention. Mario Díaz Leyva
Jury: Mariano Rodríguez (painter), President Casa de las Américas. Cuba
Aracy Amaral (art critic), Director Museum of Modern Art Sao Paulo University. Brazil
Marta Arjona (ceramist), Director National Patrimony, Ministry of Culture. Cuba
Manuel Espinoza (painter) Art Critic, Venezuela
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Julio Le Parc (kinetic artist), Espacio Latinoamericano. Argentina
Pedro Meyer (photographer), Organizer Latin American photographic colloquium, Mexico
Juan Antonio Roda (graphic artist), Colombian consul in Barcelona. Colombia
Exhibitions:
- Competitive Exhibition
- El Verbo de América (America’s Language). Roberto Mata. 23 & M Gallery
- Jacobo Borge Retrospective (1936-1984). National Museum
- Catecismo para los indios remisos I-IX (Catechism for indigenous conscientious objectors I-IX).
Francisco Toledo, Casa de las Américas
- Wifredo Lam. National Museum
Academic Event: International Conference on Wifredo Lam
Participants: Jose Ayllon, Lowery Strokes Sims, Claude Esteban, Per Hovdenarkk, Roberto Segre,
Adelaida de Juan, Jorge Glusberg, Segio Maghallaes, Rogelio Salmona, Ali Sinon, Fruto Vivas, BadiBanga Ne Mwine, Rashid M. Diab, Koho Fosu, Geeta Kapur, Mirko Lauer, Manuel López Oliva, Pierre
Restany, Alvaro Medina, Desiderio Navarro, Graziella Pogolotti, Adolfo Sánchez Vásquez.
Positioning and visibility were the bottom line for the first Havana Biennale. Displaying
closed to approximately two thousand works from almost eight hundred artists was an
extraordinarily ambitious undertaking. In comparison, the 1984 edition of the Venice Biennale,
under the topic “Arte e Arti: La storia e il presente” (Art and the Arts: History and the Present)
consisted of two large exhibitions on current artistic practices, set up in the Giardini, showing
approximately one hundred artists. The main satellite exhibition hosted in the Palazzo Grassi,
was dedicated to The Arts in Vienna from the Secession to the fall of the Habsburg Empire. 343
The 17th São Paulo Biennial of 1983 was still struggling to find a model for itself. With almost
two hundred artists, it grouped them by analogy and country of origin. Forty-six countries
participated. It also presented two of a series of exhibitions on Brazilian Art. 344 Other events
such as the Sydney Biennial (which started in 1973), with five previous exhibitions, presented
sixty-six of the most important Western artists of the moment from twenty countries, including a
small but relevant group from Latin America. 345 What is most striking is how the Havana
Biennale emerged in a moment of great tension in cultural policy in Cuba, yet at the same time it
emerged from what some would call the crisis of modernity or the post modern moment. 346 The
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initial model chosen for the Biennale was similar to such precedents as the Venice and São Paulo
biennials, and was based on the idea of a big survey of the new art been recently produced. What
was distinct was its focus on the Third World. It did not, however, want to be a counter-biennial
but one that looked at the production of the “other” in a new way. The awards given were not
only trying to recognize the diversity of production taking place in the region but also to indicate
a sort of deviance from the Eurocentric hegemonic path. Designating the prizes with the names
of important Latin American artists was intendent to acknowledge local artist who had set a tone
of independence and originality. 347
Figure 50. Logo 1st Havana Biennale, media and visitors in the Cuban Pavilion, 1984
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The visual was at the center, in a context in which the echoes of North American
aestheticism were resonating strongly, especially because of its recognition in the art world and
success in the art market. For example, the prize named after Joaquín Torres-García (the famous
Uruguayan constructive artist) was given to Carmelo Arden Quin, the son of immigrants from
Eastern Europe, who worked as an avant-garde artist in Argentina, connecting his work to the
major stream of international abstractionism. The same happened with the prizes named after
Emilio Petoruti and Antonio Berni, given to the Argentinean Horacio García Rossi for his series
“luz-color” (Light-Color series) and to Colombian graphic artist Omar Rayo for his series of
abstract monochrome intaglios.
Figure 51. Omar Rayo, “Idea fija 1.” Intaglio, 1975
On the other hand, José Gamarra won the Candido Portinary prize with one of his
figurative paintings titled “La tentación de Hernán Cortés” (Hernan Cortes’ Temptation),
completed in 1981, in which the depiction of several historical characters and moments takes
place in an a-historical place, the jungle, a clear postmodern imaginary in which simultaneity of
historical and physical times and spaces is present. The political was also present in the array of
awards given to Argentinean Carlos Alonso’s series of paintings (Manos anónimas / Anonymous
Hands, 1983) depicting a series of scenes of military torture during the apex of the military
dictatorship in Argentina. In Brazilian artist Branca de Oliveira’s etchings showing scenes of
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hanged people in secluded spaces, it is not possible to discern if the subjects depicted are
prisoners or just desperate people committing suicide during one of the Brazilian military
regimes.
Figure 52. Branca de Oliveira, “Agora e na hora de nossa morte amén.” Etching, 1982
The Revolutionary image was also central during this first Biennale; at least three awards
went to artists depicting an aspect of the revolutionary imaginary of the Americas. The Cubans
Gilberto Frómeta and Mario García Joya used images of the Cuban Revolution and José Martí in
their works, respectively. Both were photo-montages with a clear propagandistic tone. The
Wifredo Lam Prize, the most important, went to Mexican artist Arnold Belkin and his work
“Traición y muerte de Zapata” (Treason and Death of Zapata) made in 1981, which in a protopop style depicts a scene of the iconic image of Zapata which repeats itself several times. In the
background, it is possible to see two American troopers stepping on a representation of the
People.
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Figure 53. Arnold Belkin, “Traición y muerte de Zapata.” Painting, 1981
(Betrayal and Death of Zapata), grand prize. Acrylic on canvas, 94 by 160 inches.
It is worth mentioning the publication of a parallel volume, sometime after the Biennale,
which includes several of the academic presentations that took place during the International
Symposium on Wifredo Lam. It is a summary of the diverse views that scholars of Lam’s work
produced for the event. The volume is, in that sense, multi-focal and includes pieces by the
American art historian Lowery Stoke Sims, who at the time was curator of contemporary art at
the Metropolitan Museum in New York City, the French poet and art critic Claude Esteban,
professor at the Sorbonne in Paris, the Norwegian art historian Per Hovdenakk, curator of the
Kunst Henie Onstad in Oslo, the Spanish Marxist philosopher Adolfo Sánchez Vásquez, a highly
influential thinker for Latin America at the time of the Revolutions of the 1960s who by that time
was living in Mexico, the Colombian art critic Alvaro Medina (working in Paris as a specialist in
Latin American art for UNESCO), and the Cubans Adelaida de Juán, Manuel Lopez Oliva,
Desiderio Navarro, and Graziella Pogolotti. 348
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According to Lam Center records, many art critics, scholars, and curators from around
the word, especially Africa, the Middle East and Asia Minor, assisted with the publication.
Among them were Ali Sinon (Senegal), Badi-Banga Ne Mwine (Congo), Rashid M. Diab
(Sudan), Kojo Fosu (East Africa – Nigeria), and Geeta Kapur (India), who responded to the call
and attended the meeting.
That first Biennale became a celebration and demonstration that a new platform could be
established, one that decentered the attention from major art venues and one that was, early on,
responding in practice to some of the theoretical theses on identity politics, postmodern
aesthetics, and postcolonial thought. The ones following it would build a space for art, artists,
critics, curators, and topics that they did not have one before. The Havana Biennale also would
become model, after grounding its own functioning, for other events during the 1990s.
In December 1984, Luis Camnitzer published an articled in Art in America titled “The
First Biennial of Latin America.” It was the first article on contemporary Cuban art published by
the magazine and his first in a series of articles on the issue. In it, Camnitzer argues that the
Havana Biennale is “probably the most ambitious exhibition of Latin American art ever
presented.” 349 This is correct, as exhibitions preceding it were smaller scale group exhibitions,
developed as part of diplomatic agendas or embedded in a national discourse. 350 The author also
situates the Havana Biennale in the context of North American, noting that it was opened in May
25, 1984, just “a week after the unveiling of the renovated and expanded Museum of Modern Art
in New York,” with an exhibition titled International Survey of Recent Painting and Sculpture
which opened on the 17th of the same month. 351 He also situates it in the middle of the debates
about Euro-American versus Third Word views, arguing that not only did they have a date in
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common, but they also shared, oddly, their objectives; “to bring light to the differences between
metropolitan and colonial values, needs and ways of judging.” 352
Figure 54. Art in America, December 1984
In discussing the blockbuster exhibition at MoMA, Camnitzer comments on the rising
power of curators such as Kynaston McShine, appointed by William Rubin (the new Chief
Curator at MoMA) to curate the exhibition. The author calls McShine “a mechanical pope” who
by choosing 165 artists (72 Americans, and only one artist from Latin America) defined the state
of the arts at the moment. Camnitzer also mentions the Georges Pompidou Center in Paris
(founded in 1977) and certain movements in the arts happening in Germany and Italy (the neoavant garde) as responses to U.S. cultural imperialism at the moment of the postmodern debates
and about de-centering and relativizing main narratives.
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The awareness of a colonial discourse present in Camnitzer’s article is noteworthy. This
could be the result of his recent visits to Cuba and the impact it had upon him, or just the
experience of growing up in Uruguay (Camnitzer was born in Germany, grow up in Uruguay and
later migrated to the U.S.). In one interview with Camnitzer, he made it clear that publishing the
article in Art in America was not an act of assimilation but one of independence, taking into
account the whole of the complex relationships experienced in colonialism.
At the time I was keenly aware and fearful of the dangers of co-option. I figured that I'd
better spell it out in the report, to save both the Bienal and myself. It meant that neither of us
desired to be “accepted” by what Art in America represented. It was fitting that the report
appeared in what somebody called “the ghetto section,” that is, not among the feature articles
(in spite of its length). The Bienal started very independent and talking “locally” to the
periphery. It was not a call to the mainstream saying ‘Hey, we are here too and you haven't
looked at us until now.’ I didn't want the report to imply that this was the mission; the report
was to be nothing more than a report and a clear staking out of the territory. I should add that
somebody else had been invited to write about the Bienal and that person backed out for fear of
retaliation in the U.S. on residence issues. I just filled the void. That was my first published
writing in the U.S. In terms of the independence of the Bienal from its model, I fear that that
has lessened with time. 353
Indeed, at the moment of analyzing the Biennale, Camnitzer applied international and
validating terms, such as quality and economic success (both ruled mostly by the market). He
emphasizes that not even an event such as the Havana Biennale could refrain from such
judgments, since the event itself was caught in such rhetoric (well inserted into the national and
regional perspectives). The author mentions as examples how the history of Latin America has
been written by the work of artists such as Torres-García, Lam, and Matta (whose work some
argue was derivative from major European movements). At the same time, Camnitzer comments
on the biennial structure arguing that it follows Venice’s “validating model,” and elitist legacy.
He comments that a biennial pops-up wherever ever a local bourgeoisie wants to confirm its
cultural and economic status (nationally, regionally, or internationally). In Latin America, this is
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clear in some cases, e.g. the São Paulo and Medellín biennials. The first survived, the second was
a failure because of its exaggerated dimensions and ambition. Others, such as the Bi-dimensional
Biennial in Cali (Colombia) were more successful, scaling down their reach and balanced in its
possibilities and resources. Eventually, the Cali Biennial would die out as a result of Colombia’s
inner conflicts during late 1980s.
After the initial remarks, which set a tone for the whole article, Camnitzer discusses the
event itself. He mentions the five exhibitions accompanying the Biennale. These were devoted to
Wifredo Lam (Cuba) and Oswaldo Guayasamin (Ecuador) at the National Museum; Roberto
Matta (Chile) at the Hotel Habana Libre; and Francisco Toledo (Mexico) and Jacobo Borges
(Venezuela) at Casa de la Américas. These exhibitions framed the event in a Latin American
setting. Camnitzer notes how works were “hung according to formal criteria rather than national
origin.” 354 Discussing the prizes, Camnitzer comments on how “the jury was sympathetic to art
with explicit social content; paradoxically, most members of the jury actually lean towards a
modernist aesthetic (including the Argentinean kinetic artist Le Parc).” On the issue of
representation, the author, comments on how different countries employed different selection
criteria which were connected to their relations with Cuba. As a result, it was all but impossible
to compare the production of different countries; “extra-aesthetic factors were sufficiently strong
to slant the result.” 355
Camnitzer also comments on the role Cuba had in the arts continentally speaking, and
how the event passed without attention in the Western cultural press, more for political rather
than aesthetic reasons. He underlines the reception among Cubans, which according to him went
in masse to the opening days (44,2000 in the first week) and how the local press covered the
event in a celebratory tone. 356 That would be repeated during the nine editions of the event, with
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some exceptions. The broad scope of the exhibition did not allow Camnitzer to make individual
judgments on single artists, but to show the heterogeneity of artistic production in the region.
The author explains how other biennials of such stature would produce (in statistical terms) an
image of what the Latin American cultural identity would look like.
On the Cuban front, Camnitzer makes a comparative reading, “one of the most important
contributions of postwar art in the U.S. had been its concern with presentation: size, finish,
‘aesthetic-packaging’ of the work of art. Of all the work in the Biennial, the Cuban entries
seemed to handle this esthetic most successfully.” He refers to the work of José Bedia, in his
painting “Twelve Knives;” and Flavio Garciandía’s kitsch installation titled “Swan Lake”
(1983); Arturo Cuenca’s “Objeto, Análisis, Síntesis” (which derived from a conceptual exercise)
was most appealing to Camnitzer, as well as Leandro Soto’s “January 1st, 1983” (a mixed media
work using memorabilia and a photo of Castro carrying a boy wearing Revolutionary gear but in
the fashion of Cornell and/or Rauschenberg).
On the regional front, the author mentions the colonial character of Latin American art
and the potential that a biennial like this could have. Camnitzer notes that artistic
experimentation in Argentina during the 1960s was finally producing results. The derivative,
argues Camnitzer, can become a signature. The author mentions a group of young Latin
American artists who could become part of a new constellation: Carlos Capelán (Uruguay),
Oscar Muñoz (Colombia), Gracia Barrios and José Balmés (Chile), Luis Zilvetti (Bolivia),
Barros Sellán (Ecuador), Marcia Grostein (Brazil), Clever Lara and José Gamarra (Uruguay),
Alvaro Barrios (Colombia), Ricardo Rodrígez Brey and José Elso Padilla (Cuba), Luis Jimenez
(Latino USA), Juan Sánchez (Puerto Rico), Cesar Paternostro and Luis Felipe Noé (Argentina).
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Camnitzer ends his report affirming that “with the initial clarity of its simple aims, the
Biennale may over time be able to remove the spurious label that moves the Latin American
market, promoting something new, unknown, but badly needed… It may well turn out to be the
socio-artistic event of greatest importance in the history of Latin America since the wars of
independence.” 357
The figures bellow present the composition of the Biennale in terms of participating
countries (by world areas). These data reveals the Cuban scope and reach of the event, as well as
the capacity of establishing a network of support for the Biennale itself. The participation of
Latin America during the first (and second) Biennale was overwhelming. (The next set of graphs
will be posted in pairs, establishing comparative readings to inform the reader of the changing
composition during the history of the event).
Figure 55. Participation by world areas in the first Havana Biennale, 1984
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Figure 56. Participation by countries in the first Havana Biennale
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5.2
ON CARIBBEAN ART
“...the Caribbean is not a common archipelago, but a meta-archipelago...and as meta-archipelago it has the virtue of
having neither a boundary nor a center. Thus the Caribbean flows outward past the limits of its own sea with a vengeance and...
May be found on the outskirts of Bombay, near the murmuring shores of Gambia...at a Balinese Temple, in an old Bristol pub...in
a windmill beside the Zuider Zee, at a cafe in a barrio of Manhattan...”
Antonio Benítez-Rojo.
358
Second Havana Biennale / Dates: November 26 - December 31, 1986.
Artists: 690 artists from 57 countries, more than 2.400 art works.
Prizes: José Bedia (Cuba)
Carlos Capelán (Uruguay)
Alberto Chissano (Mozambique)
Joven Chowdhury (India)
Lani Maestro (Philippines)
Manuel Mendive (Cuba)
Antonio Ole (Angola)
Marta Palau (Mexico)
José Tola (Peru)
Mentions.
Juan Francisco Elso (Cuba)
Marina Gutiérrez (Puerto Rico – USA)
Dagnoko Nene Tima (Mali)
Tomás Sánchez (Cuba)
Jury: Ida Rodríguez Prampolini (Mexican art critic); Luis Camnitzer (Uruguayan artist); Jagmohan Chopra
(Indian scholar); Balente Malangatana Ngwenya (Painter from Mozambique); Antonio Segui (Argentinean
artist); Adelaida de Juán (Cuban Art Historian).
Exhibitions:
- Competitive Exhibition, National Museum of Art
- Nja Mahdaoui (Tunisia), 23 & 12 Galleries
- Indian Contemporary Art, Provincial Center for Visual Arts and Design
- Por encima del bloqueo (Over the Blockage), Obrapía House
- Latin American Masters (60 artists), National Museum of Art.
- Amelia Peláez, National Museum of Art
- Hervé Télemaque (Haiti), Casa de las Américas
- Edgar Negret (Colombia), Casa de las Américas
- Oscar Niemeyer (Brasil), Castillo de la Real Fuerza
- Solentianame Painting (Nicaragua), National Endowment for the Arts
- Baya (Argelia), Arab House
- Valente Malangatana (Mozambique), African House
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- International Art Magazines, Segundo Cabo Palace
- Retrospective Exhibition of Atelier Arcay, Havana Gallery
- May Salon, National Theater, Havana
Academic Event: International Conference on Caribbean Art
Participants: Juan Acha, Horace Alexander Banbury, Tamara Blanes Martin, Christian Bracy, Rita Eder,
Zuzanne Garrigués, Rober Farris Thompson, Roberto Segre, Yolanda Word Pujols, Adelaida de Juan,
Oyewunmi Fagbenro, Gustavo Nakle, Hermanos Saíz Association. It took place in the convention center of
Havana.
Other Academic Events: The National Endowment for the Arts of Cuba organized a gallery event and a
Serigraphy convention, Casa de las Américas organized an event with Art Critics from the Americas, and
in the National Museum took place a meting of Directors of Museums of Art from Latin America and the
Caribbean.
Workshops: Serigraphy (Rene Portocarrero’s studio), Graphics (Experimental Graphics workshop of
Havana), Textile art (with Marta Palau at the Museum of Decorative Arts), Julio Le Parc workshop
(Guama-Codema Vedado), Mural Painting Restoration (National Center of Conservation and Museology).
The Second Biennale became a laboratory that would be the foundation for the future of
the event in several ways. Nearly 700 artists from 56 countries participated. By having an area of
focus (the Caribbean), it gathered a group of international scholars working on the issue who
would contribute to an open view of the complex phenomena of the Caribbean. At that time, the
Caribbean was becoming a center for a series of interesting explorations from the perspective of
cultural studies. According to Stuart Hall, “Caribbean” is not only a root word, “Caribbean” is
also a “route” word – it can offer ways to travel; a path in practices of self-articulation. 359 The
presence of scholars such as American art historian Robert Ferris Thomson, who at the time was
one of the most important historians of Caribbean art (and later on African art), brought a
mainstream perspective to the problem of the Caribbean to the scholarly production of Cuban
and Latin American scholars, see the scholarship (e.g. Adelaida de Juán and Mexican art
historian Ida Rodriguez). Indeed, these methods would help to shape the future work of Juan
Manuel Noceda, who at that time, was not only working with the material gathered during the
First Biennale on Lam, but also was deeply involved in the organization of the theoretical events
for the 1986 Biennale.
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Figure 57. The Caribbean
The Second Biennale also became also a place of encounter and networking for the art
not only of Latin America and the Caribbean, the focus territory, but also a place of exchange,
networking, and a social gathering of people interested in the art coming from the Third World.
The Biennale extended its reach to the countries of Africa, the Middle East, and to a lesser
degree, Asia. It did so with the assistance of critics, curators, and cultural reporters from three
continents.
The Biennale became a forum to differentiate common elements and visual expressions
attached to Western structures and, at the same time, to find similarities in a number of societies
and cultures united by a shared history of colonialism, in this particular case the Caribbean, but
more broadly in the Third World. It is important to emphasize that among the array of
exhibitions the Biennale developed and introduced the art of countries such as Tunisia and India,
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in addition to others from the Middle East and Africa, with a solo exhibition by calligrapher and
visual artist Nja Mahdaoui, who regards text as an intricate part of the composition in Muslim
aesthetics. Calligraphy in Muslim art is a source of beauty and a sign of wisdom, being careful to
balance its use as both language and visual form. Mahdaoui creates a rhythmic, even melodic
flow wherein the attention to line required in calligraphic work unites forms and colors. India
contributed a collective exhibition that took place at the Provincial Center for Visual Arts and
Design, Algerian artist Baya Mahieddine also participated with an exhibition at Arab House; and
Mozambique was represented by Valente Malangatana.
Figure 58. Nja Mahdaoui, "Composition." Ink on paper, 1982
These exhibitions contrasted with the ones of ‘modern’ regional artists such as the
Haitian artist Hervé Télemaque, Cuban painter Amelia Peláez, Colombian sculpture artist Edgar
Negret, Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer, and the huge exhibition with works by 60 Latin
American ‘masters’, where the most important active artists were present. All this was curated by
the Wifredo Lam Center (in particular Gerardo Mosquera and Llilian Llanes), with the support of
the critics and institutions of the countries of origin of the artists. 360
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The entire city of Havana had to deal with the Biennale since many spaces, galleries and
museums were used to host the amount of events that took place during the months of November
and December of 1986. That spirit would mark the next enactments of the Biennale so that by the
fifth one it would, literally, take over the entire city of Havana. 361
Figure 59. Llilian Llanes (center) during one of the openings
These developments occurred despite the complex economic conditions Cuba was facing
at the time. The administration had centralized the Cuban economy during the period 1982-1987
to combat the shortage of funding coming from the Soviets. 362 In the introduction to the catalog,
Armando Hart Dávalos was confident that the sacrifices made at the time would be rewarded
later. The minister proclaimed that “the challenge the Third World has to face is universality and
contemporaneity. Our problem is not to confront the universalization of cultural phenomena
triggered by the increasing communication flow. Our problem is to end the fabrication of such
‘universal culture’ created without our participation and implanted hegemonically.” 363 The
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minister understood the dimension of the event, stating “until today this is the biggest exhibition
of the visual arts coming from the Third World.” 364 He concluded by arguing that at the time the
great challenge was to move from cultural survival to cultural decolonization.
The second installment of the Biennale maintained its competitive character and issued
an international call for artists to participate. The Wifredo Lam Center offered prizes (10) of two
thousand dollars each to Masterful Lani (Philippines), Antonio Ole (Angola), Marta Palau
(Mexico) and José Bedia (Cuba).
The International Conference on Caribbean Art took place and produced a publication
that elaborated the issues discussed during the event. 365 Among the participants were Juan Acha
(Peru), Horace Alexander Banbury (Jamaica), Tamara Blanes Martin (Cuba), Christian Bracy
(France), Rita Eder (Mexico), Zuzanne Garrigués (U.S.), Robert Farris Thompson (U.S.), Rosa
Luisa Márquez (Puerto Rico), Antonio Martorell (Puerto Rico), Roberto Segre (Cuba), Denis
Williams (Guyana), Yolanda Word Pujols (Cuba), Adelaida de Juan (Cuba), Oyewunmi
Fagbenro (Nigeria), Maurice Xavier (Martinique), Gustavo Nakle (Brazil-Uruguay), Lazara
Mendez (Cuba), Gerardo Mosquera (Cuba), Jorge Tamargo González (Cuba), and Carlos
Vanegas Fornias (Cuba). It took place in the Havana Convention Center.
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Figure 60. Cover catalog 2nd Havana Biennale, 1986
A series of articles in the catalog and the academic publication summarize the contents of
the event and the debates around Caribbean art. In an introductory essay, Juan Acha explores and
compares Latin America and Caribbean cultural identity and argues that cultural identity
“belongs to our fantasies, desires, and good intentions”. 366 Acha cites Walter Benjamin’s “The
Work of Art in the Age of its Mechanical Reproducibility” (published in Spanish by Taurus, the
famous Spanish editorial house and translated by Jesús Aguirre in 1973). Acha notes that for
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many communities, art does not have an exhibitionary character but a ritual one. Following
Benjamin, he argues that this leads to the emergence of the “autonomy of the art work as
spectacle. Autonomy that differs from the one we found in the highly mediated production of
images on today’s world”. 367 Acha also comments on the de-colonial condition of the Caribbean,
the fact that the newly formed nation-states are reproducing Western models, and lamented that
there is not a clear way to introduce what is really at the center of the cultural production into the
narrative of the nation-state. Using Adelaida de Juan’s studies on Caribbean art (published in
Mexico during the late 1970s), Acha offers three models of Caribbean art at the time: the Cuban
model, following Wifredo Lam’s path; the Haitian model, based on the exoticization of the self
and the primitive and the naive character of their work; and the Jamaican model in which
political and religious ideology mixed, shaping a mobile and flexible cultural production (e.g. the
Rastafarian aesthetics).
Cuban scholar Yolanda Wood emphasizes the multiple historical times inhabiting the
Caribbean and supports her view by reference to the work of Moissej S. Kagan’s on the
dialectical dimension of cultures, their particular and general dimensions. She takes on the issue
and sets out an historical overview of the different colonial forces that had manufactured a
particular Caribbean culture.
Rita Eder, on the other hand, uses Nestor García Canclini’s approach and emphasizes the
colonial legacy of the region. The Mexican historian states how internal and external colonialism
is still pervasively and transversally acting upon the development of any national or regional
project – be they economic, political, or cultural- in the Caribbean.
Renowned American art historian Robert Farris Thompson also participated in the
conference and authorized the publication of the second chapter of his book Flash of the Spirit:
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African and Afro-American Art and Philosophy (1983) for the compilation. His work explores
the presence of African religion and culture in America and had become a cornerstone for
scholars of Atlantic and Black studies. The text focuses on the connections between the native
culture of the Congo (or Kilongo people) and modern cultural practices in the Americas. For
example, he comments on the popular usage of terms such as “funk” that in the native language
means “bad smell,” which in reality refers to the aroma of old people. Farris Thompson explains
that being in the presence of the elders, a transmission of knowledge takes place. Among jazz
musicians the term makes reference to a return to home, to the roots. 368 Farris Thompson draws
the lines of connection between the cultures of African descent in the Americas (North America
and the Caribbean) in a rigorous manner. The scholarship deployed in his presentation, as well as
in the essay, was an important revelation to the Lam Center team about the way scholarly
research might be undertaken. Certainly, Farris Thompson embraced the recently emerged
school of the social history of art and applied it on his own work.
Gerardo Mosquera’s essay “África dentro de la Plástica Caribeña” (Africa inside the
Visual Arts of the Caribbean) explores the work of contemporary Caribbean, and in particular,
Cuban artists. Mosquera emphasizes the fact that it is not necessary to be of African descent to
use its legacy. His thesis is informed by Fernando Ortiz’ transcultural process in which an
exchange of cultural values takes place, and where (and he refers specifically to Latin America)
mestizaje has been the result, instead of a process of acculturation, integration, and/or
segregation. He underlines the fact that there is a diverse range of cultural experiences in the
region that have to be studied exhaustively. He notes that visual artists were recognized by the
establishment, such as Wifredo Lam himself. He praises Jean-Michele Basquiat’s fusions
between graffiti, public space, and high art and also mentions other names of artists who function
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on the borderline between popular culture and high culture, as in the case of Haitian artists
Hector Hyppolite, André Pierre, and Kapo. 369
The Second Havana Biennale also included a large number of African artists in its
exhibitions. The magazine African Arts, established in California (at UCLA) by Farris Thompson
and others, published a note underlining the participation of that group. African scholar John
Povey, co-founder and director of the prominent magazine, wrote a note titled “Segunda Bienal
de la Habana.” In it he makes reference to how the entire city of Havana “seemed to be at the
service of the occasion… there were numerous galleries and theaters that presented works from a
wide spectrum of artists and from regions rarely available to American audiences. The number of
exhibitions and performances was astounding. Several were of special interest to readers of
African Arts.” 370
The best way to report on Povey’s outstanding knowledge of African visual arts is to
quote at length his notes on the exhibition.
“Some of the African artists were quite familiar; others were less well known. My stays
in Togo had not alerted me to the work of Do Mesrine, but Ghana was represented by the
established painter Saka Acquaye. The Tanzanian presentation included the inevitable Makonde
carvings and paintings that indicated that the influence of Tingatinga long survives him… Amir
Nour of Sudan contributed new work: heavy geometric bronzes. Zambia was represented by
Henry Tayali’s prints. Ethiopia submitted work by Worku Goshu. Zimbabwe offered only two
Shona carvings and included the work of Helen Lieros.
Certainly, the most original contributions came from those embattled stated, Angola and
Mozambique. Alfonso Massongui produced haunting, simplified formats in cast metal, while
Antonio Ele, working with acrylics, received one of the several first prizes for his painting
Animal Herido. Mozambique offered brightly colored works by Berina Lopez that were near
caricature and strong in impact. Another prize winner was Alberto Chissano for his sculpture
Donde voy a deja mis orlocos elegantes… The quantity was all but overwhelming, particularly
in view of the wide range of quality and styles, which precluded ready generalizations. Examined
in juxtaposition with the presentations from more exotic and differentiated cultures the works by
Latin American artists seemed visibly European.” 371
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Figure 61. John Povey, “Segunda Bienal de la Habana” African Arts, Vol. 20, No. 3 (May, 1987) p. 83
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This last statement is significant, since one of the subtexts of the Biennale was to bring
awareness to the work of the art produced in the Third World, in particular the Cuban and Latin
American art to international awareness. For UCLA professor Povey this was striking, since
issues such as the politics of difference were being widely debated in the American academy.
In addition, he mentions the parallel exhibitions taking place in the Casa de Africa (The
African House), where Malangatana Ngwenya of Mozambique had an important selection of
works. Povey notes the curatorial work recognized by the Lam Center and produced by F.I
Osague, who brought a group of modern Nigerian artists to the Biennale. These included:
Fakeye, Emokpae, Enwonwu, Ogundele, Onobrakpeya, and Wangboje (the last one considered a
modern master in his country). Working for the Nigerian government, Osague set out to establish
a consistent narrative of modern art for Nigeria, something that other countries such as Tanzania
and Zimbabwe were also following. Finally, Povey makes a remark on the work of Tunisian
artist Nja Mahdaoui, after commenting on the delineation problems of the continental geography
in Africa. A certain fragmented identity between North and South in Africa has restrained the
continent from achieving Kwame Nkruma’s project of Pan-Africanism. This is an issue brought
to the table in contemporary times by Libyan leader Omar Kaddafi and other African leaders. 372
Nonetheless, Povey comments on the detailed calligraphy that creates designs richly delineated
in gold and red on black backgrounds; which “become both verbal statement and pure form, a
remarkable tour de force of artistic precision and visual organization.” 373
The were artists from other countries: India, Jogen Chowdhury and Vivan Sundaram;
Irak Haifa Zangana; Uruguay, Carlos Capelán; Mexico Alberto Gironela, Martha Palau, Arnold
Belkin; Panama, Alfaro Brooke; Argentina, Julio le Parc and Liliana Porter; Brazil, Alex
Fleming, Siron Franco, and Cildo Meireles; Chile, Cecilia Vicuña and Juan Downey; and
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Venezuela, Carlos Cruz Diez and Alejandro Otero, among others. Placing them beside emerging
names established a generational transition. This was clearly true in the exhibition of work by
sixty of the most prominent Latin American artists at the time. It became an important
introduction to the legacy of the art of the region to new generations of artists from Cuba.
Other academic events held during the Biennale were: a Serigraphy Convention
organized by the National Endowment for the Arts of Cuba and an event with art critics from the
Americas organized by the Casa de las Américas. Additionally, a meeting of directors of
museums of art from Latin America and the Caribbean took place at the National Museum of
Fine Arts, headed by Llilian Llanes.
Figure 62. Participation world areas at the 2nd and 3rd Havana biennales
It is clear that Latin America is at the center of the Biennale (keeping its percentages around half). Africa
grew from none to 15% by the third edition. Asia and the Middle East were proportionally represented during the
second and third and will continue in the same range for percentages for the duration of the event.
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5.3
ON MODERNITY, TRADITION, AND CONTEMPORARY ART
Third Havana Biennale / Dates: October 27 - December 31, 1989.
Artists: 538 artists from 54 countries, more than 850 artworks. (No Prizes)
Exhibitions:
- Tres Mundos / Three Worlds
- José Bedia (Cuba)
- Roberto Diago (Cuba)
- Eduardo Ramírez Villamizar (Colombia)
- Ahmed Nawar (Egypt)
- Calligraphy in Contemporary Arab Painting
- Antonio Ole (Cuba)
- Victor Teixeira (Angola)
- Roberto Fabelo (Cuba)
- Latin American Textile
- Cuban Lithography
- Bolivar’s Wooden Carves
- Mexican Dolls
- African assembled Toys
- Humor Tradition
- Chilean Censured Photos
- We Love Paraguay
- Messages from South Africa
- Sebastian Salgado (Brazil)
- Graciela Iturbide (Mexico)
- Jose Tola (Peru)
- ISA’s Art Students Exhibition
Academic Events: Open Debate. Tradition and Contemporaneity in the Third World (National Museum)
Participants: Roberto Segre (Cuba), Jorge Glusberg (Argentina), Segio Maghallaes (Brazil), Rogelio
Salmona (Colombia), Ali Sinon (Burkina Faso), Fruto Vivas (Venezuela).
Tradition and Contemporaneity in Third World Visual Arts
Participants: Badi-Banga Ne Mwine (Zaire), Rashid M. Diab (Sudan), Kojo Fosu (Nigeria), Geeta Kapur
(India), Mirko Lauer (Peru), Juan Acha (Peru), Federico Moraes (Brazil), Pierre Restany (France), Graciela
Pogolotti (Cuba).
Other Academic Events: International Lithographic Artists Encounter, Experimental Graphics Workshop of
Havana. International Silk-Screen Encounter (at Rene Portocarrero’s Studio).
Workshops: Adire, by Oyewunmi Fagbenro (traditional African textile techniques). Urban Architectural
Solutions, at several urban spaces in Havana; Architecture-Projects (at the Malecon) organized by the
Hermanos Saíz Association; ceramic workshop by Gustavo Nakle; new photographic techniques, papiermâché, and Latin American Textiles.
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1989 was indeed an intriguing year; the events prior and during the aftermath of the fall
of the Berlin Wall confirmed the arrival of a new world order. Cuba and the Havana Biennale
were not exempt from such changes. The art world was also being reconfigured. The crisis of the
museum as institution had worsened, not only because of the new artistic practices, but also
because of the financial crisis of 1987. New markets and interests connected to the postmodern
critique of the late 1970s had brought to awareness the art produced in the Third World. Twenty
years earlier, exhibitions such as “When Attitudes Become Form” (organized by Harald
Szeemann in the Kunsthalle in Berne) and others following it pioneered new appraches in which
open projects changed the gallery space and the function of the artist (now as producer)
transforming them into mediators, The museum itself became a laboratory of creation. 374 The
fluxus movement, conceptual art, the situationist international, and new collectives introduced
critical views in which the participation of a multitude of disciplines enriched the aesthetic
debate.
Figure 63. Cover catalog 3rd Havana Biennale, 1989
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In the catalog’s preface, Llilian Llanes (Director of the Centro Wifredo Lam) explained
the factors that led the Third Biennale to change its previous model. First, she defines what she
calls “international hegemonic culture” as the force that homogenizes cultural production in the
Third World. This force attaches the label of “popular” (or folkloric) to an artistic practice or
product coming from the peripheries of modernity. This art acts under asymmetries of power, or
colonial conditions. By 1989, however, the prospect of transforming the status quo, and the
establishment of a real new “Economic Global order” and “Universal Culture” through Third
World awareness and action, had become real. That new order is supported by the revolution in
telecommunications that, if used wisely, could create a mirror image to the imperialist project.
The text comments on how the Lam Center, modestly, has been working to put together an
archive of cultural production that could present a clearer image of what Third World art and
culture looks like. 375
Llanes goes on to comment on the practical changes the Biennale suffered. An evaluation
of the first two events left issues open for discussion; the competitive dimension, she observes,
was important because of “mobilization and promotion; however, it establishes critical
orientations losing its value in a process in which a more complex and integral model for the
Biennale was developed.” 376 The exhibitions had to guide, critically, through a visual journey to
achieve a first level of analysis; the workshops would create exchange and enrichment among
participants; and the academic debates would become the necessary space for critical and
theoretical creativity among participants.
The Biennale had to turn its energy towards the dialectical, tense and problematic
relationship between “tradition and contemporaneity” in the Third World. Llanes emphasizes
that “our interest was to break up the structure through the recognition of what is really ours. To
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identify those traditions that are the result of the interactions between history, mestizaje, and the
interaction with the natural environment and the geography; all of those are entangled in a web
of particular socio, economic, cultural, political, and historical processes and the art that
responds to it.” 377
The question that Llanes wanted to underline and that the Biennale wanted to answer
was: “Do or do not our artistic practices have to express themselves through a language and
medium that responds to contemporary codes in concordance with the world we live in and with
our tendency to go from the local to the global?” In that dichotomy, in the inner contradictions of
the Biennale -following a dialectical structure, to be for or to be against- the Third Havana
Biennale started the most promising journey. To attempt, always with its humble voice, to
address issues of real relevance for the art being produced in the Third World, at the moment of
the emergence of the global, in the rise of unipolar world, in the aftermath of the Cold War, in
the decade of the 1990s.
“Tradition and Contemporaneity” became the concepts that would entangle the
contingency of the debates that were taking place not only in Havana but on a larger scale, in a
world in transformation. 1989 has become recognized as the year that established the end of the
bi-polar phase of modernity into a uni-polar stage in which global capital (and the emergence of
what Antonio Negri and Michael Hardt have called Empire) was transforming the economic and
the cultural face of the planet. Tradition and Contemporaneity became concepts that represented
the debates around the simultaneity of historical times in a world that was, apparently, unifying
under the flag of globalization. 378
Peruvian critic Juan Acha in the opening essay for the catalog and the academic volume
(that on this occasion could not be produced as a book, just as a transcription due to the always
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precarious economic conditions) states with respect to the concepts in play that “It is true that all
these deductions and conclusions are generalizations, products of the Western Culture. Those
take us away from concrete realities, if you want; they are amputated deductions (truths) of
Eurocentric illusions.” 379 Acha points to the basic stages that define Western culture and imposes
its several moments on the present of Latin America. He would like to speak for the Third
World, but finds an obstacle, the difference and the particular of the historical experiences in the
several regions that compose such socio-economic construction. He concludes that Latin
America’s problems are not scientific but political, because all come down to the same word
“dependency”. Acha argues that Third World plurality (social, economic, and racial diversity) is
not the problem. They would be solved with basic education that would bring acceptance to such
differences -the created, enforced, and voluntary differences all at once. Acha says “our identity
is plural, no matter if it is the collective or the individual.” 380
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Figure 64. Juan Acha's chart, 3rd Havana Biennale. 1989
According to Acha, Latin America shows two aesthetic cultures at once: the hegemonic,
Western one of Renaissance origin, and the popular with its religious base of thought. Extending
these to the Third World, Acha argues that these aesthetics also are present in a sort of
simultaneity of historical times. It is possible to find what he calls “feudal craftsmanship,
renaissance arts, and modern design” corresponding to an evolutionary development in today’s
Third World. 381 Finally, Acha insists that the popular is subjugated to the hegemonic aesthetics
by a purely economic interest which maintains that the first one is attached to pre-capitalist
systems of production. When needed, the popular -informed by the cultural industry and the
mass media, controlled by the hegemonic aesthetic- becomes a tool giving birth to nationalisms
and xenophobia.
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Figure 65. Juan Acha's chart (my translation)
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For Acha, a conventional Marxist scholar, what the Third World has to do is to recognize
its stage of development in order to evolve from a pre-capitalist or pre-modern stage to a
universal stage beyond the hegemonic aesthetic. In others words, it should move beyond
capitalism to a socialistic stage, in which post-modernism would inform the transition thanks to
its exaltation of the local. Acha, nonetheless, criticized postmodernism because of its antirationalist take and its reservations about meta-narrative.
To Sergio Magalhaes, a Brazilian architect, the dichotomy of tradition and
contemporaneity is informed by history and space. As Brazil has engaged in the discourses of the
West, its modernization has been connected to modern traditions. However, its space is one ‘out
side history’. He brings the example of Brazilia, a city of the future built in the middle of the
Brazilian plateau, surrounded by a jungle. The necessity to think in teleological terms, in the way
progress and development do, is a modern legacy. Simultaneously, Magalhaes explores the
notion of culture, as the result of the mixture of various groups living in the territory -but with an
undoubtedly Iberian label. This label is a contradictory one, since it produces wealth out of
‘adventures of colonialism’ and not through work (in contradiction to the Anglo-Saxon work
ethic). In additon, Brazil was one of the countries of the region that did not abolish slavery until
late 19th century. Culture and work, then, are entangled in the dialectic of master and slave, an
unequal power relationship in which the cultured word is extricated from the popular, and were
work is associated with exploitation and misery. Additionally, if being contemporary does not
also bring social change, there is a sense that the future is not going to be better. Then there are
misunderstandings, or better, a realization of what the modern project was. Magalhaes uses
Walter Benjamin’s figure of the angelus novus to illustrate this point. Modernization and
alienation are related and here the author mentions that Brazilian cities are a good example. Rio
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de Janeiro was built as an Iberian city. Institutions were located at the center, and as in a chess
board game the city grew in a reticule. Following Haussmann’s modernization of Paris, Rio de
Janeiro was up-dated from 1903 to 1909. The ripping out of the city did not take away the
colonial legacy. The industrial elites of the time wanted a real symbol for the country, something
that could bring attention to their cosmopolitan values. That is how Brasilia came into being.
Magalhaes argues that “the alienated search for being contemporary was paradoxical: we have to
be there before them, before the model itself…” The problem is that the model has not taken into
account the interests of the great majority of Brazilians, as it has not taken into account the great
majority of the peoples of the world. 382
In the same collection of texts, Venezuelan architect Fruto Vivas mentions how any
culture has its double, a counterculture. He goes on to explain how tradition and contemporaneity
exist side by side. His essay addresses the multiple ways in which culture and counterculture are
not only simultaneous but also related. Vivas, who founded the architectural school at the
Universidad Andrés Bello in Caracas during the 1960s, always had an interest on vernacular
forms and materials, taking the dichotomy very seriously. For him, it is part of the Western
model of thought that has created the two sides. In an historical fashion he recounts several cases
in which ‘modern’ cultures have changed or taken over by ‘traditional’ ones and how new
hybrids come to solve particular problems. He argues that it is in architecture where the
possibility of local knowledge and the conditions of hegemonic dominance can be traced more
accurately. He comments on the generation of architects working during the 1970s and 80s and
how they finally were able to distance themselves from the international style and came up with
a new discourse that valued traditional pre-Columbian architecture, materials, and techniques.
They included among others: Rogelio Salmona (Colombia), Juvenal Baraco (Peru), Oscar
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Niemayer, Eolo Maia (from Brazil), and Carlos R. Villanueva (Venezuela). At the same time,
Vivas mentions the many counter-cultural thinkers who are the seed of the new contemporaneity
of the region: Simon Rodriguez, Domingo Faustino Sarmiento, and Jose Martí (active during late
19th and early 20th centuries), and others such as Franz Fanon and Eduardo Galeano, who
recognized the value of tradition and had produced some of the most remarkable texts informing
and creating a Third World subjectivity from Latin America.
To close the volume, Roberto Segre, the most important architectural critic in Cuba at the
time, puts forward a series of questions that addresses directly the concepts at work. Is tradition
just historical ballast or a seed for the future? As an architectural historian, Segre comments on
the relevance of the modernist avant-gardes that addressed the issue: Vasconcelos during the
Mexican Revolution; de Andrade during the ‘semana de arte moderna’ in Brazil; the ‘minorista’
group in Cuba, etc. However, Segre argues that it is not only a movement from the inside-out but
also from the outside-in. The presence of multinational corporations in the Third World, the ones
in charge of exploiting the natural resources such as the United Fruit Co., in Central and South
America, others planting and producing sugar in the Caribbean, metals in Peru, Bolivia, Chile,
cattle and cereals in Argentina, coffee in Brazil, etc., have brought a particular culture (with is
own architecture), implanting new forms, materials, and techniques and transforming the
vernacular ones. This fact, in addition to the immigration of a labor force from some European
countries during the first part of the 20th century and the growth of the urban centers, diversified
the population and brought the international styles that were in play. After some decades, Segre
states, they mixed with the local ones.
Segre understands the dichotomy of the terms tradition and contemporaneity, as a twofold issue. For some, they are only related to modernization or the Westernization of the Third
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World; for others such as Habermas, Subirats or Maldonado, modernization is the only way to
bring about equality; it is through emancipation (which they confuse with modernization) that
those excluded can participate. For him the process has to take into account the whole spectrum
of society. Tradition and contemporaneity must be attached to a process of democratization. Not
as the decision of a demiurge that designs the social, political, and physical space, “but out of a
collective life able to integrate popular creativity as a poetic that works as an integral synthesis
for the people of the 21st century.” 383
The struggle to maintain the institution began with the Third edition of the Biennale.
Without a doubt 1989 has become a landmark for the emerging globalizing project. The Third
Havana Biennale was caught in the middle of such phenomena, opening a year late; it was
supposed to open in 1988 and since then it has not had a regular schedule. It saw not only its
budget cut in half, but also witnessed the ideological defeat of the Second World.
Since the beginning, the Biennale had inherited much from the old fashioned, mainstream
model for such international art events. Calling it the ‘anti-biennale’ paradoxically emphasizes
its proximity to the hegemonic model. The socialist character of Cuba made the fact less
apparent, yet it was ruled by ranking (the prizes) and cultural representation (the countries) just
like any other international event. It can be said that like Cuba itself, the Biennale was living an
inner contradiction (and it is still doing so). Think of groups of (international) jurors evaluating
what they considered contemporary and folk-art at the same level, given what we know of their
training and experience. Valuing the art from the perspective of individual prestige and market
success could be contradicting the real objective of the Biennale. Many artists were rejected, and
numbers of art works addressing the real problems of the everyday life in the Third World
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received no attention at all. That contradiction finally would be faced at the moment of the fall of
the Second World and the failure of the Socialist bloc.
Luis Camnitzer, in a piece published in the leftist art magazine Third Text, explains how
“This Third Biennial did away with prizes and classifications. Artists were selected more
rigorously than in the past and were allowed a bigger representation. The notion of a ‘central
exhibition’ was further diluted -a process already started in the Second Biennial- through the
scheduling of many parallel shows, panel discussions, lectures and workshops led by artists.” 384
Camnitzer compares the Biennale to the blockbuster exhibition “Magiciens de la Terre”,
organized by the Pompidou Center in Paris the same year. He argues that the Parisian exhibition
was an attempt to open the doors of hegemonic art to the Third World in order to find parameters
for common measurement. Camnitzer notes that only the Nigerian painter Seven Twins
participated in both Havana and Paris; meanwhile the Cuban artist José Bedia, also in Paris, had
a special exhibition in Havana but was not part of the central exhibition titled Three Worlds. On
the other hand, Alfredo Jaar (Chile) was also invited to both events, declining to participate in
Havana for lack of resources. Camnitzer comments on how an event such as Magiciens is one of
a kind and that the comparison is more odious than important in the sense that the megaexhibition addressed and brought “otherness” to the mainstream of contemporary art becoming
also a place to define the “other” instead of allowing it to identify and define itself without the
orchestration of a fancy institution and big budgets.
Camnitzer’s article is also a useful report on the most interesting pieces and exhibitions in
Havana. He praises the efforts by the Biennale coordinators to put forth a series of works that
could go beyond notions of nation-state and territory. At the same time, many works were
exploring combined problems, following the designated topic. The largest contingent was still
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Latin American, this time exploring the connections between pre-Columbian and contemporary
culture. Argentinean Cesar Paternostro’s paintings were based on Inca designs and Latin
American Constructivism; Alejandro Fogel’s landscapes with allusion to pyramids were build
from within the canvas; Peruvian Esther Vainstein’s adobe sculptures also recalled pyramids;
Colombian sculptor Eduardo Ramírez Villamizar (with a solo exhibition) presented the most
rigorous body of artistic work on the issue; Mexican Marta Palau’s and Cuban Leandro Soto’s
contributions were informed by pre-Columbian myths and fables rather than formal dimensions.
Camnitzer argues that “the nexus between the different cultures is yet waiting to be transcended
by something beyond exercises in poetic archeology.” He condemns the formal approach that he
believes takes away subjectivity and the capacity to define a common identity. 385
The topic of the event also helped to address such issues from suggested perspectives.
The inclusion of wired toys, masks, and assemblages from several African countries informed
viewers about practices that would not normally be taken seriously by the art world. Actually
these works would be at the center of new definitions of African contemporary art, a label that
was only under construction at the time. The author argues how “toy cars from Mozambique and
Guinea Conakry and popular Bolivar wood carvings from Venezuela all had their own artistic
stature.” 386
Figure 66. Bolivar's wooden carvings (Venezuela). 1989
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Carnival masks from Guinea Bissau were also included. National groups which were
participating showed some consistency. The Philippine contingent, composed of Santiago Bose,
Raymond Maliwat, and Roberto Feleo, addressed mythical, popular, religious, and folkloric
forms, materials, and colors, relating them to local political struggles. Camnitzer describes what
he defines as “peripheral (and) with a greater honesty than in preceding biennials,” referring to
the work of artists such as Vietnamese Dnag Xuan Hoa’s romantic modern abstractionism,
militant avowals in the case of Palestinian Shamia Halabi, antique references in the temperas by
Mongolian Tse Dabaajun and Ethiopian Solomon Belachew. Other artists in the same category
but addressing violence through a collection of memorabilia were the British black-artist
Shaheen Merali (who presented a group of social-realistic scenes of strikers), Ecuadorian Marco
Alvarado and Egyptian Reda Abd Salam.
As in the previous Biennales, photography played an important role. Two exhibitions by
the exceptional artist Sebastian Salgado (working at the time for Magnum) depicted the life of
Brazilian gold mine workers. Mexican Graciela Iturbide used the camera as a tool of individual
communicational connection, establishing nearness and intimate relationships with her subjects
and objects of work. Another photographer, Brazilian Miguel Rio Branco, presented a small
photograph of an Amazon woman wearing jewels on her wounded skin, side by side with an
enormous installation by young Cuban artist Adriano Buergo, who used urban debris to insinuate
order among the chaos. Camnitzer notes that the carefully staged works made the Biennale an
absorbing visual experience. 387
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Figure 67. Miguel Rio Blanco, “Monalisa.” 1974 and Sebastián Salgado, “Gold Mine Workers.” 1988
The Cuban group was also relevant since they were creating art in the midst of a series of
new rules and political scandals that led to the firing of Marcia Leiseca, Vice-Minister of Culture
in charge of the visual arts. The reason for her dismissal was her delay removing some works
from an exhibition which were seen as politically offensive. 388
That is why, perhaps, the
Biennale decided to group the most problematic Cuban pieces and artists in an exhibition titled
The Tradition of Humor in Cuban Art. It showed works by Rafael Blanco (19885-1955) and
Eduardo Abela (1891-1965) as well as guerrilla artists such as ‘Chago’ (Santiago Armada), the
art director of the guerrilla movement in Sierra Maestra during the Revolution, and contemporary
young Cuban artists such as Tonel. Camnitzer argues that the exhibition interrupted the
circulation of the Three World’s exhibition, focusing on the historical presence of humor and
sarcasm in Cuban art, noticing that grouping “these artists in a humoristic ghetto had the danger
of diminishing their artistic value, converting their work into a joke or, more seriously, of
defusing its political aggressiveness.” 389 Perhaps, however, this was the only way for a critical
message to avoid censorship.
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Camnitzer also reports on some Cuban artists, who according to him were the most
powerful in the Third Biennale. Glexis Novoa (b. 1964) with an installation titled “Etapa
Práctica” (Pragmatic Era) 1989, juxtaposed several canvases distilling Stalinist aesthetics in an
individual alphabet that, with some code-breaking effort, could spell some of the ground
breaking sentences of the Revolution (Patria o Muerte, Hasta la Victoria Siempre, PCC, etc.).
Scatological paintings in the installation titled “Filosofía Popular” (Popular Philosophy) by
Carlos Rodríguez Cárdenas also made comments on the Cuban situation by using popular idioms
such as “el mundo no es una mierda” (the world is not a shit), an idea illustrated literally in a
pellet form. These and many other small paintings, mimicking popular images, informed on the
conditions of living on the island at the time. Other artists commented on Western hegemonic art
and culture. For example, Ciro Quintana entered a painting-installation that in a collage fashion
mixed several ‘Western’ styles (such as abstract expressionist and pop art brushstrokes and
images). Small characters in the painting made sarcastic comments about them.
Flavio Garciandía, at the apex of his production, was shown in the main exhibition along
with the international contingent. Ramón Moya, a folk artist from Guantanamo, showed work
influenced by Santeria and Vudu. Artists such as Steve Kappeta from Zambia who in a similar
way (but more aesthetically pleasing works according to Camnitzer) represented what is called in
Cuba spontaneous art (by naïve or non-trained artists).
Finally, the author mentions the work of Brazilian Juraci Dorea who also represented
Brazil in the 1988 Venice Biennial. His work titled Project Earth, originally developed in 1980,
was “largely site-specific and exists in an exchange with its environment. Between Venice and
Havana Dorea’s work suffered interesting changes. In Venice it was exhibited as ‘sculpture,’
constructions of branches and hides looking like tepees and surrounded by semi-dried aromatic,
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bovine excrement. While documentation was represented, it was reduced to a secondary role…
In Havana the project was solely represented by a large documentary panel. By no means was
this a substitute for the project, informative and humble, it still was direct and faithful to the
original spirit.” 390 The work was made with participation of people of the Northeast of Brazil
(the poorest region in the country), and it invited interaction from the viewing public. It was
composed of natural materials such as wood branches, fibers, and skin (veil) that was supposed
to be cut to make sandals for each visitor. In Venice this process did not have much local
resonance. In Havana, however, the documentation of these processes was at least taken
seriously. 391
Figure 68. Juraci Dorea, “Earth Project.” Photo documentation, 1980
Arte in Colombia published a especial number (No. 43, February 1990) on the Third
Havana Biennale. It included articles by Camnitzer, interviews with Pierre Restany, Federico
Morais and Gerardo Mosquera, and a report by Leslie Judd Anlander.
In the Spanish version of the same article, published in Arte en Colombia (later Art
Nexus), Camnitzer expanded his report by commenting on some of the parallel shows such as the
ones organized by Casa de las Américas. One on Contemporary Graphic Art from Latin America
(Casa’s collection at the time included more than 2,2000 works), and another on textile art; the
latter was written with the participation of international artists from the Caribbean (Hervé
Telemaque), Spain (Rafael Canogar), Tunisia (Nja Mahdaoni), Japan (Shigeo Fakuda), and the
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United States (Robert Rauschenberg), in addition to artists from Latin America and Cuba.
Several fashion shows were organized, showing the textiles in use by models. The Biennale
complemented its calendar with especial exhibitions presenting solo shows of some of the
winners of the previous Biennale: José Bedia (Cuba), Antonio Olé (Angola), and José Tola
(Peru).
In his interview, Pierre Restany offers a comparison between Magiciens de la Terre and
the Havana Biennale. He proposes that Magiciens, directed by Jean-Hurbert Martin, was a show
that based its conception on a reduced art production. The traditional and the conceptual,
exhibited side by side, were presented from an anthropological and cultural perspective. Restany
notes that it is complicated since a power struggle emerges when reducing contemporary art,
which is attached to a system of production and a market, to a mere anthropological category. He
argues that, on the other hand, the show underlined the necessity of ritual in contemporary
society. How could a parallel be traced on both sides of the cultural divide? He calls for using
tools from the social sciences to interpret the particularities of both phenomena. He maintains
that Magiciens did not work through to the end of the issue, it generated confusion instead.
Nevertheless, because it raised an issue that resonates today, it marks a key date in the history of
contemporary art.
The Third Havana Biennale was caught in a dilemma, acutely noted by Restany. He
congratulates the Havana team because of their investigative spirit and their intention to find a
new way to treat art, which he calls “vital anthropology.” 392 Nonetheless, there is a
contradiction, according to Restany, between the first floor of the exhibition (were pieces that
explored the fetish, the baroque, and the sacred within everyday culture that goes well with what
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is qualitatively called ‘Third World aesthetics’) and the rest of the exhibition. Restany notes the
“active Third World criteria” used for works chosen for the first floor. 393
Restany talks about a qualitative differance, a difference that has to be deal with. On one
side there were works well made, aesthetically speaking, while on the other there were works
that addressed certain Third World quality. Restany declares it is as “paradoxical and
contradictory.” For him, it is a problem that has to be worked out by the Biennale in future
editons. Similarly, in his statement during the academic event he noted:
The Third World is connected to the difficulties of being in the world where identity
formation is in trouble. This problem is not exclusive to Latin America, South East Asia, the
Middle East, or Africa… I found this problem in many parts of the world that are not part of
what is called Third World. For example, how is it possible to be a contemporary artist in
Ireland? When living within a British economic, political, and military rule; but at the same time
showing fidelity to Celtic tradition and roots? Some Japanese artists, being part of the
technological and economic powers, chose to work with mediums and methods derived from
Eastern traditions. What about those working under mediums and methods of the West? ... These
problems are close to the ones the Third World suffers. Then, I believe that – in the midst of
what can be a world map of countries with problematic identities - we should rethink the
operative concept of Third World and start creating new selections that show more clearly
contemporary reality. 394
The same issue is taken up by Gerardo Mosquera in his interview in the magazine. He
explains that the events are not really comparable, since they are different in nature. Mosquera
sees Magiciens as:
An exhibition made out of a clear curatorial concept. It proposes one hundred “artists” as
the synthesis of what is going on today. They have talked of the “first global exhibition”. On the
other hand, Havana is just a more flexible and open space. Our exhibition was just trying to see
some responses to the topic we selected as the curatorial route. Its conception is de-centralized
and we put together a series of different exhibitions –that go from personal shows as in the case
of Ramírez Villamizar to group shows, as like the one on African toys. It is an open concept that
tries to address and underline some aspects of living in the Third World. 395
Additionally, Mosquera talks about the Lam Center, and states that part of its objective is
to address such an issue not in a single event but through all the activities it organizes. He
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underlines the fact that while their work is dogged by a lack of resources (a problem that
Magiciens did not have), the Biennale remains an opportunity to open a space to establish dialog
and encounters where cultured and non-cultured agents meet, debate, and find common positions
to address particular problems.
Figure 69. Eduardo Ramírez Villamizar, “Construcción en rojo” (1969) and “Caracol rojo” (1978)
Leslie Judd Ahlander also produced a report for Arte en Colombia titled “La Bienal
amplía su panorama” (The Biennale Opens Up). She comments on how many exhibitions took
place parallel to the main exhibition. The author reports on her favorite artists in the display;
among the Cubans she prefers Manuel Mendive’s installation “La Luz” (The Light), that used a
series of objects derived from Yoruba rituals as part of the Santeria tradition. José Franco
Codinach used a leopard (linear) design to cover not only his graphic work but also his
installation title “Cobras and Leopardos somos todos” (We Are All Snakes and Leopards).
Without sourcing her claim, she states that Francisco Cabral (from Trinidad & Tobago), whose
assemblages of every-day materials were part of fantastic thrones, was the most popular artist
with the general public. She celebrates the installations by the Mexican artists Milburgo Treviño
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Chávez and Rosa María Robles –in both works large format works were also highly decorated
with popular and mythological allusions. These included the highly finished figurative sculptures
by Sami Mohammah (Kuwait), the textile work by Bolivian artist Inés Córdova, and the
conceptual proposals by Eugenio Dittborn (Chile) and Juraci Dorea (Brazil).
To Anlander, the selection system appears propagandistic. She believes that there are
many artists who are as good as those participating in the Biennale but who were not chosen. She
names Latin American artists working, living, and/or exhibiting in the U.S. such as José Luis
Cuevas (Mexico), Roberto Matta (Chile), Mauricio Lasansky (Argentina), Antonio Frasconi
(Uruguay), Jesús Soto, Carlos Cruz Diez, and Jacobo Borges (Venezuela), Alejandro Obregón
and Fernando Botero (Colombia). In addition, she notes that only two Americans (or artists
living in the U.S.) - one of Philippine origin and another Mexican-American - were part of the
official list, as well as one British (black) artist. Carlos Villa (Philippine-American) had a piece
which used James Clifford’s definition of Third Word (from his book The Predicament of
Culture). 396 It introduced an issue the members of the Lam Center were well aware of, the
changing of the world order. The piece, a foam board accompanied with a floating silhouette
made out of feathers followed/threatened by spears and knifes stated: “El Tercer Mundo se
caracteriza por la riqueza y diversidad de sus expresiones en los que están presentes el interés
por la reafirmación de sus raíces y una vocación de universalidad como resultado de la
extraordinaria mezcla de pueblos y culturas” (“The Third World is characterized by it richness
and diversity of expression. In those there is an interest in reinforcing cultural roots and a
vocation for universality that is the result of the mixing of peoples and cultures.”) At the end of
her essay, Ahlander also quotes Clifford: “The Third World is composed of people who are
marginalized –or feel that they are marginalized- or silenced in the Western World.” She asks, if
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that is true, why were not African American artists invited to the Biennale? She finishes by
calling for a more humanist rather than a political approach to the event. 397
These remarks were common at the time, when an awareness of the global came into
being. This image presents the way art magazines, such as Art in America, tackled the issue after
1989. World coverage became customary for such publications and a percentage of what had to
be published, showing the, purportedly, openness of the art world.
Figure 70. Cover of Art in America visualizing the new global order (July 1989)
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5.4
COLONIALISM AND NEO-COLONIALISM
Fourth Havana Biennale / Dates: November 16 - December 31, 1991.
Main Theme: The Challenge to Colonization
Artists: 250 artists from 43 countries.
No Prizes
Exhibitions:
- Art that Challenges: Art from three Continents - National Museum of Fine Arts
- Correcaminos. Eugenio Dittborn (Chile). Morro Fortress
- Wifredo Lam: Unknown. Casa de las Americas
- Weifang Art. Morro Fortress
- Bogolan. Art roots. Morro Fortress
- Dias de Guardar: 13 Photographers. Real Fuerza Castle
- Images of Our World (photographs from three continents). Morro Fortress
- Canadian Indigenous. Real Fuerza Castle
- Rogelio Marín. Photographer (Cuba). Morro Fortress
- Luiz Paulo Baravelli (Brazil). Morro Fortress
- Luis Camnitzer: The utopian and his perseverance. Morro Fortress
- Salome. Rachid Koraichi (Algiers). Morro Fortress
- Pedro Teran. The kingdom of Manoa (Venezuela). Imago Gallery, Havana Theater
- Zerihun Yetmgeta (Ethiopia). Morro Fortress
- Mestizo Popular Culture. In Casa de las Americas
- Arte Nativa Aplicada (Brazil) Morro Fortress
Academic Event: Cultural Domination and Alternatives to Colonization
Participants: Guy Brett, Ticio Escobar, Alberto Petrina, Gerardo Mosquera, Luis Camnitzer, David Craven,
Rigo Vásquez, Jay Murphy, Coco Fusco, Ramón Gutierrez, Ibrahim Ben Hossain Alaoui, Roberto Segre,
Cristián Fenández Cox, Iván de la Nuéz, Nelly Richard, Jorge Glusberg, among others.
Other Academic Events: Theory and Criticism Encounter, Alejo Carpentier Auditorium. Havana Theater
The 1990s was for Cuba the time of El periodo especial (the special period) in which the
economy collapsed as a consequence of the end of Soviet subsidies. The end of the Cold War for
many members of the now “global” world, the U.S. and Europe in particular, was a moment of
triumph and celebration. 398 For many others, mostly on the outskirts of the global circuit of
megalopolises, it signaled the arrival of a new epidemic: free trade and global control. In Cuba,
energy, food, basic public services, and commodities have been in shortage ever since. It was the
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decade of the balseros, hundred of thousands who fled the famine and the catastrophe of an
economy without a safety net. In Florida, ninety miles from the island, many celebrated the fall
of the regime and received the new exiles with open arms. Indeed, they thought the time had
come to return and reclaim what they believed was theirs.
The previous Biennale had defined a topic of concern, a major advance, for this edition it
would be in consonance with the celebration of the five-hundred anniversary of the encounter of
the worlds. The Biennale had found its own dynamic that had separated the team into research
areas in order to focus on the task of putting together another edition. After some years of
interaction and training, the “foundational group” was transformed by Llanes’ vision. It had to
prove that the Biennale, even without Mosquera, could produce results. This group of people was
clearly responding to the historical context facing them. At the time, the Biennale was already
recognized on the global stage of artistic mega-events. The previous edition had established a
line of comparison with William Rubin and Kirk Varnedoe’s Primitivism in Twentieth Century
Art: Affinity of the Tribal and the Modern (MoMA, 1984) and Jean-Hubert Martin’s Les
Magiciens de la Terre (Pompidou Center, 1989). 399 It had demonstrated that the Havana
Biennale deserved to be compared with the world’s other major exhibitions. To maintain this
position, the Biennale had to introduce a series of new debates underlining what art should be -or
at least what it could be.
Some of the texts published in the catalog addressed such issues. In the “Introducción al
Arte Contemporáneo Arabe” (Introduction to Arab Contemporary Art), Ibrahim Ben Hossain
Alaoui stated that the divide East-West and the orientalist view that was brought into the
mainstream of art history at the same time challenged and normalized Middle Eastern art
historical narratives. 400 Ben Hossain comments on how early attempts at producing a Pan-Arab
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art historical subjectivity were well on their way, from 1971 with the constitution of the PanArab Artists Association and the 1972 Al Wassiti Art Festival in Bagdad (the first of many art
biennials in the region), to the first Arab Biennial in Bagdad in 1974 and the following one in
Rabat in 1976. 401
Bringing forward issues such as that of alternative narratives and peripheral art history
writing made the Biennale the center of attention in international publications such as Third
Text. 402 The magazine, directed to study the perspectives on contemporary art and culture from
the Third World, produce a especial issue presenting several articles and essays on the Havana
Biennale. In that volume, nine authors elaborated on several aspects of the event and the
artworks, architecture, film, music and culture around the topic “The Challenge to Colonization,”
the Biennale’s organizing concept. The opening remarks are by Llilian Llanes followed by an
article by Guy Brett comparing Havana, Venice, and São Paulo. Ticio Escobar wrote on Identity
and Myth; Alberto Petrina introduced issues surronding Cuban Revolutionary architecture,
Gerardo Mosquera developed further his work on Wifredo Lam and Third World art subjectivity,
Luis Camnitzer sent his paper from the conference on neo-colonialism in Third World art; David
Craven elaborated the history of the arts during the Cuban Revolution (leading to his future book
Art and Revolution in Latin America, 2002), Rigo Vásquez (from a musicological point of view)
talks about the “nueva trova Cubana” as the written poetry of contemporary Cuba; Jay Murphy
interviewed several young Cuban visual artists to present a critical view on the cultural policies
during the special period; and Coco Fusco commented on the complications of organizing the
first exhibition with Cuban artists in the Unites States in the late 1980s.
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Figure 71. Cover of Third Text, No. 20 (autumn 1992)
Llilian Llanes begins her text by explaining why the concept of Third World art was still
in use at the Biennale, arguing that “historically, research conducted in Third World Countries
has been directed toward their traditional arts or the monuments of their ancient cultures… In
these circumstances, the search for a better knowledge of what is happening today in Third
World fine arts is a challenge and a commitment for all those who are involved in art or culture
in general in those countries. It is not surprising to see an increasing number of institutions,
magazines, and workshops dealing with these problems, and contributing to the satisfaction of
the need for information and for communication and exchange among artists in Asia, Africa,
Latin America, the Caribbean, and the Middle East, so that they may find their rightful place
within global art.” 403 Llanes states that even the term “Third World” is part of certain rhetoric,
one that is still in use because the globe is under a system of relations imposed by the
industrialized nations in the aftermath of colonialism (the neo-colonial system of exchangeproduction-consumption), which has generated economic and cultural dependence.
Llanes celebrates the fact that there are ‘already some voices, even if isolated, defending
the need to examine the characteristics of present contemporary art with a truly universal scope
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and to assess adequately those artistic values emerging from outside the well-known poles of
art.” 404 The Fourth Biennale, after the evolution that the event had experienced, selected a topic
that emerged out of the ever-present conditions and consequences of postcolonial and/or
neocolonial relationships. According to Llanes the idea was to explore “actual artistic
production” under such conditions and to foresee the future achievements of such production in a
critical environment. A clearly dialectic attitude is taken by the institution in order to address
such a complex issue, that of the colonial versus the neo-colonial at the beginning of the new
conditions of economic and political globalization.
British critic Guy Brett discusses his own situation as a “tourist-critic” being
overwhelmed by his first visit to Havana (a theme that will be present again and again in
discussions of the Biennale). He seemed surprised at finding the array of sophistication and
popular culture, all in one place (odd for a critic who had traveled and written about Brazil many
times before). Nonetheless, Brett went on to compare -in terms of size, scale of works exhibited,
organizational complexity, and supporting program- the Havana Biennial with other major
international exhibitions such as the Venice and São Paulo Biennales, large surveys like the
Quinquennial Documenta at Kassel in Germany, and the recent Magiciens de la Terre in Paris.
Overall, he found that it compared favorably. 405
Brett argues that events such as Venice are part of the now Euro-North AmericanJapanese axis, where institutions have emerged to establish an official account of contemporary
art. The official discourse is connected to a reinforcement of the national in a fluctuating
entanglement with internationalism. On the other hand, there are events such as the São Paulo
Biennial, which is based on the association between industrialism and nationalism (the fact that
the biennial was created by industrialist Francisco Matarazzo in 1951 in a period of economic
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optimism and prosperity is an indicator of such a connection). Its main interest has been
placement, to locate Brazil and its cultural production, always in relation to the West, into the
world map of cultural and economic power. Not only on the local but also on the international
level, the Biennial followed past regional rivalries (in the fashion of Rotterdam and Amsterdam
in Holland) for national positioning (along with Rio de Janeiro the former capital of the
Portuguese Empire). Brett comments on how the artistic decisions - for example of inviting
international artists for solo or special shows (Picasso’s Guernica in 1953, the participation of
the British Council in selecting artists for them, and Anselm Kiefer;s case in 1987) have been
connected to political and economic interests within Brazil and Latin America as a whole.
Simultaneously, the presence of artists coming from Third World countries into São Paulo
corresponds to a certain interest in becoming the mediator-representative and/or Western-agent
for those countries. Brett mentions the necessity of more research in the area. Its contested
history, attached to dictatorships and some marginal history of resistance (on the part of some
Brazilian and international artists and critics) is contradictory, yet important. Brett goes on to
affirm that “the perennial problem of the São Paulo Biennial has been that it has never extracted
an intelligent exhibition policy from the issues already dealt with in the work of Brazil’s most
independent artists and theorists.” I would argue that it did, some years after Brett’s comments,
in 1998 during the 24th Biennial when Paulo Herkenhoff was artistic director and an historical
review on the anthropophagic dimension of Brazilian art (and by extension Third World art) was
systematically produced, studied, debated, and displayed. 406 But it would not be until 2006 that
the Brazilian mega-exhibition really changed the model of national representations to be fully a
curated (multi-curated) project. 407
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Brett continues, commenting on how Documenta included for the first time in 1992
works by a number of artists whose origins were outside the first world. That fact made the
German event, (as David Hammons, the U.S. artist in the Biennale, argued, “a success”). 408 Brett
also mentions also Magiceins de la Terre; it “put together practitioners working at different
points on the global map, but in different cultural, religious, sociological and aesthetic contexts,
without articulating those differences. By taking folk, shamanistic, popular, and village artists
out of an anthropological category, the organizers thought they would be correcting a Western
prejudice and hierarchal system of classification… The irony was that in the event this
neutralized both bodies of work, both forms of ‘magic’.” 409 In comparison, Havana is the only
biennial exhibition that includes popular and professional art side by side, an important
accomplishment since it establishes a South-to-South connection, something that is much harder
to achieve that the usual North-South ones, just because economic and political conditions are
desperate in such regions.
Havana has become, argues Brett, a “forum” in the art world, one where Third World art
is not longer exotic or primitive. It is a clear demonstration of what he calls “trans-peripheral”
exchange, open to artist from Asia, Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean, the Middle East, and
ethnic minorities within First World countries (black and Palestinian British in particular for that
edition of the Biennale).
Like many other visitors, Brett listed some negative aspects, which the Biennale shares
with all other mega-shows. It had become a monstrous event that is almost impossible to digest
in one visit. Because of its financial problems, it lacked direction, documentation and guidance.
The Biennale, without intending to do so, established market niches for new art, and emerging
hierarchies for regional or individual practitioners. Additionally, it suffers from misuse by the
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kind of politics of representation at stake when asking for support from official entities and or
from institutions in other countries in the Third World. The positive points that Brett notes were
that the Biennale moved toward multidisciplinary approaches and its intellectual activity and
production in relation to critical conditions. Brett imagines that such a lively intellectual debate
could become the major asset for upcoming installments of the event.
In his final notes he introduces the work of Indian scholar Ashis Nandy on the
inadequacy of Western studies of mass culture (such as those produced by the Frankfurt School)
when applied to non-Western situations. 410 Context could illuminate the “whole relationship
between secular, scientific, rational Marxism and the religious and ethical system of Santeria,
what one hears talked about on every side in Cuba” argues Brett. 411 He believes that new
pathways are to be found in the work of artists in such entanglements, and that it is worthwhile
for the world to look critically but openly at their proposition.
In Camnitzer’s contribution to the magazine (a transcription of his participation in the
theoretical event for the Biennale), it is interesting to note his sharp criticism of the role of
postmodern thought in Third World subjectivity at the time. He states that, “pluralism is no more
than an instrument to achieve a seamless and dependent absorption of those readings into the
hegemonic context… Pluralism helps peripheral artists to smooth the sharp barbs of bad
communication and to make the exotic –that area of initial incomprehension– an acceptable
artistic commonplace that will further pad out the notion of absolute values.” 412 It is not only that
flattening of differences, but also a sort of depoliticization. “It is depoliticization through the
contextual change of the work, through the corruption of the artist, or through the trivialization
of the politics themselves.” 413 And that is a product of the establishment of market niches for any
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type of production, which according to Camnitzer, will ultimately neutralize and formalize a
counter possibility.
One of the last contributions to the magazine is a text by Jay Murphy, a New York based
critic. The author conducted a series of interviews with some of the younger generation of Cuban
artists. He asked them about the recent migration of the 1980s generation and the measures taken
by the Ministry of Culture and the Establishment during the first years of the special period. His
text titled “The Young and Restless in Habana”; he also re-published the report, with a few small
changes, titled “Testing Limits” in Art in America, October 1992. Murphy mentions the firing of
Marcia Leiseca, the Vice-Minister of Culture, over the scandal produced by the display of a
group of portraits depicting Fidel Castro made by Eduardo Ponjuán and René Francisco. Murphy
argues that the series of exhibitions in the Castillo de la Fuerza and the 1989 scandal marks the
triumph of the post-1985 generation. 414 A critical position was present in the art at the time,
connected to the general situation of unrest in the country in addition to the reaction by that part
of the government that, instead of harvesting the possibilities of a new generation decided to
suffocate any attempt by collectives or individuals to pursue further attacks (ideological or
artistic). Mosquera himself had been critical of the measures. This situation would, in part, result
in his departure from the Lam Center and the Biennale altogether.
Murphy evaluates the participation of new Cuban artists in the context of the Fourth
Biennale. He shows how Lazaro Saavedra’s work was dismantled before the opening since,
being an artist typical of the 1980s generation, his work was contextual and confrontational.
Saavedra decided to ridicule himself publicly as an artist leaving the country on an international
grant. The exhibition “Arte Cubano Actual”, a parallel event to the Biennale, did not open
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simultaneously, but a couple of weeks later. It featured work by Ponjuán-Francisco, Consuelo
Castañeda, Tonel, and members of the ABTV. 415
Social space was part of the concern of the artists who participated in the Biennale.
According to Murphy, this was a condition of choosing the Cuban artists, because of their less
confrontational aesthetic. Dario Blanco’s paintings titled “Espacios de Silencio” (Silent Spaces)
and Eduardo García’s works both used urban metaphors (roof tops, urban grids, disappearing
stairways, devastated tiles, and asymmetrical geometry) and commented on the melancholy and
nostalgia present at the time. Antonio Echavarría’s copies of architectural ‘copies’, the Havana
Capitol, and many Baroque buildings, comment on the appropriation (physical and intellectual)
by part of the discourses of colonial and postcolonial (postmodern) aesthetics. A show by ISA
students also demonstrated a certain energy that differed from the 80s generation and pointed to
a new aesthetic paradigm. 416 Murphy underlines the work of other artists during the Biennale,
Yaquelin Abdala (on female subjectivity); the young Kcho (Alexis Leyva), a provincial artist
that, at twenty-one years of age presented some of the most striking pieces in the Biennale.
Murphy locates him between Juan Francisco Elso, José Bedia, and Ana Mendieta. Murphy was
one of the critics who pushed for Kcho’s international recognition. Another artist mentioned in
his report is Barbaro Mijares Puig and his piece “Tres igual uno” (Three Equal One), a large
assemblage of paintings that used primitive, Third World, and First World historical references
to address the simultaneity of the present (an interesting illustration of Walter Benjamin’s
famous image of the angel of history). Finally, the author praises the collective works by
Ponjuán and Francisco and the parallel exhibition by ABTV titled “Juntos y Adelante” (Together
and Further) that, using hyperrealism and deriving their images from the media (in particular the
official newspaper Granma), and copying Soviet posters and graphic design styles (a signature of
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Cuban art at the time), pointed to a return to the image and abandoned objects. Those works
exemplify a return to an individual production that would characterized the new generation of
Cuban artists, who were well informed, well trained, and determined to continue being critical,
satirical and sharp.
Art Nexus (formerly Art in Colombia) is a magazine deeply interested in the art
production of the region. It had been a platform of contemporary debates on the Americas since
the early 1980s and has since become one of the most important art magazines in the region.
Reporting in it on the Fourth Biennale, Luis Camnitzer states that, on the one hand, it achieved
what seemed difficult -locating itself in the international calendar of international events,
identifying artists that would be otherwise unknown. On the other hand, “the Biennale has
become a display for Cuban artists and in general Cuban art, but that the art production on the
Island is decreasing and/or in crisis.” 417 He makes reference to the terrible living conditions at
the time, yet also notes too the inventive humor of the Cuban artists. Camnitzer comments on
how these difficult conditions pressured the Lam Center to make a more severe selection, which
had the effect of increasing the quality of the Biennale. At the same time, he notes how the use of
the old fortresses (La Cabaña and el Morro) and another structure in the city for exhibitions gave
more space for each project.
He emphasizes some of the parallel exhibitions and academic events. Among them were:
a solo exhibition by Chilean artist Eugenio Dittborn of his air-mail-art projects; another of the
Cuban photographer “Gori.” And an architectural exhibition with works by Luis Barragán
(Mexico) and Carlos Villanueva (Venezuela) that were good companions to the central
exhibition. Projects such as Alejandro Aguilera’s sculptural work “Flores para Camilo” (Flower
for Camilo) that, in a satirical and sharp way reworks the concept of the monument in the best
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Cuban tradition of the 1980s was also in tune with the overall topic. However, a different spirit is
noticed in the rest of the Cuban artists selected; they “seem disconnected from each other.” For
Camnitzer this was a symptom of a problem in Cuban artistic production: they are indeed “really
good individual artists; it is the cultural dynamic which is in trouble.” 418 According to the author,
a group of painters trained in ISA and other art schools were making the cut. Lázaro García
(1968) paints in a realistic manner appropriating several pictorial styles from the history of
Western art and introducing disturbing characters that comments on the actuality of the country.
Nestor Arena (1967) and Marcos Castillo (1967) do the same, twisting conceptual art into their
own pictorial games. Fernando Rodriguez created a blind partner who dictates what he does; the
artist then produced a series of “naïve” works of excellent quality. According to Camnitzer what
was happening was “an inner-referentiality”, where the relationship between masterpiece,
master, and student did not maintain its normal structure. Additionally, the economic success of
the previous generation had established greater interest in what artists were producing at the
time.
Figure 72. Eugenio Dittborn, Para vestir (aeropostal painting. No. 56)
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Going in depth into the Biennale’s concept “The Challenge to Colonization and Neo
Colonization,” Camnitzer mentions the works of Enrique Jaramillo (Colombia), who produced a
set of large weapons made out of discarded wood and junk, creating an ambiance of decay.
Carlos Irazarry (Puerto Rico) presented a mural made out of small drawings which he produced
during his four years of imprisonment in the US. 419 The mural depicted a series of portraits of
modern American patriots, Teddy Roosevelt, Andrew Carnegie, Peggy Guggenheim, among
others, accompanied by their own biographies. The title of the piece “Los Capitalistas” (The
Capitalists) points to the topic of the Biennale. Chilean artists Carlos Altamirano, Brugnoldi and
Errazuriz, as well as Gonzalo Díaz, were of interest to the author for their particular conceptual
production. Venezuelan Antonio Lazo’s suspended mattresses and Brazilians Marcos Chaves
and Valeska Soares were mentioned as part of an art-povera style, pervasive in certain countries,
addressing space and material (as architectures of poverty). Installation was the technique used
by many, comments Camnitzer, obscuring the work of more subtle artists. Indonesian Iene
Ambar produced enormous sculptures; their poetical presence seemed almost trivial, but, as
Camnitzer notes ironically, “in a biennial, size matters.” The author finishes his report by
commenting on how postmodern aesthetics, which were under furious attack in the West could
accurately designate many of the works present in the exhibitions. But in contrast to the so-called
“consumption of eclecticism in the West, it would be better to talk about of an eclecticism of
survival” when describing postmodernism in the Third World. 420
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Figure 73. Enrique Jaramillo, “Si no mueren no juego.” Installation, 1989-1991
Figure 74. Participation world areas 4th and 5th Havana Biennale
Participation by world areas reaches stability by the fourth and fifth editons. The North American
contingent of artist increased as the Biennale got attention in the U.S. and the market for Cuban art became apparent.
The 14% in 1995 will not be reached in future editions of the Biennale.
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5.5
MULTIPLE REALITIES
“This year's Havana Biennial V (May 6-June 30) generated more attention in the U.S. and Europe than any previous
one. Given Latin America's new high-powered commercial galleries, sophisticated contemporary art museums and big-budget
art collectors, and given the continuing economic recession in the European and U.S. art markets, Latin American artists have
gained unprecedented international stature in the last few years. As a result, the Havana Biennial, a showcase of current Latin
American art, the first look at a new generation of Cuban artists, and the most important gathering of artists of the Third
World, has become an important event for the First World art scene.” Kurt Hollander
421
Fifth Havana Biennale / Dates: May 6 - June 30, 1994
Main theme: Arte, Sociedad, Reflexión (Art, Society, Reflection)
About 350 artists, 54 countries.
Exhibitions
1. Fragmented Spaces - Art, Power and Marginalization. La Cabaña Fortress
2. The Other Shore – Migrations. El Morro Fortress
3. Appropriations and Crossovers - Hybridizations, Cultural Mixtures. Simon Bolivar House, CENCREM,
Obrapía House, Mexican House
4. Environments and Circumstances - Ecology, Conditions of Life. National Museum, Fine Arts Palace
5. Art and the Individual at the Periphery of Postmodernity- Individual and Collective Obsessions. Wifredo
Lam Center, Museum of Education, Craftsmanship Museum, Segundo Cabo Palace, Colonial Art Museum,
Imago Gallery
Academic Events: International conference about the topics of the Biennial.
Other Academic Events: First International Encounter of Visual Arts Students, ISA. International
Symposium on Ceramic Art at the Real Fuerza Castle. III International Sculpture Symposium: Form, Sun,
Sand, Guardalavaca Beach, Holguin. V International Silk Screen Encounter - Rene Portocarrero’s Studio.
Workshops: With participation by the represented artists; with the critics and art theorists invited; On
Photography; Graphics; Workshop on Identity; On Public and Private Collections; On art – culture –
commodities; On the redefinition of the universal condition of art.
Catalog: 310 pages, color and black & white pictures. Essays and texts on particular topics by Llilian
Llanes, Nelson Herrera Ysla, Néstor García Canclini, Carla Stellweg, Ery Camara, Eugenio Valdés
Figueroa, Hilda María Rodríguez, Ibis Hernandez and Margarita Sánchez, Magda I. González, Juan
Antonio Molina. (Spanish)
A selection from the Biennial was exhibited at the Ludwig Forum for International Art in Aachen/Germany
in September 1994 (catalog in German) Catalog and official documentation, Centro Wifredo Lam. Habana
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The economic debacle and political isolation at the beginning of the era of global markets
obliged the leadership of the country to open up their economy and introduce a series of social
experiments (allowing private property and small business, as well as allowing the flow of
foreign currency, especially that coming from Miami). Another layer of blockade from the U.S.,
the Cuban Democratic Act known as the Torricelli Bill, was introduced. In the arts, the so-called
crisis of Cuban art had also produced a new "new Cuban art" (called by Mosquera the mala
yerba / weed generation). It was defined by its distancing from the political and a retake on the
aesthetic paradigm, in a sense connected to the nascent art market for Cuban art (part of the
larger “global art” circuit). The artists of the new era circulate (more and less) freely around the
mega events of the global cities of the world -in the way Saskia Sassen had argued for the
creation of transnational citizens in the global stage. 422 Cuban artists were already part of this
flow; the generation of the 1980s was living mostly abroad. They paved the way for the new
generation who saw in individuality and object-based art a solution to their own inner crisis.
They have been denounced for cynicism, extreme formalism, and even for complacency. 423
But the truth is that these generations of global artists, and especially the Cubans
constituted an important part of the new networks of creativity that thrive in the world of art. The
opening of a branch of the Ludwig Foundation in Havana as a consequence of the interest on the
part of German collector Peter Ludwig in Cuban art, created a direct path from Cuba to Europe
(provoking interest in the international market). 424 The paradigmatic Cuban curator-investigator
had also emerged. Gerardo Mosquera and others did not rely only on a cult of personality; they
are the result of a formal and para-scholarly education. In the case of the Lam Center curators,
they come from a specific social and artistic context supported by the apparent stability of the
socialist system and from their continuous traveling and exchanging of information, including
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interaction with artists, curators, critics, etc., during and previous to each Biennale. The
curatorial team of the Havana Biennale had renounced individuality in order to reach their main
objective. They achieved maturity by traveling, translating, and in many cases, being part of an
expanded field of practices and artistic scenes taking place in the Third World and beyond.
In the introductory remarks for the catalog, Llilian Llanes comments on the change of
tone that took place for this Biennale. She underlines the rethinking of the Third World as a
concept, and the opening of the Biennale to a larger scope of issues in order to offer a reading of
the contemporary society in new terms. The inclusion of the curator-investigators as part of the
whole process of the conception of the event is also clear. Finally, Llanes calls again for a
systematic participation of artists in the international arena, reinforcing a new reading of the
‘state of affairs’ in the early stages of globalization. Universality, conviviality, tolerance, and
respect have to be the values of a new global society; nonetheless her stance toward the global
market for art is strongly critical. Llanes denounces its voracity and inconvenience when
establishing new readings of contemporary art and art history narratives. 425
Figure 75. Cover catalog 5th Havana Biennale, 1994
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The curators-researchers (especialistas, in Llanes’ words) were fully operational in the
event and took control over the exhibitions at stake. Nelson Herrera Ysla functioned as ViceDirector and coordinated the exhibitions from a macro perspective. In his introductory text he
summarizes the history of the Biennale as a space for artists coming from the so-called “world in
development” and reaches for the point of complete universality.
In the same order of ideas, it is relevant to note the views of one of the curators who
comments on the position of the Fifth Biennale, as it relates to others. Hilda María Rodríguez
states:
“1994 is an important moment for the Havana Biennale project, it was finally settled. The
first and second function as its establishment, the third and fourth demonstrated that a different
project was possible, the fifth we called ‘the moment of putting everything on the game board’…
For me, this Biennale marks that moment. Several orbits were developed in relation to the
conceptual structure. The idea was to use such orbits to talk about what was happening in the
world at the time. We got rid of the central exhibition and developed five shows, which
addressed the questions we posed. Artists and art pieces approached them from several
perspectives. If the Third Biennale introduced the curatorial project, it was the Fifth that
materialized such a proposition. I do not want to say that the selection of artists and projects was
perfect, the fact was that we did have lacunae, but at least we were addressing sharply (and on a
big scale) the problems we thought were the ones afflicting the world at the time.
The current conditions of art production, where art interacts with society, pushed us to
used non-conventional venues and establish a collaborative work with the artists. In fact,
bringing the Biennale to the fortresses of La Cabaña and El Morro was an achievement, but we
went beyond this and decided to use the city itself. In those spaces we had the possibility to
invite artists to interact with the architecture on a whole new level. We suffered many problems
in terms of production, however, that decision added another feature to the Biennale; the
historical weight of such places put the exhibitions in motion and in relation the city and the
city’s history. That is now part of the spirit of the Biennale.” 426
As reported by the Biennale, and confirmed by the press reports, out of 171 participants
140 assisted in installing their own work; “the result was an exhibit with a better set-up than ever
before and with a high degree of interpersonal exchange -one of the aims of the Biennale. Added
to that was the presence of over 400 foreign art-related visitors…” 427 Many reports, articles, and
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press pieces were published around the world on the Fifth Havana Biennale. However, as Rachel
Weiss noted on the leftist web-site <leftmatrix.com>:
I have written an extended (article) pertaining to the treatment of the past Fifth Havana
Biennale by the art and news media in the U.S. I wrote this paper after having been fortunate
enough to have been present at the past 3 Biennales and witnessing upon my return to the States,
coverage, which, especially for the past two Biennales [#s 4 & 5], has been narrowly placed
within the dominant discourse created and promoted the United States government. In particular,
the articles appearing in Art in America (and we know the ‘America’ referred to here rarely
includes the “Americas”) “covering” the last two Biennales discuss only in the briefest of
passages the intent of the Biennale, such as: the thematic concepts; the broad participation of
artists from the Americas, Africa, Asia, and those diasporic artists living in Europe and the U.S.;
or the creation of and discussions occurring within the various forums which took place during
the Biennales - forums which brought together some of the most important critics and historians
from throughout the Third World, to present papers and discuss related issues. 428
Weiss was not the only one denouncing this situation. In his regular review of the
Biennale Luis Camnitzer began by unmasking the rumors that were launched to reduce
attendance to the Biennale, those citing the economic burdens and the supposedly censored
ambience. 429 Then he goes to offer an in-depth report of the state of the event, recognizing that,
“the biennial proved its institutional stability and definitive place in the configuration of
international biennials”. 430 He adds, “From being an eccentricity of the underdeveloped sector, it
became the other side of the coin, a side without which a coin doesn’t exist. This passage from
experimental to maturity was confirmed and cemented in the Fifth Biennale.” 431
The Biennale had become not only a regular event in the international schedule but also
an object of interest on the part of the international critical and cultural apparatus. Camnitzer also
recognized that there was a big change when comparing the event with its previous installments,
“One could say that the Biennale itself became object oriented. The accent was on the exhibits
while previously there had been an effort to give primacy to panel discussions, practical
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workshops and less orthodox spectacles like flying Chinese kites. This one, in a mammoth
expansion through a multitude of buildings, underlined the consumption of the work of art.” 432
In addition, the Fifth Biennale invited the participation of artists outside the Third World
to a degree that drew the attention of critics such as Betty Klausner and Kurt Hollander of Art in
America. In Klausner’s report in the October (1994) issue of the magazine entitled “U.S.
contingent in Havana - U.S. artists represented in the Havana Biennial V,” the author describes
how the Biennale functioned in conditions of scarcity and underlines certain accomplishments.
Klausner wrote, “Cuba is desperate. People are hungry. The gorgeous Spanish colonial buildings,
with their arcades, balconies, ceramic and elegant iron railings, are decaying. In the center of Old
Havana, opposite the Plaza Hotel, where I stayed, a few crumbling walls of a collapsed structure
remains. Throughout the city vacant buildings survive, but as I passed their fancy facades and
looked up, I saw sky instead of ceilings.” 433 As a visitor from the United States, Klausner sees
how “Only the hotels and a few public buildings look freshly painted and cared for. Tourism
earns coveted dollars for the government. So the hotels Nacional, Inglaterra and Habana Libre,
and all the glitzy joint-venture tourist hotels two hours away in Varadero, offer efficient
plumbing, full-time electricity and air-conditioning, CNN, new telephones in each room, and all
the Cuba libres or mojitos you can drink. You expect these comforts in a luxury hotel. But not
now, in Cuba during the continuing ‘special period’ of deprivation which has adults surviving on
900 calories a day.” 434
After such a description, which was not far from the truth, the article emphasizes the
participation of artists from the United States. The writer recalls the exhibition that took place
parallel to the event in 1986, an exhibition called “Over the Blockade” in which some important
American artist participated. 435 Klausner comments on how Havana had focused, almost
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exclusively, on showing art from the Third World countries, however, “This year, under the
rubric ‘Art, Society and Reflection,’ the policy was broadened, and American artists were invited
to participate. In previous Biennials, some foreign artists living in the U.S. and some uninvited
U.S. artists squeezed in under special circumstances… But this year, according to Llanes,
marked the first official U.S. inclusion. The rationale was that the issues in the forefront of the
Biennial - migration, marginalization, the environment and the like - are universal; Third World
concerns are not limited to underdeveloped places.” 436
The issue is significant regarding the re-conceptualization of the term “Third World.”
The re-organization of the world after the collapse of the Second World and the increasing
mobilization of massive amounts of people from the southern (and Eastern) regions of the planet
to the centers of economic and cultural hegemony made clear that the inclusion of artists
addressing the collapse of the First and Third world was appropriate. As suggested by Maria de
Herrera, cultural affairs administrator from Santa Monica, Calif., who accompanied a large
contingent of invited West Coast artists: “Cuba now identifies us as becoming more Third
World. Our minorities are underserved and don't have the benefits of living in an industrial
nation.” 437 This quote is consonant with the work of theorists such as Homi Bhabha, Arjun
Appadurai, and James Clifford who by that time were producing some of the most relevant texts
on displacement and the constitution of “diasporic public spaces” in the global cities of today. 438
Klausner named the 1994 Biennale “the miracle,” not only because of the exhibition
itself, but also because of the innovative use of alternative venues and the fact that the Wifredo
Lam Center had a new renovated home in Old Havana. Klausner comments that Llilian Llanes
“Director of both the Biennial and the Lam Center, had indeed performed seemingly impossible
feats. Amid scarcity, daily hardships and national bankruptcy, aided by local and international
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cohorts, she created a handsome, functional exhibition space for the Lam Center - and another
Biennial… Llanes managed to organize an exhibition representing 48 countries and 288 artists
without a working photocopier. Lack of phone connections and irregular mail service made
communication and planning difficult. This was a Biennial on a shoestring, and the limitations
showed.” 439 The author comments on Llanes’ visit to the U.S. during the previous years to
participate in academic debates and biennial forums on the East and West Coasts and her
whereabouts contacting artists and curators in Los Angeles and New York. She points out how
resistance on the part of some curators and galleries made things complicated, “curator Lizetta
LeFalle-Collins proposed three artists, although ultimately only Sandra Row participated
(showing self-portraits and manipulated computer clip-art of women in offices, work that
commented on sexism and racism in our society), the others withdrawing because of
uncertainties about exhibition conditions. A few American galleries dissuaded their artists from
participating.” 440
A total of eighteen U.S. artists, in addition to twelve international artists living in the U.S.
at the time participated in the Biennale. That makes almost ten percent of the total participating
in the event that year. For Klausner, if the Americans were exhibited as a group, their presence
would have been more apparent, however, the conceptual and physical structure of the Biennale
did not group nationals together. Additionally, there were more than a dozen venues used by the
Biennale spread thoughout the city.
A national perspective is also evident in other reports. In the New York Times it was
noted that “ Most of the art on view at the Fifth Havana Biennial would not have been out of
place at last year's Whitney Biennial: it is both uneven in quality and highly political in content.
Pride of place, filling the entry hall of Cuba's Museo Nacional, goes to a 100-foot-long
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photomontage by the New York artist Michael Lebron lambasting the owners of Coors beer for
supporting right-wing causes. The work was conceived for a billboard at Pennsylvania Station in
New York, but after Amtrak officials refused to display it, it made its debut here in a wholly
different context.” 441
Figure 76. Michael Z. Wise, "Tweaking the Beard of the Maximum Leader." New York Times (Sunday) June
12, 1994, Section H, p. 35-36
5.5.1
Exodus, Boats, and Boat-People (balsas and balseros)
A serious issue brought up by many critics, one which appeared in many reports and
press notes, was the humanitarian crisis of Cuban immigrants that the art took as one of its axes
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of production. The exodus of Cuban artists during the first half of the 1990s had put the issue on
the creative landscape. James Clifford in his Travel and Translation in the Late Twentieth
Century, uses the figure of travel to define different modes of dwelling and displacement, as well
as for trajectories and identities, storytelling, and theorizing in a postcolonial world of global
contacts. He defines travel as “a range of practices for situating the self in a space or spaces
grown too large, a form both of exploration and discipline. Our culture (the global one) is a
traveling culture.” 442 Clifford, an anthropologist, looks at museums and biennials as “contact
zones” and travel as forms of dwelling. Contact Zones, according to Mary Louis Pratt, are
“social spaces where disparate cultures meet, clash, and grapple with each other often in highly
asymmetrical relations of domination, like colonialism, slavery, or their aftermath as they are
lived out today across the globe.” 443
Clifford argues that travel and contacts are crucial sites for an unfinished modernity. It is
necessary to de-essentialize culture to understand it as a place of contingence and heterogeneity.
He uses the metaphor of roots and routes. Museums, argues Clifford, are the bourgeois places for
excellence, the sites of cultural performance and display. They are conservative, Eurocentric
institutions that function as commodifiers of culture (the image of the relentless collector comes
to mind). However, new border cultures have gained centrality, have established new maps and
are introducing new histories. That is the case of the Havana Biennale.
Diaspora subverts nationalities, and creates instead non-absolutist forms of citizenship,
where translation becomes the navigation tool to negotiate between multiple roots and routes
historically. Clifford argues that, instead of maps, a path to navigate the complexities of
contemporary culture is needed. To evoke the simultaneity of the historical time it is necessary to
work on the borderland of academic action. Clifford states that contemporary culture is a work of
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translation, a work in progress. It creates a border, a limit and contact-zone where ethnographers,
curators, and native informants are travelers or dwellers that establish a relationship, a site of
encounter. Museums and art events such as biennials have to be something like, in Clifford’s
terms, “travel stations.” 444
Following that logic, Klausner reports on the exhibition La otra orilla (The Other Shore),
“a metaphor for migration, focused on the trauma of departure from one's country and the
ensuing strain of encountering another culture. It included the work of (American artists) Juán
Sánchez, Pacita Abad, Mo Bahc, Ik-Joong Kang, Antonio Martorell and Yong Soon Min.” 445
In the same issue of Art in America, another report presented a review mainly of Cuban
artists participating at the Biennale. Kurt Hollander titles his piece “Art, emigration and tourism:
works by Cuban artists in last spring's fifth Havana Biennial foreshadowed the country's current
massive exodus of boat people.” 446 The author points out several of the issues facing not only
Cuban artists but the Cuban people at large. Hollander emphasizes that the Cuban artists
represented and explored themes of exile, dislocation and migration.
The author discusses, in some depth, the migration factor in light of the new tourist
industry and how it has affected the quality of art production in Cuba. 447 Of the exhibition The
Other Shore, he states, “The idea was to bring together artists from all over the world to address
how the massive migrations of the 20th century have transformed not just (the) cultural debate
but cultures themselves. Unfortunately, the artists from Cuba's ‘other shore’ (that is, Miami)
were nowhere to be seen… Even though among them are some of Cuba's best, such as Carlos
Cardenas, José Bedia and Consuelo Castaneda.” 448 He noted that Fidel Castro organized a
meting early that year to start creating some commercial and cultural exchanges with Cubans
living abroad (especially in the U.S.).
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Migration, trade, and tourism were at the center of this edition of the event (and future
ones) in a moment in which a reorganization of the world was taking place. 449 Cubans were
witnessing how one by one countries of the former “Soviet bloc” were falling and transforming
their political and economic systems. The nascent European Union was ready to absorb the
strongest ones and help the transformation of the weak, but willing, ones.
The migration phenomenon was central in many important works made by the new
generation of Cuban artists. 450 Hollander constructs a time-line and description of the boat and
boat-people as a major theme in contemporary Cuban art. He starts with Carlos Cardenas, a
Cuban émigré not included in the Biennial. He describes Cardenas’ 1991 paintings (he titled the
painting “Monumento a los caídos” (Monument to Those Who Have Fallen) in which dozens of
balsas (boats) are piled on top of each other with a skeleton figure traced inside each,
transforming the boats into floating coffins. Ever since, the balsa has become the most common
image in Cuban art. He then introduces the work of Kcho (Alexis Leyva) who would become the
symbol for the Fifth Biennale and for the Cuban art in the mid and late 1990s as the heir of the
1980s generation; “for the Biennial, he made Regata, an installation at the Morro of dozens of
tiny rafts created out of toys, shoes, sandals, driftwood and other objects. Kcho was also included
in the exhibition of three Cubans at Galería Habana (Tonel and Ibrahim Miranda were the
others). There he presented several installations, including one of a piano with oars, and one of
oars made of crutches.” 451
Another artist who used the iconographic image of boats was Tania Brugera, who created
a series of works alluding to the art of Ana Mendieta; her idea was to make it seem as if
Mendieta were still alive. The Mendieta-like work was a performance in which she reclines in a
boat, and performs an exercise to try to become the boat (following Mendieta’s ‘becoming’
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exercises in nature). In the same group of new Cuban artists, Hollander discusses the work of
Sandra Ramos, who was by the time was a recent graduate of ISA. Her series titled “Migrations”
(she showed No. III at the Morro fortress) was a group of 10 suitcases painted on the inside with
scenes of migrant balseros. Hollander describes some:
In one, a man floating in a boat is painted in the bottom part of the suitcase, while his
dream of luxurious consumer items (yachts, cars, cameras, whiskey) appears in the top.
Another depicts the island of Cuba, in the shape of a whale, as a balsa on the stormy seas,
while in the upper compartment Cuban-Air planes fill the clear skies. In another, a man and a
woman float in the night sea, surrounded by mines, while a U.S. flag waves up above, as if this
were a game which is won by reaching the flag. 452
Figure 77. Sandra Ramos, Untitled, 1994 (From the series Migraciones / Migrations)
Oil on suitcase 49.5 x 64 x 34cm - 19-1/2 x 25-1/4 x 13-1/4"
Hollander comments, not only on the new works such as in the case of Kcho’s La Regata,
but also on the work of other artists such as Rolando Rojas (a professor at ISA) and Ricardo Brey
(from the 80s generation) who also used a boat as the central image in their work.
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Figure 78. Alexis Leyva (Kcho), “La Regata.” Installation, 1994
Figure 79. Manuel Piña, From the series "Waters of the Waste Land", 1992-1994
Other artists such as Manuel Piña, a photographer developed an advertisement campaign
titled Aguas Baldias (Empty Waters) which are billboard size photos of a black man diving into
the ocean. Manuel Piña has been more interested in the historical and psychological implications
of migration rather than the political and economic ones, commenting on the intrinsic
relationship between Cuba, as an island, and the ocean.
Hollander explores beyond the Cuban contingent at the Biennale and narrates how The
Other Shore exhibition included 18 artists and was set in a Caribbean context. He notes how the
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inclusion of the Dominican artist Marco Lora Read was relevant. “The artist previously made
crude dugout boats on wheels; for the Biennial he wove inner tubes into tent-like forms that with
their evocation of temporary shelters and dislocation, conjured up thoughts of the forced
movement of Africans to the West Indies, the huts used by the slaves in their new surroundings,
and the boats used by their descendants to get to the U.S. from the Caribbean.” 453
Migration gave pace to cultural tourism in Hollander’s view and argues on the issue,
argues that the major locations of the Biennial's exhibitions were also tourist sites. He cites the
ones located in Old Havana, such as the Museo de Bellas Artes and the Lam Center, the Morro
and Cabana fortresses, “which, because of their architecture and history and a spectacular view
of Old Havana, attract busloads of tourists throughout the year - as well as the Cathedral Plaza,
the Crafts Palace and even the famous restaurant La Bodeguita del Medio. These latter are
located in Old Havana, the city's historic center, an area which has undergone commercial
restoration and gentrification but is also one of the poorest neighborhoods in the city.” 454 Is is
relevant to underline how any foreign view of Havana (at least for the first time) produces such
reactions. By that time, Cuban artists also addressed the issue tourism, market, and cultural
subjectivity; a series of watercolors by Pedro Alvarez titled “Advertisement of the End of
History,” are cited by the author, in which vintage 1950s cars are equated with Cuban ideology.
The nostalgic render, made them more attractive to foreign collectors. The art market as part of
the phenomena of cultural tourism was also part of the installation by Eduardo Ponjuán and Rene
Francisco titled Sueño, Arte y Mercado (Dream, Art and Market). The installation of paintings
showed portraits of Peter Ludwig and his curator Dr. Wolfgang Becker. “-Ludwig before a
sprawling Tom Wasselman pop art nude and a window that opens onto Havana Bay. With fragile
figures made of paint tubes seated in peasant chairs, Francisco and Ponjuán make an inventory of
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Cuban artist’s problems – their lack of materials, their dependence on foreign collectors and
glossy international art magazines to establish credibility at home…” 455
Figure 80. Cover magazine Arte en Colombia (Art Nexus, No. 22 Oct. – Dec. 1994) on the 5th Havana
Biennale
Not unexpectedly, sarcasm and satire were part of the Cuban representations. Prints by
Abel Barroso (a student at ISA at the time) in a series titled “Carpeta de grabados para resistir y
vencer” (Portfolio of Prints for Resisting and Overcoming) takes on tourism and the Cuban flesh
trade, “with near-naked women and dollar bills temptingly floating in the air. A series of painted
wood reliefs by Fernando Rodriguez (also an ISA student) comments directly on several issues
relevant to the Biennial and tourism in general. Rodriguez depicts an invented character named
Francisco de la Cal, an older black man who fought in the Revolution and later went blind.
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Francisco supposedly relates to the artist his dream of the wedding day of Fidel and the Virgin of
Charity (the patron saint of Cuba).” 456 Hollander also brings into his account members of the
new generation of Cuban artists: notably, Los Carpinteros (The Carpenters), a collective
composed of three sculptor/painters, Alexander Arrechea, Dagoberto Rodriguez and Marco
Castillo. 457
Most of the reports (certainly the ones produced outside Cuba) commented on the cases
of censure. In Hollander’s article “censure demonstrates how the regime looks at what is
exhibited very carefully,” on the other hand Camnitzer believes that the two reported cases were
“conjectural and that responded to curatorial decisions rather than to a political (or ideological)
intervention.” The first case was related to one of a series of works produced by Mexican
photographer Lourdes Groubet (who had participated actively in past biennales). Her work,
produced in collaboration with the sociologist Nestor García Canclini, on the border culture
Tijuana-San Diego was celebrated; however, a second one depicting Cuban exiles living in
Mexico (accompanied by lengthy testimonies) had to be relocated to avoid conflicting interests
for the organizers of the event. 458 The second case, Ecuadorian Marcos Alvarado’s photoinstallation titled “Las Mejias y sus hijas viendo los hombres que van al cinema mientras el
diablo se rie” (The Mejias and Their Daughters Watching the Men Who Go to Movies While the
Devil Laughs) was withdrawn by the artist after the Director, Llilian Llanes, removed some of
the most clearly pornographic images. 459
Finally, Hollander comments on Peter Ludwig's cash donation to the Biennial and his
creation of an art foundation in his name “that gives grants to artists. Ludwig's intervention in the
Cuban art world (he also bought heavily in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe before the fall
of Communism there) exploits unequal development and hard-currency advantages. In
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November of last year, Cuban artists created work especially to show to Ludwig, in hopes of
sales. The self-censorship involved when creating for exhibition in Cuban galleries was absent,
and consequently the work was more daring in its critique of Fidel and the situation in Cuba.” 460
Among international artist who were recognized for their work in this biennale are some
of the 1990s generation of Latin American artists. Among them: Abraham Cruzvillegas and
Nestor Quinones (Mexico); Tunga (Brazil); Fernando Arias (Colombia); Francis Alys (BelgiumMexico); Jose Antonio Hernandez-Diez (Venezuela); Nadin Ospina (Colombia); Carlos Capelán
(Uruguay); Victor Grippo (Argentina); Mónica Girón (Argentina); and Rosana Fuertes
(Argentina). Other international artists mentioned in various reports were Mallos and Amadou
Diallo (Senegal) and Miguel Mágo (Philippines). 461
The Fifth Havana Biennale became paradigmatic of the Biennale as a whole.
Simultaneously, it showed the contradictions of an event that had became, on the one hand, a
forum for the peripheries, and on the other hand had been integrated into the hegemonic circuit.
The problem it now faced was how to avoid becoming an alternative event for the First World,
and thus a peripheral event without repercussions on the narratives of global art.
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Figure 81. Luis Camnitzer's article on the 5th Havana Biennale
Figure 82. Coverage 5th Havana Biennale (Germany)
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Thanks in part to the Havana Biennale, the global art market paid attention to the
peripheral artists. In turn, starting with the Cubans, they became aware of this and used the
Biennale as a marketing niche. The cultural institutions in the country (as a result of the new
economic policies in place) found in the Biennale a useful way to retrieve economic gains. “State
art sales for hard currency rose to over half a million dollars last year (1993) from little more
than $20,2000 a decade ago, according to the Fondo Cubano de Bienes Culturales, the body
handling the transactions.” 462 In becoming a successful international event, the Biennale also
faced the benefits (and losses) of mercantile operations. But the Biennale (in fact) has been in
crisis throughout its history. The Fifth Biennale was also the first time that an official group of
collectors, curators and critics from the National Association of Artist's Organizations (NAAO)
traveled to the event. The sumptuous catalogue, on the level of any produced by world megaexhibitions, was provided by Spain thanks to the interest of Antonio Zaya. Spain is the island's
largest partner in tourist development. “The commercialization and touristization of the Fifth
Biennial was not lost on the organizers or the artists however. In fact, both were painfully aware
of the cultural contradictions inherent in the theory and practice of the event. A number of artists
and groups produced work that scrutinized the effect of tourism and the market on the event.” 463
Lillian Llanes threatened to boycott a Sixth Biennial if it became a shopping-mall for Cuban
artists. The Lam Center’s position pointed to the growing tension between the organizers and the
Ministry of Culture, that at the time was accommodating its policies to meet the new challenges
of the time (actually Hart Dávalos would step away from his post in 1997 leaving the place to
people more qualified in managing cultural markets).
Luis Camnitzer summarized the challenges facing the Biennale in the near future:
“The Biennial has become of cultural value to the Third World and probably should be
assisted financially by UNESCO in order to maintain its independence from market pressures
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and possible ideological changes. It would be a cultural disaster if the Havana Biennale were to
cease or change its laboratory character because of Cuba’s economic crisis. The Biennale has
carved a historical niche in the decade of its existence. It should not be allowed to become
history.” 464
In addition to the reports quoted in this section there were a series of articles published by
the Curators of the Lam Center in magazines such as Atlántica (Canary Islands –Spain), Lapiz
(Spain), Heterogenésis (Tecktomatorp, Sweden), and the local and regional press. Both
magazines as well as other local publications would continue publishing articles by the curatorial
team for some time to come, thereby expanding Havana’s reach and network. Atlántica and
Heterogenesis became major forums for their work. Because both were produced in Europe, this
also helped to affirm the international reach of the event and strengthened ties with future
sponsors. 465
Figure 83. Atlántica and Heterogenésis' magazines on the 5th Biennale
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5.6
ON MEMORY AND RUINS
Sixth Havana Biennale / Dates: May 8 – June 8, 1997
Main Theme: The Individual and His Memory
180 Artists from 41 countries
Exhibitions:
- Faces of Memory. El Morro Fortress
- Interior Inhabitants. La Cabaña Fortress
- Collective Memories. Wifredo Lam Center, Simon Bolivar House, CENCREM, Obrapía House, Mexican
House, La Casona, Education Museum, Colonial Art Museum, Provincial Centre for the Visual Arts and
Design, Alejo Carpentier Center, African House, Arab House.
Academic Event: Open Panel, Curators, artists and public (at the gallery spaces). Several meetings between
artists and curators took place, some of which were in the three exhibition areas, and with participants from
specific world-regions. A few artists spoke about their own work. Wifredo Lam: Open Panel at Alejo
Carpentier Center.
Artists' Symposia, Workshops: 2nd International Symposium for Small-Format Ceramics, Rakú 97;
Serigraphy-Workshop and Exhibit “Para Quebrar los Moldes”; Workshop for Ephemeral Sculpture “ArtIndividual-Nature,” Soroa Complex
Parallel Events:
Performances: Manuel Mendive, Cuba (Cathedral Plaza); César Martínez, Mexico (Hotel Sevilla); Flavio
Pons, Brazil (Centro Lam); Carlos Garaicoa, Cuba (Old-Havana); Casas & Lemebel, Chile (Centro Lam)
Chandrasekaran, Singapore (Casa de Asia); Arahmaiani, Indonesia (Casa de Asia); Mike Parr, Australia
(Castillo del Morro).
Roundtable Discussions, Lectures & Podium Discussions: The Salon of Cuban Art; Latin American Art;
Contemporary African Art
Lectures (themes): Contemporary Art of Trinidad-Tobago, Central America, and Puerto Rico; New Art
from Scandinavia; Murals of the Nicaraguan Revolution; Street Art in Jamaica; Danish Photography;
Photography and Violence; the Exhibit Women Beyond Borders; Globalization and Fragmentation in
Today's World; Taxonomy of Post-Remembrance; the Body as a Place of Memory.
In addition a Video Program took place, several screenings about art, as well as artists' videos in the Centro
Cultural Cinematográfico Yara.
Group Exhibitions:
Realidades Virtuales (Virtual Realities): Rubén Alpízar, Pedro Alvarez, Abel Barroso, Luis E. Camejo,
Omar Copperi, Max Delgado, Osvaldo Díaz, Eduardo Garaicoa, Inés Garrido, Douglas Pérez, Félix E.
Pérez, Bernardo Prieto, Juan Carlos Rivero, Elio Rodríguez, Lazaro Saavedra, Jorge L. Santana, José A.
Toirac. Pabellón Cuba, Vedado.
Una miseria temporal (A Temporary Misery): Eduardo Aparicios, Sandra Ceballos, Ernesto Leal, Ezequiel
Suárez. Espacio Aglutinador.
Zona Vedada (Preserved Zone): Abel Barroso, Los Carpinteros, Ibrahim Miranda, Sandra Ramos,
Fernando Rodríguez, Osvaldo Yero. Guests: Thomas Glassford, Angel R. Ríos, Federico Uribe. Private
house in the Vedado Quarter.
Individual exhibitions (by Cuban artists)
Tania Brugera: El Peso de la Culpa (The Burden of Guilt). Performance at the house of the artist.
Los Carpinteros: Viejos métodos para nuevas deudas (Old Methods for New Debts). San Francisco de Asís
Abbey in Old-Havana.
Raúl Cordero: New Paintings. Apartment of the artist.
José Alberto Figueroa: Proyecto Habana (Havana Project). Private Restaurant, La Guarida.
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Tonel: Segundo autorretrato como intelectual orgánico /Otro homenaje a Gramsci (Second Self-portrait as
Organic Intellectual - a Further Homage à Gramsci). Ludwig Foundation in Cuba
Osvaldo Yero: Al rescate de la fauna (To the Rescue of the Fauna) Gallery Teodoro Ramos Blanco, Cerro.
After achieving maturity during the Fifth Biennale, the event took on a new aspect. The
Sixth became the consolidation of the curatorial project. The many curatorial trips and contacts
the Biennale had arranged during the first part of the decade had produced a complex network of
friends and supporters throughout the world. Even in the United States an active community was
taking into account what the small collective in Cuba was doing. As Rachel Weiss puts it in her
piece on the sixth installment, “as new areas log on to the global contemporary circuit, a biennial
can magnetize a location, drawing in attention, ideas and works from faraway places and
aligning them with the local reality.” 466 Several exhibitions, parallel events, and new art galleries
(most of them illegal or paralegal with the support of art centers such as Ludwig) emerged in
Havana. Art subsumed in the new tourist economy (indulging sex tourism, drug consumption,
alcohol, parallel transportation, illegal business, the black market, etc,) where scarcity and
abundance were both pervasive and contradictory.
Figure 84. Private (illegal) taxi drivers, common in Havana during the 1990s.
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Figure 85. Cover catalog, Sixth Havana Biennale, 1997
For some newcomers to the Biennale, the event continued to be critical of the nature of
contemporary society. In particular, the Cuban artists using the Biennale as a platform were able
to comment, with their usual acidity and sarcasm, on the collapsing official structure of the now
global economy. In a lengthy report by the editorial team of Universes in Universe: Worlds of
Art (the German-Argentinean collective working to promote art beyond the West), it is clear how
attention to the Biennale went beyond the official selection, taking special notice of the
troublesome but vital Cuban scene. 467 “As with all previous Biennials, this year too had
numerous parallel exhibitions on Cuban art. What was new this year was that an astounding
number of artists showed their works outside of institutional structures.” 468 Initially, officials
attempted to prohibit these private initiatives. In order to avoid scandal during the event that at
the time was drawing thousands of visitors from Europe, Canada, Latin America, and for the
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second time in great numbers from the United States, they desisted. Some exhibitions actually
received support from abroad as well as from Cuban and other institutions.
The approaching turn of the century, and the end of the millennium made the Biennale a
place of peregrination. It became one of the best attended events in the art calendar that year.
Weiss noted, “Havana’s ascendance into the big time, there was a strong representation of top
people from upcoming international exhibitions in Johannesburg, São Paulo, Istanbul, Kwangju,
and Pittsburgh.” 469 And not only curators, but academics, collectors, students, gallery owners
and goers, etc., were present.
Organized under the banner of “The Individual and Memory” the event took on almost a
sepia-tone, due to the widespread presence of memorabilia and photography (in particular
personal and familial album-like images). The theme, memory, brought some criticism since it
had been used as a counter argument to some more relevant concepts such as history. Herrera
Ysla’s text in the catalog makes reference to social memory rather than individual longing; he
refers to this dimension as a “transnational notion of cultural memory,” making the concept open
and not closed to nostalgia and melancholy. Nonetheless, a nostalgic aura surrounded the official
sites of exhibition, which did not include the National Museum of Art (under renovation until
2003). The colonial architecture - not only of the fortresses but also of the many houses in the
Old Havana district – created a more diffused tone and made the navigation more intricate. If this
was an unavoidable situation, walking through the Biennale became a tourist adventure, as if one
were time-traveling through the city. It helped some artists that, by going to Havana, they could
take good care of their pieces, thus using the situation to their advantage, while for others the
physicality of the spaces was overwhelming. A large percentage of the works in the exhibitions
just faded away from the visitor’s memory.
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Figure 86. Some photo installations in the Cabaña galleries, 1997
Figure 87. Visitors navigating the Sixth Biennale
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Figure 88. Venues 6th Havana Biennale
Figure 89. The Plaza Vieja (three venues)
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In one of a series of reports published by Universe in Universes -which translates almost
all its contents into German, English, and Spanish - Colombian art critic Fernando Valencia
wrote:
“It is necessary to state as introduction, that the quality of the current Biennial leaves
much to be desired. Three factors have been decisive for the existence of an endless number of
works of no interest: 1. Theme: ‘The Individual and Memory’ was favored for works without
elaboration that fell within the obvious: fading portraits, evanescent atmospheres, and, in general,
remissions to the past literally confronted, without the transformative strategies inherent in
artistic production. 2. A precarious third-world rhetoric proliferated with the use of poor
materials, discarded items, and obvious elements that in an attempt to prioritize the problems of
identity from determined regions (Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Caribbean), on the
contrary created an open concession to the clichéd idea of ‘how they think of us’ from the
centers. 3. With the facade of political art, a visual and expressive mediocrity is being
legitimized that could create a worrisome image for future biennials since this type of art work is
not transcendent like artistic facts and is outlined like political ideas.” 470
On the first point it is relevant to quote a fragment of the introductory text used by the
Lam Center on the issue of the selection of the theme for the Biennale.
“For many people, one of the most serious problems man has had to cope with during this
second half of the century is the loss of memory used as a point of reference to act upon society
in order to change and improve it. A sort of amnesia is promoted as a means of avoiding the
main problems. The traditional questions such as: where do we come from? Who are we? What
is our fate? seem to have lost all validity in a world which is alienated by a vague notion of
future. To live in contemporary society means coping with a present full of violence, drug
addiction, discrimination and intolerance leading towards a future of privation and uncertainty.
Memory, the place where man has traditionally found the roots of his own identity, is
being threatened by the homogenization of an image, designed and projected by mass media and
communication multinationals which attempt to make universal those paradigms created in the
centers of power. The most sophisticated means of contemporary technology are used to
advocate for so-called ‘internationalization’; one of their most recent creations is the Internet,
which is far out of reach for developing countries, since they are not able to feed these media
with their own information.
Even within this context, memory is able to forge identity and to build up dignity and a
sense of belonging, either by going into a recent personal, family or communal history, or by
looking into the culture to which the individual feels attached as a member of a spiritual
community.” 471
As a response the selection brought a series of artists who would use low tech
approaches, starting with French art-star Christian Boltanski (1944) and producing a particular
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hue in the exhibitions, creating at the same time what Valencia calls the “third world syndrome”
where a materiality takes over content. Valencias’ second point is also raised by Weiss when
citing the presence of art professionals “whose time is spend patrolling the precincts of Kassel
and Venice, it was, ‘Third World shit,’ in the harrumphing words of one visiting German
curator.” 472 The third point, political art, was embodied in the Biennale’s means and ends. It
cannot be extricated from its structure, which, while it has changed over the years, keeps its spirit
of confrontation with the elites of the art world and culture very much alive (even in its
contradictory desire to be part of them). Valencia explains how for some artists such as Kcho, the
topic was just right, since he fits the topic, yet is an extension of the 80s generation, not only in
terms of materials (recyclable), format (installation), but also conceptually (with an ‘apparent’
critical stance). Additionally, he argues that “Kcho's work does not accede to the ‘mainstream’
within the parameters of ‘universal history’; it makes his own path, creating a possibility
described by Hans Belting as the ‘new geography of art history.’” 473 Kcho’s international fame,
launched after his participation in the Fourth and Fifth Biennales and the invitation by the
Sydney Biennial, made him a highly visible figure for the international audience. That year,
Kcho had also reached the North American market with a solo exhibition at the Barbara
Goldstone Galley in New York City.
Kcho’s piece at the Biennale was a kind of monument, a tower of junk (boat, shacks and
related materials) that echoed not only famous obelisks such as the Washington Monument but
also Tatlin’s Monument for the Third International. Trembling, standing in a high ceilinged
space in el Morro Fortress, In My Mind (1995-97), according to Valencia, connects the best of
the Cuban contemporary traditions and establishes a path towards the so-called “new
geography.”
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Figure 90. Kcho, “In My Mind.” Installation, 1997
Valencia also comments on some performances, in particular the work of the Chilean
Collective Las Yeguas del Apocalipsis (Mares of the Apocalypse), an overtly political duet of
gay activists (Pedro Lemebel and Franscisco Casas) who “offered through their action in the
courtyard of the Centro Wifredo Lam, a unique mix of private attitudes with public implications.
“That is to say, an art that entails politics although personal, in order to in this manner initiate
attitudes openly political, to no longer denounce, but to generate reflection over the despicable
acts of the Chilean dictatorship and the archetypal ‘sequin’ we have named ‘neoliberalism.’” 474
The duo, formed in 1987, represents the marginalized and oppressed voice of the minorities. As
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victims of the dictatorship, these self-confessed homosexuals and frustrated socialists produced a
conference-performance of tragicomic anecdotes concerning their cavalcade through the political
and artistic history of Chile. They raised a major issue in Cuba, as gay rights were at the bottom
of the political agenda during the early stages of the Revolution.
Figure 91. Las Yeguas del Apocalipsis (Francisco Casas y Pedro Lemebel). Video-performance, 1994
Performers have always been part of the Biennale. In an interview conducted by Gerhard
Haupt for Universes in Universe, Gerardo Mosquera comments on Tania Bruguera’s
performance. “(It) was especially noteworthy, not only from an artistic point of view. In one of
the more run-down and overpopulated quarters of Old-Havana, she opened her house to the
street and gave an impressive performance in which she ate Cuban soil for 45 minutes straight.
Her audience included Biennial visitors from across the globe, as well as people from the street
and from the bar across the way.” 475 This performances also marked the inauguration of a new
project by Tania Bruguera, consisting of the establishment of an artistic space, “Tejadillo 2l4”,
which operates as a venue for conceptual works and performances within a double kind of
cultural project - showing the experiences of Cuban artists, and bringing to Cuba foreign artists
to share with the well educated, inquisitive, and respectful local public. For the opening,
Bruguera presented her “El Peso de la Culpa” (Burden of Guilt) performance using as stage a
Cuban flag made out of human hair. Bruguera also invited Coco Fusco to be a counterpart in the
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event. Neither artist was invited to be in the Biennale. In the back of the house, Fusco, an exiled
Cuban artist who lives in New York, interpreted her dead grandmother “under a white sheet
along with her few personal belongings, with the light of black neon above. A text at the
entrance illustrated a family anecdote according to which her grandmother had left her native
town to go first to Havana and later to the United States, until, just before her death, she decided
to travel to Barcelona, Spain, and thus abandon the arduous life of exile.” 476 Fusco also went to
Havana to report on the Biennale, where she found alternative galleries such as Espacio
Aglutinador (the Melting Pot, run by artists Sandra Ceballos and Ezequiel Suarez) showing not
only radical Cuban artist but the work of exiled Cuban Artists. 477
Figure 92. Tania Bruguera, "El peso de la culpa" (The Burden of Guilt). Performance, 1997
The Biennale itself was inaugurated with a performance organized by Cuban artist
Manuel Mendive, entitled “The Gods and Ancestors, the Good Man and the Bad Man.” Using
dozens of performers, the mobile performance-installation depicted the Yoruba Olympus. Each
formal element was associated with Afro-Cuban religion. The almost carnivalesque procession
moved around the Historic District in Havana.
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Brazilian artist Flavio Pons gave several performances. Despite the lack of connection
between the actions, there was a repeated use of painting, not just as color, but as a means of
writing. Pons’ work is collaborative, always including more people. His final presentation
included the participation of children from an elementary school in Havana. 478
Curiously, Carlos Garaicoa (Cuba), an installation artist, presented a performance. The
‘happening’ consisted of the counterpart to the Japanese Garden he presented within a Museum
location. This time it was the Cuban Garden, an area of ruins recovered from Havana itself and
which had been subtly modified by him. Rubbish and waste materials and urban junk provided a
perfect setting for a reflection on memory, the past and the sense of ruin which Garaicoa
conjured up. Photographs of the place appeared as a frieze on the walls of the site, heightening
the area of the garden and the city as a whole - a perfect place to think about memory. 479
Two Asian performers also presented their work. Arahmaiani (Indonesia) used an almost
choreographed action to express her rejection of violence. Chandrasekarana (Singapore) kept his
public waiting in the street, alongside several empty boxes which, in various languages, referred
to the theme of waiting. 480 These examples indicate that the Biennale was looking towards Asian
art, not necessarily Chinese but South East Asian art. Artists from the Philippines, Reamillo and
Juliet (the second from a British background), Agnes Arellano, and Alfredo Juan Aquilizán
presented installation works on issues such as media pervasiveness, contemporary religion, and
the recycling culture. They were adequate counterparts of the best known Latin American and
African artists also presenting installation works (the favorite genre for mega events). Other
artists such as Suzann Victor (Singapore) and Navin Rawanchaikul addressed sex tourism.
Indian artist Vivan Sundaram presented a series of works (“Grandfather’s coat with photographs
of Grandmother’s Aunt and Mother,” 1996) dealing with personal stories and their translation
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into larger narratives. Latin American artists of Asian origin, such as Peruvian Eduardo Tokeshi
(“The Room of the Rescue,” 1996) and Colombian Pablo Van Wong (From the series
“Obrepción con Decoración”), deriving from collectivism and Eastern trade dealt with images of
violence and the production of textile and clothes. 481 Finally, the presence of Japanese
photographer Tokihiro Sato, with a series of phantom photographs taken on-site, brought for the
first time an artist from that island nation. 482
Figure 93. Tokihiro Sato, from the series “Photo Respiration.” Large exposure photos, 1997
“Installation Biennial” was the title of Eduardo Costa’s article published in Art in
America. This was his first of many contributions to the magazine on issues related to Cuban art
and artists and their constant presence in North America. In the fashion of a travel story, Costa
offers an account of the venues and major installation works, which for him are the “dominant
form throughout the exhibition.” 483 Among other artists mentioned are: Roberto Huancaya
(Peru), Whitfield Lovell (U.S.), Pepon Osorio (Puerto Rico), Ignacio Iturria (Uruguay), and
Braco Dimitrijevic (Former Yugoslavia)
The presence of other African artist was also noted: Romuald Hazoumé (Benin) with his
now widely known remakes of African masks; Owusu Ankomah (Ghana), Sokari Douglas Camp
(Nigeria), Pascale Marthine Tayou and Bili Bidjocka (Cameroon) and their discourse, quietly
chaotic and saturated with Cameroon nationalism and Pan Africanism, including references to
rebel armies through camouflage fabric, soccer, nature, and politics; Amadou Gayé, Bouma
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Medoune Seye, and Djibril Sy (from Senegal), Wilma Cruise, Penny Siopis, Moshekwa Langa
(with two fascinating installation-pieces creating geographic-maps-models made out of thread,
paper, scrap metal and another with milk and light), and William Kentridge with an on-site video
installation taking elements from his animation-films into real space (from South Africa). These
artists functioned as mediators of a truly tri-continental art exhibition.
Figure 94. Romuald Hazoumé (Benin) & Owusu Ankomah (Ghana) installations, 1997
Figure 95. Moshekwa Langa, “The Permanent Unfixed Image.” In-situ installation, 1997
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At the same time the Biennale was helping to position new names, it became a regular
site for the international mega-exhibition goers. Unfortunately, the forums and academic events
where the most important art critics and thinkers from Latin America, Africa, and Asia debated
Third World and Southern subjectivity, art, and culture – a glory of past Biennales – they were
not as well developed as they used to be.
5.6.1
Cuban Presence and Alternative Inner-worlds
It is interesting to see how the Biennale became a place of contingency for alternative
artists (inside Cuba) who had to find parallel spaces (studios, living rooms, and illegal restaurants
“paladares”) to show their work outside and at-the-side of the Biennale. In earlier editions, the
Cuban artists in the Biennial had become the symbolic legacy of the Revolution. But for this
edition of the event, Cuban artists in the official exhibition became one of a series of signs that
depicted the past and present reality of the Cuban Revolution.
In this sense the Biennale had become just another element in the strategy aimed at
constructing a legitimizing discourse of what Cuba offers in terms of its social revolution. Since
1994, new policies on tourism, cultural tourism, and infrastructure were set in place to counter
the effects of the special period. Cuba presented itself, in its Cubaness, as a locale for the
consumption of foreign tourists. Thus, the “double alternative” artists (those not selected to
represent Cuba, yet who showed in the alternative Biennale) became the focus of interest for
external viewers. It is obvious in the majority of the reports of the Sixth Havana Biennale that
alternative exhibitions (unofficial or para-official) were seen as a kind of Salon de Refuses in the
best modernist style.
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This unofficial staging of the Biennale, or what tourist-theorists would call the “backregion-staging" is also worth deeper analysis. “Throughout Havana, artist's homes and studios,
paladar cafes, and alternative galleries, were appropriated by Cuban artists and curators who
established satellite exhibitions.” 484 These backstage exhibits seemed to present the visitor with
the “most authentic” Cuban experience, not only because they were to one side of the official
navigation of the event (though many of them were located nearby), but also because they
supposedly showed the more charged, critical and ironic work. They promised a sense of
solidarity with the artists, and constituted a counter-information network about art in Cuba. If the
Biennale is considered an alternative to mainstream artistic production, then the border
exhibitions represent a double alternative and therefore, a place of independent reflection, and in
a sense, of counter-spectacle.
Figure 96. San Carlos de la Cabaña Fortress. General view
Figure 97. The San Carlos de la Cabaña Fortress (1774), a military compound becomes a gallery
By the sixth Biennale this military infrastructure became the front stage of the exhibition. Its barracks and
halls were transformed (for every edition) into gallery spaces.
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On this edition of the Biennale Gerardo Mosquera affirms:
“The fact that artists took this initiative really says something, because that hints at a
more independent, more active attitude. Authoritarian regimes are always afraid that the people
will get used to a feeling of independence. In these artists' private exhibits, I see the signs of a
definite awakening of Cuban society, a search for a way out of the institutional framework.
What's interesting is that there was no declaration in the sense of ‘Galleries of the Rejected.’ The
artists simply wanted to show their work to foreign visitors. Nevertheless, all unofficial events
which weren't in private homes were forbidden by the Ministry of Culture. What goes on in a
private residence can hardly be forbidden. That illustrates the fear which the Cuban state has of
these initiatives.” 485
There was, however, a lot of pressure brought to bear on those who exhibited work at
their homes. When Tania Bruguera ended her performance, she was visited by the police.
Luckily, she had previously obtained official permission for a celebration, so there wasn't
anything they could do. Although the exhibition ‘Zona Vedada’ was in the end officially
supported by the Ludwig-Foundation in Cuba, the artists were continually hassled by the police.
Finally, they were forbidden to hold any activities in the temporary exhibition rooms. Without a
doubt, some of the most interesting works of the Biennial were to be seen in this exhibition.” 486
Figure 98. "Zona Vedada" exhibition. Entrance of los Carpinteros gallery. 1997
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A crowd of young Cubans, foreign curators and neighbors circulated into and through
such places. During the opening of Espacio Aglutinador, copies of “Perra”, a gay magazine
edited by visiting Cuban American artist Eduardo Aparicio, were distributed (something that
could have had negative consequences a decade before). The exhibit included Aparicio's photos
of Miami Cuban drag queens. “By exhibiting works by Cubans in the U.S., the Espacio
Aglutinador is breaking with what was, until very recently, an official policy of denying access
to visual arts venues to exiles and their children, as Aparicio left Cuba in 1969. He says he shares
many views with his peers who stayed. In Miami, he frequently meets with Cuban artists of the
1980s generation, who left the island in the early 1990s, escaping a wave of censorship and a
debilitated economy.” 487
As the policy of the Biennale the Cuban participation has to be balanced (in numerical
terms) with respect to the general number of artists participating (in regional and national terms).
Among the artists representing the island some were well known and others completely
unknown, as it was the policy of the Biennale to open space for the newer generations. For
example Lázaro Saavedra’s “Sepultados por el Olvido” (Cast into Oblivion) was highly
troublesome. The installation of rows of white marble, un-engraved tombstones led into a
temple-like chamber and continued to form a pile of rubble out of which protrude various limbs.
It was located in the Cabaña Fortress in a place which used to be used as an execution pavilion
(during the Spanish era and also during the early stages of the Revolution). Coco Fusco, in an
interview for a Radio Latino USA., asked Saavedra about the piece, trying to push a political
answer, however Saavedra “insists that his piece is a memorial to all those who have been erased
by history.” 488
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On the same issue, Gerhard Haupt asks Mosquera about the ongoing critical attitude of
many Cuban artists and he replies, “that's always been there. There was actually the danger that
this critical attitude could become a sort of trademark to be used to make oneself more
interesting to collectors and the international press.” 489
Typical of many foreign reports is one written by Satoru Nagoya, a freelance journalist
from Japan, who talks about the participation of Japan at the Biennale. “President Akira Ishino of
Press Kit Co., the corporation which supported the Biennial from Japan, and related guests were
to pay a visit to Director Llanes of the Lam Center, (and ) I accompanied the group. According to
the Director, Fidel Castro, Cuba's supreme leader, has never visited this Biennial.” 490 In his “A
Journal on the 6th Biennial of Havana,” Nagoya comments on the hardships of the socialist
regime and how art is used no more than as a tool of politics. After making a tour of the venues
and commenting on his difficulties as tourist, Nagoya comments on the work of Cuban painter
Juan Grillo:
His works were oil paintings filled with the spirit of social criticism, using U.S. dollar
bills as a motif. Since his technique was solid, they were convincing. It was cynical that one
rarely encounters a work like this that has true communication power, at the Biennial. We were
served Cuba Libre using the precious cola, and we enjoyed a conversation with the painter and
other artists who were present. We reached a consensus that “the Biennial, which neglects
plasticity and is biased towards works focusing on messages, is prone to being used
politically.” Probably because of their opposition to the American economic blockade, the
Biennial attempts to gain support from the Third World, however, an incorrect system cannot
be justified. 491
Nagoya ends with a prophesy: “Some people seem to say that, it is ten more years of
endurance (until Castro passes away).” In his final day in Havana, on May 9th (Friday), the entry
reads, “In the morning, paying the bill amounting to an average of about ten years' salary of a
Cuban, I checked out of the hotel. After eleven in the morning, I departed for the Jose Martí
International Airport to go to Mexico City. After a flight of approximately two hours and a half, I
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arrived at the Benito Juarez International Airport in Mexico City. There were an abundance of
commodities, and an air filled with life. How happy I was to return to the ‘free world’.” 492
On the other hand, Japanese-Peruvian artists Eduardo Tokeshi’s “El Cuarto de Rescate”
(Rescue Room), presented a two-fold reality: colonial and postmodern. The dual iconography
(religion – consumption) is placed between the radical ends of playfulness and ambiguity, which
enriches a work that tends increasingly to become a kind of emblem of lost illusions and
collective obsessions. Tokeshi’s work raises specific requirements that give prevalence to the
vacuum where empty, and highly decorated, dresses (of an invisible man) recall the apotheosis of
the usage of ex-votos in Latin-American art and recalls the time of powerful “caudillos”
(political leaders), and the impossibility of political change by peaceful means.
Figure 99. Eduardo Tokeshi, “El Cuarto del Rescate.” Installation, 1996
Comparison with well established mega-exhibitions is instructive. In 1997, Documenta
X, directed by Catherine David, also took place. This exhibition had an apparent commitment to
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politics and a revisionist approach to photography. Here there were few non Euro-American
artists in the exhibitions, which led to harsh criticism. Nonetheless, the event was well received
for its interdisciplinary achievement and open debate. The 47th Art Exhibition of the Venice
Biennial, curated by Germano Celant, revolved around the topic "Futuro, Presente, Passato"
(Future, Present, Past), in which three generations of artists between 1967 and 1997 met. In total,
the Exhibition hosted 58 participating countries. Golden Lions went to Marina Abramovic and
Gerhard Richter. It also was criticized for the poor representation of Latin American Art, and
Third World artists in general; the lack of coherence and arbitrary quality of the Biennale were
discussed. Luis Camnitzer wrote an article (published in Art Nexus) in which he describes the
various pavilions and singled out the Austrian exhibit in particular for challenging the Biennale
as an institution and simultaneously asserting historical recognition. 493
Figure 100. Participation world areas Sixth and Seventh Havana Biennales
The charts show the increasing participation by European and North American artists, making clear the
growing interest by the West in the Havana Biennale.
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5.7
OPEN CONTEMPORARY ART AND THE POST-PRODUCTION DEVIATION:
COMMUNITY, TECHNOLOGY, COMMUNICATION
“This biennial, like the three others that have been inaugurated since the collapse of European socialism in 1989,
represents a Cuba even more unaccompanied then ever in its political position in the world. The demeanor of the event seems to
reflect these circumstances, no longer able to muster the optimism and fierce determination that was its early signature.”
Rachel Weiss
494
Seventh Havana Biennale / Dates: November 17, 2000 - January 6, 2001
Main Theme: Uno más cerca del otro (Closer to Each Other)
Artists, 163 from 42 countries
Exhibitions:
- Art and Communication. Cuban film posters
- Third World, South, People at home
- Contemporary Cuban Ceramics
- Jean Michel Basquiat: Fiction and Reality
- Helio Oiticica
- The Technological Renaissance: A concept for the 21st Century
Academic Event: Round Table: Biennials, Institutions, North-South-Relations
Sunday, November 19th, 2000. Location: Hotel Parque Central
In collaboration with the Goethe-Institute. Direction: Bernd M. Scherer, Director of the Goethe-Institute in
Mexico City
Participants: Ute Meta Bauer (Germany), Nelson Herrera Ysla (Cuba), Manuel López Oliva (Cuba), David
Mateo (Cuba), Cuauhtémoc Medina (Mexico), Wendy Navarro (Cuba), Elida Salazar (Venezuela),
Gabriela Salgado (Argentina-Great Britain), Bernd M. Scherer (Mexico), Harald Szeemann (Switzerland),
Roberto Valcarcel (Bolivia), Jorge Villacorta (Peru), Yolanda Wood (Cuba), José Luís Brea (Spain).
Gerhard Haupt and Pat Binder (Germany / Argentina), Diana Domíngues (Brazil), Serge Guibault
(Canada), Rhana Devenport (Australia), Rosa Martinez (Spain), Guy Sioui Durand (Canadá)
Performatic Experience. Magali Espinoza, Tania Bruguera (Cuba), Krisnamurti (Indonesia), Francis Alÿs
(Mexico), Peter Minshall (Trinidad-Tobago).
Art and Technology: Fabian Wagmister (Argentina), George Schöllhammer (Austria), Adad Hannah
(Canada), Miguel González (Colombia), Kevin E. Consey (USA)
Architecture: Exhibitions and forums on Cuban Architecture Exhibitions
- The Preservation of the Historic City. Coordination: María Elena Martín (Architect) 495
- The Transformation of the Contemporary City. Location: Grupo para el Desarrollo Integral de la Ciudad
- The Havana of the Future. Location: Dirección Provincial de Planificación Física
- National Activity in Architecture. Location: UNAICC (Unión Nacional de Arquitectos e Ingenieros de la
Construcción de Cuba). Location: Faculty for Architecture, ISPJAE
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Latin American Architecture Exhibitions:
- Experimental City: Proposals for the Preservation of Quarters and Other Similar Projects (Venezuela).
Locations: Galería Imago, Gran Teatro de Havanna
- Project for the Historic Park of Guayaquil (Ecuador). Location: Consejo de la Administración Municipal
de la Habana Vieja
- Project for the Comprehensive Preservation of Santa Ana de Velasco-Chiquitos (Bolivia - Cuba).
Location: Centro Literario y Cultural Leonor Pérez
- Arquitetura. Arte. Cidade (Brazil). Location: Ministerio de Finanzas y Precios
Workshops: On urban revival of Havana, with the participation of architects, designers and artists as well
as students of these disciplines. Developed in three locations, La Rampa, from Malecón to Calle J; the
Malecón from Calle 23 to Prado; Avenida de Rancho Boyeros, from Calzada del Cerro to Avenida Van
Troi.
Meetings: Three international meetings will be held in conjunction with the Biennial: Architecture and
Urbanism; Students of Architecture, Art and Design; Theory and Criticism. 496
During the year 2000, as the island survived new economic and political measures
adopted by some countries to isolate it further, the Havana Biennale also survived. The seventh
edition of the Biennale was intended to reflect communication and dialogue among human
beings in the midst of global economic projects and the re-emergence of ethnic, religious and
cultural distinctions, which seemed to increasingly accentuate the differences among the various
communities and nations of the world.
At the same time the Biennale faced one of its more important internal challenges, the
departure of Llilian Llanes who, with little explanation, left the direction of the Wifredo Lam
Center and the Biennale altogether. 497 Nelson Herrera Ysla, a veteran curator and co-founder of
the Biennale, was called in to take control of the direction of the center and the biennial itself. In
his introductory text for the event he does not mention this issue; rather, he goes back to the
origins of the Biennale, bringing it again under a strong Third Word language. Underlining the
conceptual motivation of the Biennale, Herrera Ysla states,
Given the differences existing among rich and poor nations, these levels of
intercommunication do not develop equitably. In today's world hundreds of millions of persons
still lack the necessary means to exercise what seems to be a universal right. Furthermore, all
the progress made in computers, microprocessor and information technology has not been able
to bring individuals closer as was thought at first, since, paradoxically, having computerized
and digitalized equipment even in our homes has not led us to establish closer contacts with
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other people; on the contrary, in many cases it has led to isolation and immobility in order not
to part for a single moment from that guiding line which “communicates” us and is an
inseparable part of many lives, perhaps depriving us of the traditional sources of exchange that
have always made it possible to stay closer, to talk face to face, to understand one another
better. Many men and women today suffer from the information and communication
syndrome, which is only a new face for the loneliness syndrome. 498
The argument here is that Western societies have been subjected to so much development
that they have ended in an underdevelopment of personal relations. Herrera Ysla calls it a
“contemporary paradox,” pointing out how these modern means of communication that should
effectively contribute to establish fair relations among individuals, among different communities,
and nations are not doing so. “Artists who live in rich countries and artists who live in poor
countries alike have felt the nearness of that abyss, because art has not escaped that feeling of
loneliness that rarefies the current atmosphere, and today experience the urge to break those
barriers and lay down bridges, resorting to finding new ways and means that will make for a
better rapprochement among humans.” 499
Figure 101. Cover catalog 7th Havana Biennale, 2000
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According to the curatorial team, artists from everywhere are reconstructing traditional
forms and models of communication. This could reveal better ways to understand each other
“and coexist in an atmosphere of respect and peace which is so necessary in order to overcome,
once and for all, the persistent intolerance that has gradually consolidated into one of the main
evils of this 20th Century and threatens to extend timelessly to the 21st Century, with its
inevitable sequels of ethnic, cultural, and religious conflicts that oftentimes lead to war.” 500
For this installment, despite counting on important international co-sponsors such as
HIVOS, Fundacão Memorial da America Latina, the Prince Claus Fund, among others (which
were proudly shown in the catalog and all print materials), the Lam Center recognized that it was
unable to support many artists and their projects. Despite existing in a world of abundance (2000
marked the highest point of success of economic globalization in the West), echoes from the era
of scarcity were still resonating after one decade after the fall of the Soviet Bloc. 501
In order to show that without Lillian Llanes the event would function perfectly, the
Biennale organized and co-organized several events simultaneously: two important exhibitions,
one with drawings by U.S. artist Jean Michele Basquiat (underlining his Caribbean-Latino
origin) and another on the work of pioneer Brazilian artist Helio Oiticica. A large academic event
on the Biennial phenomenon was co-organized by Bernd M. Scherer, Director of the Goethe
Institute in Mexico City. It included some of the most important names among international
curators: Harald Szeemann (recently appointed director of the Venice Biennale), Ute Meta Bauer
(from Documenta), and Rosa Martinez (a future Venice Biennale director) alongside academics
such as Serge Guibault from Canada and José Luís Brea from Spain. Additionally, the Biennale
brought the city of Havana and many other renewal experiences into dialog in an alternative
Architecture Biennale-type event. All this would maintain Havana’s prominence on the map of
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international events for that year. The expenses in terms of lodging and food were high. This was
a price the organization and the Ministry of Culture were able to pay regardless of what artists
had to do to bring their work to Havana. Rachel Weiss makes this point when describing the
event as “a palimpsest of globalization, ripping apart at the seams where solidarity and
commerce intersect…” The economics of the Biennale as reported at the time were stark; the
official budget was “U.S.$ 121,2000, a minuscule amount by international standards but hefty by
Cuban ones… This precarious financial situation must take at least part of the blame for the
chaotic nature of this biennial, and especially its technical problems.” 502
Figure 102. The Three Kings of the Morro Castle (1610), and Nadin Ospina's "El paseante." Soft
sculpture, 2000
Becoming a mega event to try to answer all criticism made in the past was almost a
fixation for Herrera Ysla at the time. The first factor was to retake leadership in the region. How?
By bringing a topic for artists that was directed towards a critical stand against the modern
project. Communication, technology, isolation, and development have been at the center of such
debates; but at the same time, space had to be there to negotiate on an increasingly global stage.
On this issue, the work of Nadin Ospina on view at the entrance of El Morro Castle became a
symbol. In an interview conducted by the team of Universes in Universe (which conducted a
major coverage of the Biennale), Colombian artist Nadin Ospina stated:
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The models for my work are small pre-Columbian figures from Colombia's central
coffee region. They are ceramic objects often found in old graves, which have become a
popular symbol in Colombia for the pre-Hispanic culture. They are reproduced very frequently
and are sold to tourists at such souvenir markets as this one here at the Morro. And so they
have become pieces which are easily recognized, and besides that they have a strong sculptural
form which I find very interesting. I saw that they have monumentality - even in a small format
- and for just this reason I chose them as a point of departure. 503
The second factor was to address the reduction in academic production during previous
editions, which used to make the Biennale the center of art thinking for Latin America and an
active participant in building Third World subjectivity. As a result, the curatorial team was called
upon to be more aggressive in publishing articles in international magazines in participating in
academic events on their own areas of expertise, in order to position their views and imprint their
opinions on global discourse, all based on their expertise in the different areas covered
traditionally by the Biennale. 504 A final factor was to show that even in a biennial-saturated
world, Havana was able to maintain its position an alternative to the large and new art events
emerging everywhere.
The seventh Biennale included architecture and urbanism as artistic manifestations in the
exhibitions, conferences and workshops. Renowned specialists from Cuba as well as from abroad
were invited to communicate their experiences of interaction with the city. Havana has been
always at the center of the Biennale and its presence has always been part of any comment about
the event. For the Seventh Biennale, and possibly as a result of Herrera Ysla’s interest as new
director (being himself an architect), the city was part of many parallel exhibitions and
discussions. 505 It made of the Biennale three events, one addressing a topic (communication and
non-communication at the end of the century), another academic (debating the biennial
phenomenon), and finally one addressing issues such as the restoration of historic places, the
renewal of urban-centers, and the design of public spaces in the midst of international debates on
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the cities at the end of the century and responding to the revitalization of downtown areas, a part
of the real state boom in major cites in the global network.
Figure 103. Havana's Cityscape
This edition of the Biennale brought hordes of participants, artists, academics, curators,
collectors, buyers, and visitors, to Havana’s newly renovated hotel and tourist infrastructure. Old
Havana was under major renovation, signaling perhaps that the country was finally coming out
of the special period. The art market for Cuban art was at its highest and the first of a hotly
debated series of contemporary art auctions took place under the auspices of cultural agents in
the country, and many from outside. Officials, collectors, and curators from the Museum of
Modern Art in New York arrived at the Biennale, ready to buy in bulk. 506 Additionally, the
whole curatorial team for the Documenta11 also visited the Biennale, scouting for new artists.
Several art critics and journalists covered the event, which was widely published in major
art magazines and news papers. Nico Israel, a frequent contributor for Artforum, gives a glimpse
into the Biennale with a cinematic reference. In his article “VII Bienal de la Habana,” Israel
combines Wim Wenders’s Buena Vista Social Club’s “charming decrepitude” with Julian
Schnabel’s “grotesque prison house” style of Before Night Falls when describing his own
experience of the city. The critic also mentions Copola’s The Godfather and Kurosawa’s Throne
of Blood during his descriptions and discussions of certain works. Unfortunately, his view is the
shallowest among the many critical pieces published, and only brings some light to a topic
discussed during the Theoretical Event, arguing that much of which focused on globalization
(and its discontents). “Rosa Martinez (who co-curated Venice, curated SITE Santa Fe, and is
currently attempting to mount a biennial in Kathmandu, Nepal), spoke about the potential for
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biennials to make genuine connections among people of different nations and cultures. Others
(like Edy Camara, a Senegal-born critic who lives in Mexico) decried the biennialization of the
art world, comparing it to economic globalization under Western domination or the
homogenizing effects of ‘world music.’” 507
With the suggestive title “Sweet Dreams (Seventh Havana Biennial Exhibition, Cuba)”
Art in America also covered the event. The article written by Grady T. Turner describes the work
of some artists, among them many established international figures (Susan Hiller from the U.K.,
William Kentridge from South Africa, and Annette Messager from France), participation
American artists (Jennifer Allora and Albert Chong, himself Jamaican born), the Cubans, and a
handful of other names. Like other reviewers, Turner’s comments on the Cuban situation are
superficial, mentioning the aftermath of the Elián González case and how for Americans, like
himself, it was striking to see the amount of work that could be read as political or critical of the
regime in the Biennale. Commenting on the mural sized photographs by Jennifer Allora and
Guillermo Calzadilla (U.S.-Cuba/Puerto Rico), which depicted young couples staring at the
ocean, he answers his question stating, “Habaneros appreciate the multiple interpretations of the
photographs. Perhaps the man and women were contemplating escape; perhaps they were simply
admiring the sea; perhaps they were lonely and would find one other along the Malecon. Locals
comfortably harbor many contradictory ideas about life, about politics, about art- that undermine
any easy stereotypes of Cuba.” 508 Noting that the Biennale had become one of the most
significant art events in the hemisphere, he explains that: “This has been true since the Fifth
Biennial of 1994, when the legalization of the dollar encouraged U.S. critics, collectors and
curators to join colleagues from the Caribbean and Central and South America. Word spread that
there was something unique in Havana: the Biennial’s emphasis on emerging artists from
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developing counties has introduced U.S. viewers to art that might otherwise have gone unnoticed
in North America.” 509 What else can be expected from a magazine that believes that what is not
in its pages does not deserve to be part of the art world? Turner turns to the topic of the event,
arguing that it “was a bit ironic as a theme for this Tower of Babel, it was all the more so because
of the restrictions and complications faced by several artists.” 510 Nonetheless, Turner’s article is
informative about the amount of work displayed in the Biennale. Dividing it into four sections
the author organizes a journey across the Biennial’s complexities. The first addresses general
issues, the second one the Cuban scene, the third one the international component, and a final
one the alternative scene and parallel events. 511
In a similar manner, Walter Robinson, editor of the online magazine Artnet, mentions the
many visitors attending the Biennale from New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and London
and the echo of Cuban artist in the mainstream. He also underlines the striking image of Havana,
as city spectacle, where “still more astonishing is the total absence of advertisements, television
and other manifestations of American pop culture. Christina Aguilera? Who? Music and songs
are everywhere, but (they) don’t come from Uncle Sam. The people are poor but educated, and
their iconic hero is a bearded, bespectacled macho intellectual – Che. It’s as if Fidel’s revolution
has proven one thing: privation does not have to equal squalor.” 512 He then mentions the work of
Kcho, who is “part of the Cuban elite, who earns the equivalent of a year’s salary for an average
Cuban from the sale of a single work.” 513 Following his narrative comments on the work of Los
Carpinteros, who won the UNESCO Prize for this year’s Biennale (the prize was given only that
one time). Their work, called “Ciudad Transportable” (Portable City), consisted of a number of
model-tents of prototypical revolutionary buildings a factory, a jail, an apartment complex, a
lighthouse (paradoxically the work was produced in California). The young Carpinteros,
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(Alexander Arrechea, Marco Antonio Castillo, and Dagoberto Rodríguez) according to Robinson
had a busy schedule, exhibiting in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Spain that year. He
comments also on the work of Tania Bruguera, and the young artist Belkis Ayón (who died
under mysterious circumstances, her work was exhibited at the Galería Habana). “Her powerful
works have reported been bought by New York collectors, including Peter Norton and the
Museum of Modern Art.” 514
Figure 104. Los Carpinteros, “Transportable City.” Installation, 2000
Robinson mentions the special auction of Cuban contemporary art held in the Casa de las
Americas to benefit the Children’s Hospital of Havana (the oncology wing). Organized by Cuban
authorities and the Austin-based U.S.-Latin American Medical Aid Foundation, the auction sold
around 40 works for, approximately, U.S.$150,2000. 515 Finally, the author mentions several
relevant artists such as William Kentridge among others, “who are already players on the
international stage… (Kentridge) who projected his animated film Procession in one of the vaults
in the Morro Castle” had become another recognizable figure in the Biennale. 516
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Figure 105. William Kentridge, "Shadow Procession." Animation, 2000
Dermis Leon, a Cuban curator living in the U.S., explains in her report titled “Havana,
Biennial, tourism: The spectacle of utopia” for the Art Journal that, “The blockade mentality, the
result of a political and economic reality, has fostered a lack of communication between the
United States and Cuba since 1959, which in turn has contributed to the mythologization of each
in the eyes of the other.” 517 This in addition to the boom of traveling to Cuba as a result of some
relaxation of the containment policies by the Clinton administration towards the embargo, which
filled the planes with Americans, arriving to see the Biennale. “The rumor that ‘everyone’ in the
New York contemporary-art world was going to Havana made me think that an extraordinary
change was taking shape in Cuba's relationship to the United States, and I felt it was important to
witness the public legitimation of the Biennial by U.S. art institutions.” 518 Furthermore, León
recognizes that,
Havana was placed as an obligatory point on the map of international art events. This
has fostered a curatorial model not centered on the star figure of the curator, but rather on a
research team. Specialized curators select the participating artists, who in turn are accepted or
rejected by the entire team--a process designed to minimize judgments motivated by
nationalistic sentiments. Without a doubt, the success of the Biennial has changed the balance
of power in the international art world by focusing critical attention away from the dominant
cultural centers toward the periphery. It has stimulated the opening of other biennials in Africa,
Asia, and Latin America, thus reaffirming Cuba's position as a cultural leader within the Third
World. Indeed, from the beginning, the Biennial has had its own political agenda; specifically,
it has operated as a forum for the discourse of otherness, center, and periphery. Cuban art
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criticism of the 1980s and early 1990s functioned as a sort of peripheral discourse within the
international celebration of the Biennial. 519
After accepting its prominence on the global scene, León addresses the issue of Cultural
Tourism and places the event as part of Cuba’s policies to attack the special period. “The
administrators of the Biennial understand that in order to survive in the precarious Cuban
economy, which is now subject to the rhythm of the international markets, it is necessary for its
art to address global themes, spiced with a hint of local exoticism.” She argues that Cuba no
longer has the same leadership role in Third World culture nor the economic resources, which it
had in the 1980s. And she asserts that “In the era of Istanbul, Johannesburg, Kwangju, and the
countless other biennials that keep critics, curators, and artists hopping from plane to plane
always seeking novelty, the Havana Biennial must offer something more than Third World
art.” 520
In a different tone, Australian critic and artist Penelope Richardson writes an almost
literary review for Third Text. In her report Richardson underlines the many Havanas that exist in
simultaneity (the nostalgic, the tourist, the modern-socialist or revolutionary city, etc.) and points
to some of the alternative events taking place that have become part of the cultural landscape
during each edition of the Biennale. “Esta es su Casa Vicenta” became a major ‘alternative’ spot
during the Biennale; “what looked like an abandoned, burnt out French style villa turned out to
be Vicenta’s house, and site for the most popular fringe exhibition of the Bienal.” 521 Then she
goes on to describe some of the most impressive works addressing the topic of the Biennale;
Galería DUPP’s installation “1, 2, 3 Probando” (1, 2, 3 Testing)” exhibited in the Morro Fortress
became the Biennale signature. 522 A project made by the collective (led by Rene Francisco)
produced dozens of large scale 1950s style microphones, in cast iron already oxidized, to be
located along the sandstone walls of the fortress. “The fort becomes metaphor for the control and
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containment, for the flow of goods and ideas in and out of Havana… They face both inwards, the
viewer becoming the orator, and outwards, Castro’s endless speeches, and as a metaphor for
communication in Cuba.” 523 Microphones were also used by Surinamese artist Remy Jungerman
in his installation titled “Flattened Toad Force 3. Nobody is Protected.”
Figure 106. Galería DUPP, "1,2,3 probando." Installation, 2000
Subsequently, Richardson commented on some of the more powerful works (in her view)
in the Biennale. Esterio Segura (Cuba) follows, his installation “Donde el Silencio Produce
Tornados” (Where Silence Produces Storms) sets a subject, a wax model, in a dark room
surrounded by airplane models of all sorts, “the sleeping protagonist lies on top of mounds of
bamboo birdcages, while hundreds of small planes line the roof above him.” 524 Tania Bruguera’s
latest performance, Untitled, also was the object of controversy. It used one of the dark
cavernous rooms at La Cabaña fortress. “Naked men stand inside a cavernous stone warehouse
carpeted with crushed sugar cane, letting off a pungent odor as it ferments. High in the ceiling, at
the center of the space, a small black and white TV had been suspended. It showed a silent video
of Castro delivering his marathon speeches, showing his heart, kissing children waving to his
people -statesman, politician, God.” 525 The men performed everyday labor tasks, underlining a
slave-master relationship -people and leader. After the opening the performance that was on the
program for a second presentation was cancelled. Another work reported by Richardson is Abel
Barroso’s “Café Internet del Tercer Mundo” (Third World Internet Café), “in which all the
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computers and associated technology are made out of wood blocks carved with messages then
hammered together in a crude folkloric style; he questions the inclusivity of the global economic
environment.” 526 Finally she comments on the work of Carlos Estevez (Cuba) whose “Botellas al
Mar” (Messages in a Bottle) use a well known device to address isolation and a desire for
communication.
Figure 107. Esterio Segura, "Donde el Silencio Produce Tornados." Installation, 2000
The interest of American scholars in Chicago, thanks to the work of Rachel Weiss (who
lives and works there), has increased during the last editions of the Biennale. In a note published
in the magazine Afterimage, Gregory Sholette (Associate Professor at the Art Institute of
Chicago), an artist and activist himself, comments on how “battalions of art tourists unloading
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like occupation troops from buses and cabs onto the bluff overlooking downtown Havana.” 527 In
his text “Affirmation of the Curatorial Class – Seventh Havana Biennial Art Exhibition”, the
author comments on how the event has undoubtedly played an important role in the art world. He
notes “at the same time it became one more occasion for the affirmation of the curatorial class:
the transnational detachment of specialized professionals who manage the global spectacle called
contemporary art… While there is still something different about the Bienal de la Habana when
compared to other global festivals –more artists of color from the southern hemisphere are
represented– the same aura of exotica provides a particular status within the larger cultural
tourist landscape. The significance of his special position is not lost on the Cuban artistic
community.” 528 Nonetheless, his report is based almost exclusively on Cuban artists. He
mentions the Gallería DUPP, Esterio Segura, Abel Barroso, Raúl Cordero, and the collaborative
team of Jennifer Allora and Guillermo Calzadilla. Cordero showed his works from the series
“Hello/Goodbye (La experiencia Las Vegas – Varadero), making an ironic reading of the
Biennale as a place of purely market driven forces. Allora and Calzadilla showed a series of
large photos which worked as a public project, from the series “Seeing Otherwise”, depicting a
young man and woman (of African origin) facing away from the viewer and into a body of water
where the sitting sun was just off-screen. “The images were digitally modified to seem as if the
sun-set were in the subject’s perspective rather than in the photographer-viewer perspective,
adding (a) certain impossibility to the image.” 529
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Figure 108. Jennifer Allora & Guillermo Calzadilla, from the series “Seeing Otherwise." 2000
Sholette also addresses artists working in video, film, and digitally manipulated images
and/or prints. Spanish artist Antoni Muntadas’ video installation underlines the pervasiveness of
the mass-media and the society of spectacle (with a spectacular video-installation at the same
time, which suffered from the constant blackouts of Havana). South African William Kentridge
brought a touching piece in which a long carnival of shadow images (using old theatrical
techniques) tells the story of the sufferings of blacks in colonial territories. Another South
African, Jane Alexander’s “uncanny sienna-toned photographs from the series ‘African
Adventure: Cape of Good Hope’… showing third-world locations, was disturbed by(the)
inexplicable presence of children mutating into animals that stare at the viewer as if saying ‘are
we not human?’ They actually made me wince.” 530 Colombian video artists José Alejandro
Restrepo (who in the report appears as two artists) presented his video-installation “Iconofilia”
(from his series titled Iconomía, 1998-2000). It is a group of short video segments that start with
the line, “Good morning sweet images, I want to see more…” Sholette continues:
Over the course of an hour the piece offers stories a la carte about the eye. Some
appear to be news clips or appropriated T.V. programs, while others are documentary footage
possibly shot by the artist himself. Among the shorts is a scene from a Colombian soap opera
in which a bandaged woman falls in love with her handsome surgeon after he restores her
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sight… This is followed by spectral images of Mary and Jesus that appear in the bottom of
coffee coups, on stained walls and even in the reflections of ice cream vendor’s cart. The final
startling but morbid episode is about a woman who proceeds to take several frame shop
employees hostage after she discovers they have lost her family photograph. It concludes with
the distraught woman shooting herself in the head. 531
Figure 109. José Alejandro Restrepo, “Iconophilia” (from the series Iconomía 1998-2000). Video
installation, 2000
Sholette also writes about the alternative events that happened in Havana and his reaction
before the changing economy and the massive transformation of the city.
In a similar note, Valerie Cassel writes a report for the magazine NKA. 532 She admits she
has a tourist’s perspective, since it is not possible for a person like her to break away from her
position as a cultural spectator in that environment. Again, she records a fascination with the
city, the fading utopianism of the event, and the number or venues in play that “dissolves into a
montage of narratives; it is, as well, an exercise in how each artist attempts to articulate, if not
reconcile, his or her unique experience of the historical and utopian.” 533 Although, NKA is a
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journal on African Contemporary Art, Cassel’s article did not refer, particularly, to the work of
African artists alone. While the images do present a visual report on some of the African
participants (Jane Alexander, Albert Chong, Bruna Truffa, Godfried Donkor, Willem Boshoff,
and Peter Minshall), the text focused on different aspects and artists in the exhibition. The author
mentions the work of the Colombian collective “Grafito” that “proved significant because they
provided evidence that places, streets, and buildings once existed. The rubbings of cement sidewalks and buildings became a communal process involving members of the group and the
general public at each site.” Their work was indeed more connected to the architectural
dimension of the event than to the issue of communication. 534 She also mentions British artist
Susan Hillers, Brazilian Rosana Monnerat, Uruguayan Nelbia Romero, Pakistani Nalani Malani,
Argentinean Miguel Angel Rios, and the Cuban collective los Carpinteros. Her descriptions are
rather shallow and do not address major issues related to the topics debated during the event.
However, as an exercise of inclusion of alternative topics in the journal, it makes an important
point signaling NKA’s move towards the postcolonial in a wider perspective.
Without a doubt, the most critical and thorough report for the seventh edition of the
Havana Biennale was produced by Rachel Weiss and published in Art Nexus. The veteran visitor
to the Biennial -her first trip was in late 1980 -when it was impacted by the appearance of the
city and the force of the Cuban art scene at the beginning of the special period. Weiss makes the
most accurate and critical comments on the event. She starts by connecting the fashionable
“Buenavista Social Club Syndrome,” in which the nostalgia for the utopian times is embedded
and repackaged in films, posters, photos, and even in the cars that still run on the island, with the
success of the Biennale in terms of international attention. They become the phantoms of loose
dreams, nostalgic objects for the Western tourist. The exotic and erotic of Cuban culture has
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become the best attraction for the increasing cultural tourism at the Biennale in recent years. 535
The Biennale uses, as Herrera Ysla insists, the simultaneity of historical times “where prehistory
and the Internet coexist” to disengage from technology and to address two other dimensions
(architecture and counter-digital culture or collectivism), the bases of the curatorial project
underlying the event, according to Weiss’ reading of Herrera’s text. She also notes that the new
tourist economy has evolved into a place in “which class divisions read clearly –between Cubans
and foreigners, and between those who are inside and those left out of the new dollar
economy.” 536 She argues that Cuban artists (the successful ones) are members of an elite that is
comparable to that of the military in the country. That has pushed some groups to criticize the
Biennale and the art practice of some artists in satirical ways; the music band (composed of
Cuban visual artists) Rock Campesino (Peasant Rock) played a version of the famous
“Guantanamera” in the opening at Havana Gallery (for the Belkis Ayón exhibition). Repeating
several times the main lyric they tried to create the same sensation that popular Cuban music
does as background sound in any tourist place.
Weiss describes the work of some of the participants, starting with Mexican Gustavo
Artigas’ project for the opening of the Biennale. Artigas is known for the use of people in his
works, in this case, “En el aire” (On the Air), invited children to play with a flurry of Styrofoam
toy airplanes in Plaza Vieja (planes and boats are still recurrent icons in Cuban art). This
collaborative and participatory dimension was present throughout the event, from the parangoles
used by Cuban subjects during the Biennale opening, to the events related to Helio Oiticica’s
exhibition. Weiss complains that this project was about resistance to a dictatorial regime, titled
originally ‘Más allá del espacio” (Beyond Space) and how in Havana it became just a puppet.
Mexican-Canadian artist Rafaél Lozano-Helmer’s work titled “33 Questions Per Minute:
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Relational Architectures 05” used a number of LCD screens to produced concrete poetry through
interaction with a keyboard where people were allowed to write anything they wanted, while
Santiago Sierra’s (not in the official list) “Le invito a tomar un trago” (I Invite You to Have a
Drink) was in the Espacio Aglutinador gallery. Sierra is also known for paying people to
participate in his works. 537 Another action that used the same strategy was “Familia Obrera”
(Worker Family) by veteran Argentinean artist Oscar Bonny. It was initially presented in 1968
when Bonny paid the double of the salary of a working Father, who sat with his family in a
gallery in Buenos Aires. Bony wanted to address the class-specificity of the art world and the
inequalities of the elitist society at the time. The project “was initially approved but later
amended by the biennial, at issue was the question of who would select the family to be hired for
the work; while the initial arrangement was apparently that Bonny would make the selection
(since it was the crux of the work), eventually it was decided by the biennial that they would be
the selectors.” 538 In a press-release days before the opening, Bonny declared his project
terminated.
Figure 110. Vicenta Borja's house, a place for alternative art
Commenting on the Cuban scene, Weiss sounds irritated. She states that the Cuban artists
seem in a state of “self-cannibalization.” The sarcasm and sharpness are no more than a stylisticy
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façade, as in the case of Los Carpinteros, Kcho (with his repetitive boats), and Esterio Segura
(with his pretentious existentialism). She exempts the work by Gallería DUPP, only because of
their connections to the paintings of Antonia Eriz, a female Cuban painter who used to use
microphones in her work, alluding to demagoguery and rhetoric. She stopped working in the
1960s for political reasons and dedicated her life to education in the CDR (Committees for the
Defense of the Revolution). “With its reference to Eiriz, DUPP’s work seemed a clear test of the
allowable limits of expression, and in that sense is similar to the installation/performance by
Tania Bruguera.” 539 The work by the Cuban collective Gabinete Ordo Amoris (Francis Acea and
Diango Hernández) titled “Un día como cualquier otro” (A Day Like Any Other Day) presented
a series of objects-replicas that comes directly from the special period, creativity at its extreme
that at the same time recalls the scarcity and moribund situation of the country from a purely
aesthetical perspective. Weiss did not go on depth about the alternative exhibitions, saying that
they were no more than “simply additional venues, rather than presenting an alternative position
(with the exception of some works at “Esta es su casa Vicenta” and the Espacio Aglutinador
project titled “Permanecer: nuestra colectiva” – To Stay: our collective). 540
Besides the controversies around the works of Bruguera and Bonny, another issue arose
during the academic presentations when invited members (Cuauhtémoc Medina, Virginia Pérez
Rattón, José Luis Brea, and Santiago Olmo) asked about the misrepresentation of Cuban
intellectuals in the Theoretical Event (which included many important international names). In
particular they asked for Gerardo Mosquera, Orlando Hernandez, and Desiderio Navarro, all
relevant intellectuals in the development of Cuban art theory and criticism and the Biennale in
particular, since the early 1980s. Director Nelson Herrera Ysla called for a private response to
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these public questions. Weiss ends her report in that tone, asking for public answers from an
event that historically has debated relevant issues in an open and public way. 541
It is relevant to also mention the participation of Nigerian artists Ude Ike and Olu Oguibe
(Oguibe presented paintings of his “Women of Substance. A Canon in Progress”) and, for the
first time, of Israeli artists (Eliezer Sonnenschein Guy Raz, Efrat Benni, and David Reeb)
alongside Palestinian (Dweik Youssef), Egyptian (Mona Marzouk), and Arab Emirates artists
(Ibrahim Mohammed Ahmed, Kazem Mohamed, and Sherif Hassan). 542
Figure 111. Olu Oguibe, “Women of Substance. A Canon in Progress,” Installation, 2000
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5.8
ART WITHIN LIFE
Eighth Havana Biennale / Dates: 1 Nov. - 15 Dec. 2003
Main Theme: Arte con la Vida (Art within Life)
157 artists from 49 countries from the Third World, Europe, North America, and Australia
Exhibitions:
-Arte con la Vida (Art with Life). Several venues
-4D RAIN. Pabellón Cuba
- Mover las Cosas, Alamar
- Isaroko, La California (art and community)
-Maneras de inventarse una sonrisa (Forms to invent a smile)
-Soy Kurtycz (I am Kurtycz)
- SENSASIONAL del Diseño Mexicano (SENSATIONAL of Mexican design)
- Encuentro de Performance (Performance Encounter)
Academic Event: Forum Arte-Vida (Forum Art-Life)
Participants: Leonor Amarante (Brazil), Paul Ardenne (France), Nicolas Bourriadu (France), Justo Pastor
Mellado (Chile), Ricardo Basbaum (Brazil), Bill Burns (Canada), Fernando Castro (Spain), Jessica Cusick
(USA), Laura Mora (Mexico), Rhana Davenport (Australia), Moacir dos Anjos (Brazil), Magali Espinosa
(Cuba), Bastien Gilbert (Canada), Shifra Goldman (USA), José Miguel González Casanova (Mexico),
Heidi Grundman (Austria), Yuko Hasegawa (Japan), Julia Herzberg (USA), Pablo Helgera (Mexico-USA),
Annete Hurtig (Canada), Geeta Kapur (India), Arshiya Lokhandwala (India), Richard Martell (Canada),
Rosa Martinez (Spain), Michelle Marxuach (Puerto Rico), Soledad Novoa Donoso (Chile), Kevin Power
(Spain), Ricardo Ribenboim (Brasil), Ricardo Rivadeneira (Colombia), Diana Salavarrieta (Colombia),
Guillermo Santamarina (Mexico), Guy Siou Durand (Canada), Eugenio Valdés (Cuba), Keith Wallace
(Canada).
In the aftermath of September 11, 2001, the Eighth Havana Biennale occurred during a
time of increasing and relentless schizophrenia and of politically engendered fear. There also was
a noticeable closing of the ideological debates between left-right and South-North, an the
increasing impact of extreme religious-right perspectives, in which terrorism and counterterrorism reigned. Indeed Cuba, from the beginning of this new stage in its history, was
proclaimed to be part of the so-called “axis of evil,” a denomination that U.S. President Georges
W. Bush used with the hope of starting a global conflict that would place his weak
administration at the center of the global order. This effort was, for a time, successful. 543
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This environment reinforced the economic embargo and set American political associates
against Cuba (the European Union in particular). The Biennale again opened late, but it finally
did, in 2003. As well, Havana also faced other challenges. The Biennale had to deal with the
recent success of Documenta11 (directed by Okwui Enwezor), the open-model of the 50th
Venice Biennale directed by Francesco Bonami, and the increasing emergence of new
biennials. 544 On the local level, Nelson Herrera Ysla ceased to be director in a move that was
explained as a successive rotation of the direction of the Lam Center and the Biennale among the
senior curators of the Lam Center. However, it seems that there were other factors involved in
the replacement. The volatile environment led the Cuban government to be further restrictive
with its own citizens, and to restrain individual liberties by taking harsh action against those
trying to leave or to criticize the regime from within. 545 As a result the major supporters of the
Biennale in 2003, the Netherland-based organizations HIVOS (Humanist Institute for Cooperation with Developing Countries) and the Prince Clauss Funds, withdrew their support as did
AFAA (Association Française d'Action Artistique). The Prince Claus Funds had contributed
90,2000 U.S. Dollars to the previous biennial, which was also supported by HIVOS. According
to a statement by the organizers, the two foundations together were responsible for 70% of
external support for the Seventh Havana Biennale. They argued that the Lam Center and its
officials (the curators in particular) did not distance themselves sufficiently from or criticize the
recent measures taken by the Cuban government. The press release was sent to the art world. As
a consequence a group of artists invited to participate also refused to send their works. An
opening statement by the President of the biennial's board, published in the exhibition catalogue,
condemns the withdrawal of funding as “part of the wave of hostile actions carried out by the
European Union against Cuba.” 546
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Uruguayan artist and critic Luis Camnitzer wrote in his contribution to the catalogue that
rather than partake in the system that defines art at a given moment, the Havana Biennale has
traditionally aimed to underline the ethical context within which that definition occurs.
“Inscribing the exhibition into a discourse that favors moral judgments over aesthetic ones, and
local authenticity over global intelligibility, Camnitzer iterates a position often assumed by
‘peripheral’ biennials that claim an advantage derived from geographical (and economic)
marginality.” 547
Figure 112. Cover catalog 8th Havana Biennale, 2003
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Nonetheless, the 2003 Biennale has to be recalled as one of the most open in terms of its
curatorial approach. The core members were joined by a group of artist-curators from Austria
and Germany, who usually work on the U.S. West Coast, called RAIN. In addition to Hilda
María Rodríguez (Director of the Eighth Biennale), Nelson Herrera Ysla, José Manuel Noceda,
Ibis Hernandez Abascal, Margarita Sánchez Prieto, Eugenio Valdés (who joined again the team
as liaison with RAIN), other names such as José Fernandez Portal (working at the Lam Center
since 1999), Siggi Hofer (Italy-Austria), Susi Jirkuff (Austria), Lisa Schmidt-Colinet (Austria),
Alex Schmoeger (Austria), and Florian Zeyfang (Germany) all participated in that year’s
selection process. This fact marks a curatorial advance and at the same time a generational shift
in the Lam Center (young curators from Havana University and ISA had started to join and work
as assistant curators). 548
For this installment, titled "Art and Life," the Biennale attempted to maintain its ethical
prerogative while trying to align itself with historically mainstream art and with what was left of
the Revolution. Camnitzer, while not among the exhibition's curators, went on to provide lucid
guidance as to how the exhibition's theme might be understood: “If Art and Life as title of this
Eighth Biennial pretends to be more than a purely anecdotic theme, the selection of the phrase
revives two main hopes that go hand-in-hand: the blockade of the temptations of mercantilist
artistic tourism, and the maintenance of a forum for discussion of the ethical contexts that to such
great extent go beyond the mere making of objects.” Camnitzer confronts the most paradoxical
aspects of contemporary art in Cuba. Because art in Cuba is less policed than other goods (it's
not embargoed either), artistic production has become a tempting prospect toward participating
in the world market. 549
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Terry Smith wrote a review for NKA, noting that millions of dollars were spent on
Matthew Barney’s Cremaster exhibition at the Guggenheim Museum in New York City, while
Uruguayan artist Martin Sastre’s trilogy “The Iberoamerican Legend” cannibalize images,
including a parody of Barney, in an economy of scarcity and turmoil. 550 After setting a tone
(political, economic, physical, and theoretical) Smith goes on to name some of the artists
featured in the many exhibition venues. Among others, he singles out the collective RAIN and
Fabiana Barros’ (Brazil) “Fiteiro Cultural,” pieces that according to Smith were connected to the
main topic since they were located in public spaces and involved public interaction. On the
exhibition itself “an array of art from outside the main center and the new artworld nexus-points.
Art that is primarily about public specific to its conditions of creation, or that emerged from
exchange and encounter with them.” 551 That is the case in Brazilian artist Siron Franco’s
installation “Intolerancia” (Intolerance), where figures are stuffed, suggesting workers or
peasants bodies piled across after a massacre. Similarly, the large project by Mauricio Dias and
Walter Riedweg (Brazil-Germany) titled “Devocionalia” in which street children in a testimonial
manner share their experiences; the children cast their feet and hands in ex-votos that as
phantoms, haunt our dreams. Fernando Arias’ (Colombia) austere video piece titled “Infidelity”
works as a dialectic of violence, abuse, and the sexual and master-servant relationship. There is a
double image of a young black soldier (guerrilla fighter, mercenary) who shoots a weapon
directly at the viewer while a penis wearing a piercing ejaculates in reverse. Smith also discusses
the work of Iranian artist Gazhel, who in her self-ethnographic (comical indeed) short videos,
managed to parody Islamic dress codes in a clear Third World style of conceptual art. Smith also
comments on the works by Australian Patricia Piccinini, Nigerian Otobong Nkanga, and
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Ousmane Ndiaye (Dago) that used photography (and space in the case of Nkanga) to create
tensions between time, place, and being. 552
Figure 113. Martin Sastre, "The Iberoamerican Legend." Video, 2002
Figure 114. Mauricio Dias & Walter Riedweg, "Devotionalia." Installation, 1995-2003
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Figure 115. Otobong Nkanga, “Sustain Suture.” Performance - installation, 2003
Smith is also intrigued by the work of Cuban brothers Yoan and Ivan Capote (former
members of Galería DUPP) who presented individual works for the Biennale. Both work in the
best conceptual-Cuban way, sharp but clean comments and a masterly use of resources. Yoan
comments on mass-media and related topics with his sculptural TV-set cages. But it is Ivan’s
machine that attracts Smith, “like a stripped-down Tinguely, the small motor of which drove a
looped belt that pushed a rod bearing a sink plug at its point across a tray carrying a thin layer of
viscous sump oil. At each push the plug would clear a narrow space and mark the base of the
tray, as if beginning to form a letter. Immediately the oil would flow back in… The title of this
work is, indeed, Dyslexia. And it takes just one step to see this as a metaphor for social amnesia,
a disease of epidemic proportions throughout the world.” 553
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Figure 116. Ivan Capote, “Dyslexia.” Mechanical sculpture, 2003
With the same subtle but powerful aesthetic and self-reflexive effect, Smith comments on
works by Brazilian Pazé and Uruguayan Marco Maggi. Both artists use simple materials, Pazé
plastic straws and Maggi’s sheets of white paper comment on the fragility of artistic creation.
Through their sculptural and multimedia practices, these artists established lines of flight to
particular art historical moments (the avant-garde), and combat the neutral, yet charged, spaces
of the exhibition.
Smith also addresses more directly the work of some of the new Cuban artists, where
kitsch (Ramirez and Velasco), junk (Mariño, Prieto), and revolutionary rhetoric (Bruguera)
excel. Tania Bruguera was not part of the official list of participants but appeared in an
individual exhibition (as did Rene Francisco) at the Museo Nacional, recently reopened. On a
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platform, her piece “Autobiografía” was an installation in which a microphone stands alone. In
the background pre-recorded slogans by Fidel played (Hasta la Victoria Siempre!, Vencer o
Morir!, Libertad o Muerte, etc.). The sound increased when the spectator stepped into the
speaker’s place A trigger of historical and personal memory; the piece creates echoes of a
revolution on the threshold of disappearance. Smith connects the piece to a painting by Antonia
Eriz “Una Tribuna para la Paz Democrática” (A Tribune for a Democratic Peace) made in 1969,
as one of the last pieces produced by a Cuban artist that had strongly impacted the new
generation of Cuban artists.
Figure 117. Tania Brugera, "Autobiography." Installation, sound track, and publication, 2003
An article written by Christian Rattemeyer, curator at Artists Space in New York and a
frequent contributor to Artforum, underlines the participation of the collective RAIN, “founded
several years ago in Los Angeles… (which) curated the space within the Pabellon Cuba. For
their project, 4D, they invited twenty-three artists and groups to engage the history and cultural
significance of the venue… For its part, RAIN traversed the pavilion with monumental
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scaffolding akin to those used in the renovation of buildings all over Cuba, and placed works in
small open booths, recesses, and corridors. The exhibited works often engaged similarly liminal
spaces or threshold zones, such as the border between San Diego and Tijuana (Grupo Torolab) or
the concrete bunkers left behind in Albania (Bunker Research Group). The German collective
AnArchitektur's publications about such projects as nuclear bomb shelters, World War II army
test sites, and the architecture of Guantanamo Bay; Nils Norman's designs for the radical reuse of
public space and Gulsun Karamustafa's video about a group of Turkish women who were
sentenced to prison by their government all tied in with the research- and documentation-based
aesthetic of RAIN's exhibition. A nightly series of concerts, performances, and talks turned the
pavilion into the unofficial center of the entire event.” 554 That kind of projects and the venue
itself, an architectural icon –the Cuban Pavilion, altered with the parasite structure and signaled a
new direction in curatorial approaches to the event. It can be compared to the “utopia station”
curated by Molly Nesbit, Hans Ulrich Obrist and Rirkrit Tiravanija for the 50th Venice Biennale.
However, as Rattemeyer comments, “Havana’s life was more luminous and fresh than the carton
type station in the Venice project.” 555
Figure 118. RAIN in the Cuban pavilion (Vedado)
The correspondence between “art and life” seemed to be confined to an array of works
that engaged with aspects of everyday living, such as domestic environments. A group of table
dinners (the one by Zeeger Reyers was impressive), transportation related works and traffic
(Dominique Zinkpé, Betsabé Romero, Suboth Gupta, Nicola Constantino), faith-based works
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(Alfonso Suarez), media and self representation (Luis García Zapatero, Gazhel, Pablo Helgera
Soap Opera Institute, and Jayce Salloum collection of videos of everyday life in the Middle East
were astonishing), and domestic and political violence (Luis Barba and Libia Posada’s
prosthetics lab brought the worst of the Colombia conflict to the fore), among others. Some of
the events taking place in the Cuban pavilion (Bijari from Brazil in particular), and more relevant
in peripheral neighborhoods such as in the California and Alamar districts gained preponderance
because they acted in consequence with the spirit of the event. Interaction, exchange, and a
playful –horizontal interaction established a subtle possibility of addressing new audiences and
topics. Cuban, Mexican, and Brazilian artist participated in the workshops, performances, and
happenings in California. The housing project was rebuilt under the auspices of the Union of
Writers and Artists during the mid-1990s. Manuel Mendive, Eduardo Roca, Juan Roberto Diago
(who is going to be transformed by the experience) from Cuban and Fabiana Barros and Betsabé
Romero (Brazil and Mexico respectively) participated.
Rattemeyer argues that only a few artists attempted to interact directly with the living
conditions of Havana or their own city or country of origin. That was the case of the Havanabased artists' group Department of Public Interventions, which staged several events in public
places in Cuba's capital. Departamento de Intervenciones Públicas, working on the same spirit as
DUPP, produced 30 days of action in the cityscape. 556
Another article that comments on the collaborative projects around Havana during the
eight Biennale was written by Janis Demkiw and Jenifer Papararo for the C: International
Contemporary Art Magazine, and was titled “The 8th Havana Biennial: two perspectives on two
collaborations.” It emphasizes the collectives, RAIN and in particular the Departamento de
Intervenciones Públicas (DIP. Dept. of Public Interventions) with their piece titled “ACTION
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EXPERIENCE: 30 DAYS”. They ask how a small collective of students using a small wooden
house in the thick of residential Buenavista became headquarters for some of the most
compelling work happening in Havana.
The players are The Department of Public Interventions (Dpto. de Intervenciones
Publicas, aka DIP), a collective of young artists who met at ISA in 200l. DIP wants to create a
space in Cuba for public art. Working outside institutions is no small feat in a country so
heavily policed and bureaucratized… With an economy of means and the adaptability
necessary for working in the public sphere, DIP develops simple, understated manipulations of
the relationships between people in space. What might happen, for example, if 50 chairs were
inexplicably left in a public park? (50 Sillas, Alvarez/Leyva, 2001)…
Ultimately, they saw their project as an intervention into the biennial itself. The
exertions required to achieve official admittance included fabricating an exaggerated even
fictionalized account of their own history. Once accepted, DIP posted an international call-forartists to propose public interventions for the event, inviting over 50 participants from
Germany, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Ireland, the Virgin Islands, Mexico, Switzerland and
Cuba.” 557
Figure 119. Departamento de Intervenciones Públicas DIP, “30 days of intervention.” Brochure, 2003
“Art within Life” for Cuban artists Nelson Ramirez de Arellano and Ludmila Velazco
looks like a postcard on a coffee table. In the form of a photo album and a series of postcards
titled, Absolut Revolution, the couple places their own images alongside figures from history.
The Cuban revolutionary landscape functions as background for the dreams and hopes of the
young couple. Sarcasm and anti-idealism mingle in their work. “Crossbreeding revolutionary
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symbolism, popular objects, and icons of avant-garde art history, the artists effectively vacate
these signifiers and ironically undermine their heroic histories. The protagonist in Absolut
Revolution is a monument to Cuban writer and independence fighter Jose Marti, a well-known
feature of the Havana cityscape and a favorite backdrop for Castro's early public addresses.
Inserting an image of the monument into iconic photographs--from Rodchenko's mother to Man
Ray's Violin d'Ingres and August Sander's peasants in their Sunday best--the artists inscribe the
multilayered revolutionary history of Cuba into the tradition of avant-garde Western art.” 558 In
the introductory text for the 2003 Biennale, Nelson Herrera Ysla also connects the Biennale topic
to a revision of the Russian Avant-Garde, where utopia and reality meet.
Figure 120. Nelson Ramirez & Liudmila Velazco, “Absolut Revolution.” Installation, 2003
Rattemeyer also comments on other projects that equally engaged with the spectrum of
Cuba's complex and layered history. “Panama-born and England-based artist Humberto Velez
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continued his practice of collaborating with local musicians by writing and producing a song
together with the Havana-based all-female band Krystal. Presented twice during the opening
weekend, the concert camouflaged itself as an unofficial or clandestine event. Based on a poem
Velez found in an old diary discovered in the former Panama Canal Zone Company
headquarters, Una canción para la bienal (Por que el amor no existe) (A Song for the Biennial
[Because Love Does Not Exist], 2003) combined elements of traditional Cuban music and
Panamanian reggae with broader cultural references. While Krystal recalls ‘girl bands’ popular
in Cuba in the first half of the century, Velez produced costumes for the performers based on
Cuban couture from the late 60s and early 70s that merged bold tropical colors and patterns with
designs inspired by Courreges.” 559 Mixing the cultural and artistic heritage of both countries,
Velez's performances/public concerts retained the character of public/official events, not art. It is
customary for the Biennale to use this type of work that frames the possibilities of art in
connection to the people. Street performances also have a carnavalesque dimension common in
Caribbean culture and artistic practice. They also make a call for “missed utopian moments by
referencing a time in Cuban history when revolutionary optimism coincided with a highly
developed culture that was both distinctly local in its vernacular and thoroughly international in
its scope and ambition.” 560
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Figure 121. Roi Vara (Finland), "Espiral." Performance in the Cuban Pavilion, 2003
The Cuban participation has always held a special place in reports on the Biennale.
Rattemayer comments on the work of some of the youngest artists. He gives special attention to
the work of two new female Cuban artists, Lisset Castillo and Glenda Leon. Castillo’s
photographs function as aerial views of a nonexistent infrastructure. The city is her concern, and
comparing it with other major urban centers becomes an obsession for the young artist. Indeed,
she finds no comparison whatsoever, and then builds fantastic images out of sand and other
materials. Leon’s short video piece titled “Destino” (Destiny) uses a frontal static shot of a street
in which old cars pass through, cars like those that are still running in Havana, the ones that had
created a signature for the city. Suddenly the color and shape of them produce an alternative
narrative, and groupings, tensions, and even stories emerge. Fantasy unfolds when in the last
scene, a red car (an old Lada) makes a u-turn to follow another red car… Leon’s video is a short,
swet and fantastic love story with poetic resonances. Apolitico, 2001-2003, by Wilfredo
consisted of over thirty national flags on flagpoles, displayed on the front wall of La Cabaña.
They were reminiscent of trade fairs, political conferences, or international hotels and were
manufactured by the official workshop that produces all flags in Cuba. Replacing their
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appropriate colors with a grayscale, Prieto changed their designs, evoking a ghostly presence and
in some cases, the interchangeability of national banners (France, Italy, Mexico). Prieto aims to
re-create the national flag of every country recognized by the United Nations, symbolically
uniting the world, albeit in black-and-white. 561
Figure 122. Wilfredo Prieto, “Apolítico.” Installation, 2003
Other reports, such as the one published by Art Nexus by Julia Herzberg addresses other
relevant issues. She explores a larger range of artist participating at the event. Herzberg
distinguishes a series of subtopics criss-crossing the event, “political discourse, world events,
issues of identity, consumerism, travel/nomadic/territorial uprooting, and ecology”, among
others. 562 In an open way the author describes and connects works and artists, always offering a
contextual reading of their practices. Kaarina Kaikkonen (Finland), using old men’s jackets to
form the shape of a boat, commenting on the country’s long naval and fishing traditions and the
collective effort behind it. Navoj Altaf (India) presented a video installation where the blue
ocean water of the Indian Sea becomes red, referring to the blood spilled during the HinduMuslim riots in the State of Gujarat in India in 2002. During the incident thousands of Muslims
were killed by Hindu fundamentalists who retaliated after a group of unknown persons, alleged
by the Gujarat government to be Muslims, set fire to a train carrying Hindu religious pilgrims.
The pilgrims were returning from Ayodha where a sixteenth-century mosque had been almost
destroyed by Hindu extremists ten years ago. 563 One background sound is the lamentation of a
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Muslim child. Dario Oleaga (Santo Domingo) memorializes the 265 people who died in an
American Airlines flight (No. 587 going to Santo Domingo in October, 2001); they had been
forgotten in the aftermath of 9-11. In his installation titled “Y los sueños, sueños son: Pasaporte
al cielo” (Dreams are dreams: Passport to heaven) pillows (in the shape of a plane) and photos
submerged in water and frozen produced a state of transcendence. Gabriel Valansi (Argentina)
presented an installation of three panels that used images of the bombings of Kabul and Bagdad
during 2003, taking them for mass media coverage. The work comments on the supposed
neutrality of news-reporting and the use of communication-technology in the wars of the new
century.
Figure 123. Kaarina Kaikkonen, "Way." Installation, 2000- 2003
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Figure 124. Navjot Altaf, "Between Memory and History." Video, sound, installation. 2001 - 2003
Commenting on the social body, the author mentions, among others: Puerto Rican Rosa
Irigoyen’s video installation entitled “Nail Project” depicting the unusual subject of fingernail
decoration (a common practice among Caribbean women), and equating it to tattooing or
piercing as markers of gender, ethnicity, and social acceptation. The photographs and videos
show even disturbing images of decorated nails piercing human and animal skin; the video
pieces titled “Nailing On, Nailing During, and Nailing Off” create a sense of dignity and the
intricate process of decoration. American artist Alejandro Díaz following pop and minimalist
traditions, produces an installation titled “I Cuba.” Borrowing the format and style of the famous
slogan “I Love N.Y” Díaz produce a disturbing yet familiar comment on what Cuba has become.
As a Cuban American, the artist also plays with the dissatisfactions of both places, making sharp
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comments on the two. Alma Quinto from the Philippines addresses rape and fear, the artist
“whose head and gaze (were covered) with the words ‘Stop Rape,’ was dressed in a gown pieced
together with stories written by young girls about their tribulations.” 564
Figure 125. Alejandro Díaz, "I Cuba." Installation, 2003
For the 2000 Biennale the theoretical event had recovered some of its previous light; for
the 2003 symposia it came into full swing again. The Forum addressed from theoretical, as well
as current curatorial practices, the relevante issues, however, the exhibition itself remained
largely disconnected from the debates. This can be explained by the fact that the organizers of
the theoretical event where not involved in the discussions about the selection of the artists
participating in the Biennale. Nonetheless, after almost ten years the theoretical event was taken
care of, the Lam Center set up a team lead by Dannys Montes de Oca and assisted by group of
young scholars (some students) from the Department of Art History at Havana University. The
discussions took place at the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes in the Cuban section and the
Department of Arts and Letters at Havana University. The forum produced a volume that was
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presented simultaneously with the event, following the same path Herrera Ysla did in his
Biennale in 2000. The documents published are a thorough account of the diversity of topics the
forum addressed, from historical perspectives (Paul Ardenne, Ricard Ribenboin, Geeta Kapur),
to social engagement (Jose González, Bastian Gilbert, Rosa Martinez, Jessica Cusick, Laura de
la Mora), and theoretical developments (Annette Hurtig, Magaly Espinosa, Nicolas Bourriaud,
Shifra Goldman), among others. 565
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5.9
URBAN COLLAPSE, PANTHOM BIENNALE
“Walking around the magnificent Fortress of San Carlos de la Cabaña, I became so depressed. I just looked around,
trying to breathe and evoke the Bienal de la Havana’s past, when we did so much with practically nothing.”
Magda Elián Gonzalez 566
“We are walking along that self-reflection path because we are not pleased with the outcomes that apparently seem to
fulfill some of our expectations (not in recent biennials at least). Both the international context and difficult local conditions delay
a rigorous control over each of the steps to take, particularly in such winding and complex roads as ‘art paths’ are.”
Ibis Hernandez Abascal 567
“For the first time in the event’s history, the Cuban artists did not steal the show—or created an anti-capitalist zone of
cultural solidarity or any of those previous ideas that are tinged with antiquity and uselessness. The biennial is not looking at
Cuba. It’s not about Cuba any more, it just happens there. It is an art show in its middle age, enough of an institution to have clear
orders and borders but without enough money or vision to accomplish much within these.”
Rachel Weiss 568
Ninth Havana Biennale / Dates: 27 March - 27 April 2006
Main Theme: Dinámicas de la Cultura Urbana (Dynamics of Urban Cultures)
Artists, 99 from 37 countries (140 from 50 countries in total events)
Exhibitions: (94)
-Dinamicas de la Cultura Urbana (Dynamics of Urban Culture).
Solo exhibitions: Guillermo Kuitca (Argentina), Antoni Miralda (Spain), Shirin Neshat (Iran/U.S.), Jean
Nouvel (France), Lucy Orta (France), Anne and Patrick Poirier (France), Carlos Saura (Spain), Rivane
Neuenschwander (Brazil), El Anatsui (Ghana), Ana Tiscornia (Uruguay) and Spencer Tunick (U.S.)
Academic Event: Forum Idea 2006
Participants: Dannys Mostes de Oca (Cuban organizer), Jorge Albán (Costa Rica), Celia María Antonacci
Ramos (Brazil), Joaquín Barrientos (Mexico), Nicolas Bourriaud (France), José Luis Brea (Spain), Mary
Jane Carroll (Canada), Lucrecia Cippitelli (Italy), Amparo Chantada (Dominican Republic), Tereza de
Arruda (Brazil), Magaly Espinosa (Cuba), Fernando Farina (Argentina), Hervé Fisher (Canada), Rodolfo
Kronfle Chambers (Ecuador), Jacqueline Lacasa (Uruguay), Juan Llaverías Arasa (Spain), Susan Lord
(Canada), Janine Marchessault (Canada), Richard Martel (Canada), Raúl Ferrera Balanquet (CubaMexico), Santiago Olmo (Spain), Carlos Ossa (Chile), Vera M. Pallamin (Brazil), Gabriela Salgado
(Argentina-UK), Guy Sioui Durand (Canada), Humberto Velez (Panama), and Zuleiva Vivas (Venezuela).
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A series of measures that revoked the policies of reengagement established by the Clinton
administration (see the time line attached as appendix) during the mid and late 1990s had created
a new scenario in the political and social relationship between the U.S. and Cuba. A propaganda
machine had started also as preparation for the possible departure of Fidel Castro from power (he
actually stepped out in July, 2006, for a health-related problem, Castro relinquished his right to
be President in February, 2008, leaving his brother Raúl Castro in power after the local 2008
elections). In 2004 the American Embassy in Havana (Office of Interests they called it, which
works under a Swiss license) started a campaign. Using their building, located on the Malecon
between Old Havana and the District of Vedado, they broadcast messages against the regime
through a LED screen located in the upper story windows. The Cuban response, a memorial for
the “Martyrs” of the Revolution, was installed in front of the American building to block,
symbolically, the view of the messages and to send another (probably one of unity among
individuality). Big black flags with a white star on the center stand on strong flagpoles like a
forest, undulating freely and producing a stormy sound –due to the Caribbean ocean wind,
creating a resilient experience. The flags, however, have an interesting precursor in the
contemporary art scene of the island. As noted, in 2003 the young artist Wilfredo Prieto
presented “Apolitico”, a piece that became one of the land marks of that biennial, now in the
Daros collection in Germany. 569 Not even Prieto himself has commented on the relationship
between the two. 570 A propaganda battle had been initiated, and the Biennale was caught in the
middle of it.
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Figure 126. Propaganda war in the Havana's Malecon
The Ninth Havana Biennale took place in Havana City (and beyond) during the months
of March to May, 2006, under the banner “Dinámicas de la Cultura Urbana” (the Dynamics of
Urban Culture). The organizers, probably, decided to continue with one of the topics that had
been addressed in the past three installments (the last one). Perhaps they did this because of the
unsustainability and near collapse of the curatorial model, the same that had produced such
important results in the past. The leaderless Lam Center has not really recovered since the
departure of Llilian Llanes. She had autonomy and a direct line to some senior officials in the
government, making things workable even during the more complex moments of the special
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period. Since 1999, the Lam Center and the Biennale have had three directors (two senior
curators, Nelson Herrera Ysla and Hilda María Rodriguez, and for the ninth installment a new
agent coming from the Ministry of Culture, Ruben del Valle Lantarón). The lack of resources did
not allow the team to do field study; in addition, the contemporary art world has changed
dramatically in the last five years and the Biennale’s isolation from the rest of the world does not
help. A return to reification (painting in particular) and a slow movement towards conservative
aestheticism has been transforming the official landscape of the art world during the new
century. 571
In trying to cope with the history, size, and quality of the event, size apparently won.
Despite being one of the smallest Havana Biennales, it included 99 artists from 37 countries, plus
the parallel events that put the number of artists to 140, from 50 nations. The city map published
in flyers and programs showed the wide-spread reach of the event across Havana. This fact was
underlined by Herrera Ysla in his introductory text for the Biennale, and used also in a parallel
news-style publication titled Habana Urbana (printed 50,2000 copies, with free distribution
across the city). Herrera’s text was titled “Havana the Biggest Gallery in the World;” according
to official information there were 94 exhibitions total, 50 of them solo exhibitions, and more than
30 public interventions during the event.
This time the Biennale was more proactive in reaching the Cuban public than the
international one, which dropped from thousands to few hundreds (almost none were Americans)
affecting greatly the Cuban art market.
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Figure 127. Cover catalog 9th Havana Biennale, 2006
In order to cover the curatorial gaps, in their current format and reality, the event
recognized not only artists but also collectives, solo exhibitions, and even curatorial projects not
curated by the Lam Center’s team. That was the case for “AGUA-WASSER” (Water) a selection
of an exhibition that took place in Mexico City in 2003. Fifteen artists from Germany and
Mexico participated in the project, which look at the history and culture of the city, build over
what used to be a giant system of lakes, islands, and wetlands. A map of Tenochtitlan shows the
former cartography of today’s Mexico City and was used by the artists to recall Mexico City’s
former “balance with nature”. 572
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Figure 128. Agua-Waser. Collective project in Mexico City (2003). Model and map, 2006
Participating artist: Miguel Calderón / Arcángel Constantini / Minerva Cuevas / Iván Edeza / Helen Escobedo /
Thomas Glassford / Christian Jankowski / Anette Kuhn / César Martínez / Valeska Peschke / Betsabée Romero /
Peter Strauss / Frank Thiel / Diego Toledo
Another collective project product of the Biennale open structre was “Territorio São
Paulo” (Sao Paulo Territory), which intended to connect a group of collectives working on social
issues in one of São Paulo’s old building (appropriated by the artists). ARNSTV, Bijari,
Catadores de Histórias, Cía Cachorra, C.O.B.I.A, Contra Filé, among other groups were virtually
present in a niche gallery at the Cabaña Fortress in Cuba. Unfortunately, communication (via
fax) did not work and the idea was no more than that, a good idea, not even the documentation
arrived to give a sense of what happened with the collectives supporting social movements.
Other artists decided to live in Cuba for short periods of time in order to produce work in
actual connection to the city and its people. The more adventurous lived for months; this was the
case of Ricardo Herrera from Colombia. His work became a sort of ‘pimp my ride” event (the
TV show that repaired and customized cars on the U.S. West coast) in which he rebuild and
intervened more than 30 bikes. At the beginning of the special period hundreds of thousands of
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bikes were imported from China (given as a gift to the Cuban people) to fill the vacuum in fuel
and as a mode of transportation. Once the years passed they have been wornout and many times
put aside as an image of a period the Cubans do not want to remember.
Figure 129. Alvaro Ricardo Herrera, “Mecánico de Bicicletas.” Participatory Project, 2006.
A collective named CUBABRASIL that first took off in 2003 during that earlier event
also was invited in the 2006 installment. Artists from Brazil, Cuba, and Germany joined forces in
this project. They have produced uncounted street paintings, several large scale murals, many
workshops, art and video installations in the streets of Havana and Pinar del Rio. They also
worked as a network, inviting artists from other collectives. That was the case of the
BerlinBeamBoys group that produced a series of “Video Guerilleros” (guerrilla videos)
projecting images on the facades of buildings. The actions led to several operations with arrests
and questioning by the secret state police. For example, an action took place in a busy street in
old Havana on April 9th, 2006 near a pier where three Cubans where arrested for hijacking a ship
in order to leave the country in February, 2003. They were intercepted, sentenced and later
executed in an incident that had international repercussions in Cuba and on the Biennale. When
leaving the building six police cars waited. Three members of the CUBABRASIL collective
were arrested and questioned on suspicion of contra-revolutionary activities.
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Figure 130. Berlin Beam Boys and Cubabrasil, Urban Projections. 2006.
Another German collective working with Cuban artists undertaking public interventions,
which were more poetic and neutral, was the Black Hole Factory that mixed sound, images, and
technology, approaching the city from new perspectives and interacting and exchanging with the
local scene (and also leaving a trace for new media-artists through their collaboration and
horizontal work).
Figure 131. Black Hole Factory, “Taking Walls.” 2006
“Taking Walls” is a collage merging historical facts with surreal imagery collected in and around a specific
site. Live video and images extracted from a database of historical information are compiled by the artists and
projected directly back onto the surface of these historic structures. The music is based on field recordings and live
generated sounds in a real-time composition. Images: (top) Cine Yara in La Rampa, Vedado; (bottom left) La
Cabaña Castle; (right) Hotel Habana Libre (former Hilton Hotel), Vedado. The project was made in cooperation
with Sigi Torinus (USA) and José Seoane (Cuba).
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OMNI-Zona Franca, a collective that used to insert its activities into the everyday life and
which had received some attention during 2003, was also invited. The collective fuses poetry,
performance, installation, rap, and conga into a total work of art. Omni’s members have been
working together for over a decade. They define themselves as a group of action with a sociocommunitarian projection. The collective started as a society of organic-poets surrounding the
figure of writer-poet Juan Carlos Flores in the district of Alamar, seven miles from Havana. The
district was one of the first housing projects of the Revolution. Its aim was to foster an ideal
community of workers. The demographic composition of the district has marked the eclectic
production of this collective (their members do not have professional training); exiles from South
America, Eastern Europe, and Africa went to live there, establishing an extended network of
friends and family. Omni is the prefix of the terms, omnipotence, omniscience, and
omnipresence. Zona-Franca means Free-Trade-Zone (alluding to the condition of Havana as a
city-port). These features connect their work, a spiritual dimension that goes beyond the material
scarcity of their everyday experience. The use of poetry is central to their work; the word is their
medium, the body the support. Recently they have been working in collaboration with artists
from thirty countries in a sort of creative network. Thanks to that interaction, they have acquired
equipment (video cameras, computers and open source software) that helps to develop further
their communitarian enterprise. During the Biennale they presented more than twenty
performances, as well as action-events, two curatorial projects, poetry readings, video
projections (in collaboration with other groups), workshops, and a theatre-play; always using
Alamar as epicenter, its infrastructure and community.
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Figure 132. OMNI-Zona Franca, series of actions and screenings in Alamar. 2006
Among other artists working in similar ways was Margarita Pineda from Colombia, who
traveled and lived in Havana for a month to interact with people in the streets. Her work “Mapas
Mentales” (Mental Maps) are documents of personal stories and the environment of Cubans. She
exchanged used shirts for new ones and in a face-to-face conversation, the subject told her about
the physical activities and schedule across the city. After that Pineda inscribed such
conversations into paths in maps that were later stitched (by her) to the shirts. At the end of the
exhibition, she returned the shirts to the people she interviewed. A video shows the interviews,
the movements throughout the city, and the maps produced during this interaction. Other artists
such as Guiliano Montijo (Brazil), the youngest artist in the Biennale, assembled pieces of
recyclable materials to build games that resemble arcades and amusement parks, but now they
are made of wood, cardboard, wire, plastic lids, etc, for the inhabitants of the many inner cities
and poor neighbors of those cities in the development belt.
The French team of Anne and Patrick Poirier announced in a written statement that “we
prefer, whenever possible, to reside in the place, to meet with the inhabitants, to watch their way
of life, their landscape, their cities, their environment, their architecture, their memory, their
industries, etc.” Their inclusion provided a sense of the historical trajectory of this genre, that
was a major part of the curatorial concept for the present installment. The couple used sugar as
their material to build a precarious model of a utopian city in the whiteness of the white gallery
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at the San Francisco Convent. The gallery became a centerpiece of parallel and official
exhibitions of the Biennale.
Figure 133. Margarita Pineda, “Mental Maps.” Participatory project, 2006
By Cuban standards these insertions into the city’s life were common. Collectives during
the 1980s use to create ambiguous spaces where art and the city mingled. 573 Rene Francisco,
although he was not officially part of the biennial that year, created work that was a corner-stone
to the dynamics of urban culture. Francisco is a teacher in Havana at the Instituto Superior de
Arte (ISA) and is well known for his collaboration with Ponjuán. One of his current and
enduring projects “Galería DUPP” (for a pragmatic education) was an experiment which he and
his students have undertaken outside the classroom. Many important new artists had come out of
it. After creating the work, they took it to the streets for exhibition and mounted round-the-clock
showings of the works, often in the windows of shops and along the malecón in Havana. In this
way they are reaching very large audiences and extending the classroom in ways that promote
horizontal learning and teaching.
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In his latest trilogy project Rene Francisco identified a problem in a community (The
Romerillo Neighborhood, a poor area close to the ISA) and surveyed the inhabitants, asking what
they want to improve (in aesthetic and social terms). The community recognized the elderly
(female in particular) as the most needy. Francisco and his team worked with them to find what
they can do for the old women. The two works already completed by Francisco are “La Casa de
Rosa” (2003) and “El Patio de Nin” 2005. What they did was to rebuild the social spaces of the
two poorhouses where these elderly women live. This social and artistic experience connected
artists and community to work toward a common objective. Francisco showed photo and video
documentation of his project “El patio de Nin,” using as screen the side of Rosa’s house. It was
also presented in a market show at the Miramar Trade Center. Rachel Weiss commented:
“viewed on gleaming flat-screen TVs—an extraordinary luxury in Cuba—the project’s humility
underwent a kind of conversion. In the context of a biennial packed with evidence of social
remedies—art of repainting and reclammation and repair—René Francisco’s project stood out as
a masterwork, the result of a technique and persona honed carefully over the years and presented
in exquisite detail.” 574
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Figure 134. René Francisco Rodríguez, “La Casa de Rosa” & “El Patio de Nin." Video-projection at
Romerillo’s neighborhood, 2006
The Collective Caja Lúdica (Fun Box) from Guatemala was in charge of opening the
Biennale (unfortunately they could not make it to Havana). The collective is actually a culturalNGO that works with street children and youth from the poor neighborhoods in Guatemala. In a
carnival-style procession, the collective celebrates culture, tradition, and identity. Their street
demonstrations are famous because there are balance and fusion dances, theater, and a public
spectacle in which a major narrative comes into being. The carnival style parade underlines the
problems the communities (youngsters in particular) they work with face in the changing policies
and increasing urbanization of the county.
Colombian Jaime Avila also works with youths and the city; he shows the struggle for
space in the favelas, communas, and outskirts of the cities of the Global South. His series of
“Metros Cuadrados” (Square-Meters), a measure of space and status, makes connections with the
minimalists of the 1970s and the brutality of the abstract expressionists. Juxtaposing the objects,
which are cubes (made of smaller cubes) prepared from aerial photographs taken by Avila in his
travels in Latin America, he gives workshops to youth in different cities in the region. Avila also
photograph street-youth (the so-called gamins or desechables /un-recycled in his country), under
the series title “Cuarto Mundo” (Fourth World). He presents the images as in a fashion show,
they are placed in the transitory space of spectacle in the cities of the South. 575 Brazilian Eduardo
Srur presented his counter-mediatic work titled “Attack.” He performs and documents (using a
jacket with the logo MIDIA) actions that are subversive assaults against billboards of fashion
‘goddesses’ and products where the new canon of beauty is advertised on a mass scale. The
bombing (with color) of such images, creates another image (and an artistic practice connected to
abstract expressionism and neo-realism) that navigates between the legal and illegal. A concrete
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statement on the media-saturated world and the city as market place (not as a museum), the
physical and organic body versus the material and the social body are central in his work.
Figure 135. Eduardo Srur, “Attack.” Action-documentation, 2004-6
Rachel Weiss summarizes, from her perspective, the 2006 edition.
“The Ninth Havana Biennial was a mystifying event, complicated by disorganization and
rumors of problems. Shows did not open, artists and their works did not arrive, and projects did
not materialize. These difficulties were variously attributed to illness and staff changes in the
biennial leadership, storm damage to exhibition facilities, and the recurring budgetary constraints
that have made the biennial an ever-precarious proposition. The production values of the catalog,
however, were the highest yet and the text was translated into English for the first time… The
biennial has become an established and routine event. It has become a large exhibition of
artworks.” 576
Weiss is one of the most critical figures with respect to the Biennale, usually accurate
when comparing the different moments of the event. She has been visiting Cuba for more than
two decades and has built a career out of writing and showing Cuban art (among other things).
Writing on the relationship between the event and the city, she recognizes that it remained polite.
“The intermediary spaces—both physical and performance—that existed for some years have
been fully incorporated and digested by the exhibition apparatus. The collateral projects were all
sanctioned by the biennial office, or they evaporated.” The author brought also the issue of the
alleged crisis in Cuban art, arguing that “few artists showed work in their own homes. Much of
the energy of past biennials related to the question of politics, or of Cuba as a central concern,
but this biennial clearly wished to engage itself otherwise.” 577
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An interminable procession of photographs occupied the walls of La Cabaña’s galleries,
many of them tracing the congestion, deterioration, and disorder of an urban environment.
Among others described by Weiss are, the aerial views of an unnamed metropolis, staggering in
its enormity and anonymity, by Dimitris Tzoublekis from Greece; images of archetypal broken
African streets lined with buses, by Akindobe Akinbiyi from Nigeria; and multiple-exposure
views giving form to the invisible electronic networks coursing across the urban “Netropolis,” by
Michel Najjar from Germany.
Figure 136. Michel Najjar, "Netropolis" (Shanghai, Tokio, Berlin). Composite image, 2006
Architecture has always been part of the Biennale. Weiss also refers to one of the
interesting works that brought historical revisions and issues of conservation in architectural
history to the fore –e.i. the archival project, titled “Archivo Brasilia” (Brasilia Archive), by
Brazilian couple Lina Kim and Michael Wesely. It consisted of thousands of digitally restored
images (from a total of around 100,2000) from badly deteriorated negatives of urban plans and
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housing developments that led to the building of the utopian Brasilia. In doing so, the artists
“concentrated on images of the people who built Brasilia and who clearly were not destined to be
its inhabitants. The result emphasized the sense that Brasilia’s utopianism had yielded an eerily
evacuated urbanism.” 578
Weiss also cites unrealized projects, for example, one by former Wifredo Lam Center
curator Magda Elián González titled “Pacemaker.” According to her, it was reduced in status
from an “exhibition” to a “project” and then cancelled by the authorities—after it was approved
and rejected by three separate venues—for reasons that were never evident. According to the
curators at the Lam Center, the shortage of resources made alternative projects impossible to
ealize, starting with many by the artists on the official list. That is perhaps why González treated
the Biennale so negatively in her combined article with Canadian curator and critic David Moos.
González states:
“Over the course of its last three editions, the Bienal de la Habana just plummeted. Each
new edition has been worse than its precedent. Why? For innumerable reasons, I assume. The
state apparatus’ control of every project is certainly a factor. So are financial restrictions.
Professional qualifications also figure prominently. With the exception of prestigious curators
like Ibis Hernandez Abascal and José Manuel Noceda Fernández, most of the staff at the
Wifredo Lam Art Centre is less than adequately qualified.” 579
González seems horrified with the results of this edition and in the report published by
Art Papers comments, “I was just talking with my former-colleagues at the Wifredo Lam Centre.
I asked them who selected the artists. Why such terrible museography? Why so many empty
spaces? They could not provide any logical answers, beyond the fact that the art institution
follows strict rules whereby ‘parallel projects can’t be exhibited in the same series of official
exhibitions.’” 580 This is interesting, since she was presenting an independent project to be
displayed with the Biennale using official resources. In the same tone Moss, the co-author of the
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piece, goes on to compare the sophistication and robust work of Kcho with the “inspired but
insipid, romantic dreaming about metropolitan reality” of the Biennale. 581
Both González and Weiss praise some of the works shown parallel to the Biennale. While
Weiss finds Los Carpinteros’ piece at Gallería Habana unworthy because of its repetitive and
boring quality (a model of the Morro Lighthouse) titled “Faro Tumbao” (Falling Lighthouse),
González states that the “light of the tumbled beacon was still functioning in the darkened
gallery. It is a beautiful metaphor that pays homage to the Cuban people and to artist’s enduring
vitality.” Two projects at the Museo Nacional (Cuban Section) responded to the well known
critical capacity of Cuban art. The first was the collective mural orchestrated by Flavio
Garciandía (a Cuban living in Mexico for more than ten years). “Auge o decadencia del arte
Cubano” (Rise and Decadence of Cuban Art) was a twenty-meter-long canvas painted with
stripes, with colors determined by roughly 150 Cuban artists of various generations and
tendencies, from a palette of options that Garciandía provided. The second, titled “El Museo
Tomado” (Taken Museum) showed video pieces by Tania Bruguera (La Isla en Peso /Island’s
Weight), Lázaro Saavedra (Síndrome de Sospecha /Suspicion Syndrome), and José Toirac
(Tengo / I Have). Garciandía’s extravagant project underscored its deep cynicism. “The final
phase of Cuban art, it seemed to be saying, consists of this—it is nothing, a non-piece. Bringing
everyone together felt not like an act of reclamation but rather a swan song.” 582 The video
section that lasted just a few days (because of the cost of renting equipment in Havana)
addressed several issues, Saavedra’s video showed images of his own eyes in a quarter-frame of
the screen, suspiciously peering up, down and across at themselves in the other quadrants.
Toirac’s video used sign-language to recreate black poet Nicolás Guillén’s famous piece “Juan
con nada ayer, Juan con todo hoy” (I, Juan with nothing only yesterday, and today with
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everything). Weiss comments on how taking the speech from the well-known ode makes the
piece one of the sharpest commentaries in the Biennale.
González and Weiss agree that alternative spaces still function as niches for remarkable
work (less in the case of Weiss, who argues that the vitality is gone). La Huella Múltiple, a
project by the artists Abel Barroso, Ibrahim Miranda, and Sandra Ramos, organized an exhibition
celebrating their ten years of working together at the Convento de San Francisco de Asís. Acting
as living history, the exhibition included a display of artists’ books made over the years by the
writer Orlando Hernandez in collaboration with a list of artists that reads like an abbreviated
history of the period. “The project invites leading artists to do an intervention that takes
printmaking to a higher level.”
583
Espacio Aglutinador also presented a small exhibition with
pieces by Sandra Ceballos (the director of the space) and other young artists without major
coverage.
A work that enjoyed much attention was Wilfredo Prieto’s “Grease, Soap, Banana.” The
piece was presented at the gigantic gallery at Convento de Santa Clara (know also as
CENCREM). Paradoxically, his work consisted of “the most minimal operation possible”; it was
just a grease spot, a bar of soap, and a banana placed in the middle of the gallery’s floor. It was
exhibited parallel to an exhibition that became the blockbuster of the Biennial. An intervention
project that called together hundreds of artists to work on old refrigerators, “Manual de
Instrucciones” (Instructions Manual), shared the same space. 584 The show was so attractive
(becoming popular even in Miami’s exile community due to the coverage by CNN and the
Miami Herald) that Prieto’s project because it happened without being noticed; it consisted of
two phases (in Phase One, the banana was intact, and in Phase Two, which depended on a
spectator for its realization, the banana was squashed and the spectator slipped).
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Figure 137. Wilfredo Prieto, "Grease, Soap, Banana." Minimal installation, 2006
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Among the avalanche of poor work and abundant digital photography, a group of works
stood out. Roberto Stephenson’s (Haiti) photographs alluded to the current situation of his
country. Torn apart by political unrest, Haiti is still in a limbo-state/ the phantasmagoria of the
past hunts the nation. Stephenson’s images mix the forces of the modern city, the media, dump
sites, and empty streets with faces reflectiong the uncertain future of his people. The North Front
Project from Belize presented an installation composed of a series of photographs, videos and
objects reflecting the social impact of disenfranchised groups in that Caribbean nation. Its Afrocitizens have been pushed to the edges of society; they find refuge in alcohol and drugs and live
at dark. The installation compares them with street dogs and establishes a touching connection
among the subjects portrayed. Young Cuban photographer Alejandro Gonzalez documented the
night life in the streets of Havana. Since the crisis in the 90s, a series of subcultures have
emerged, some of them out of the tourist –riven machine, such as prostitution at all levels, the
drug trade, and addiction all mixed up in a cocktail of international tourism and a busy night life.
Despite that, alcohol has never been banned; public consumption of it was prosecuted
previously. Gonzalez not only documents the sites but the types, fashions and behavior (gothic –
rockers, rappers, gay, punks, etc.), allowing a direct contact with individual features in a society
treated and constructed as “equal”. Oscar Bonilla (Uruguay) followed this anthropological trend
(more as an archeologist than as an ethnographer) and registed a certain style in graffiti. The
subversive aspect of the graffiti talks about the city and its messages, assembling them in a sort
of meta-text almost as in an ancient Egyptian style as cryptology. Bonilla underlined the subtext
or unconsciousness of global urban cultures.
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Figure 138. Roberto Stephenson, Untitled. Digital print, 2006.
Figure 139. The North Front Street Project (collective). Photos by Richard Holder, Installation, 2006
Figure 140. Alejandro González, "1:47 a.m., 25 de junio del 2005, Vedado", etc. Lambda print, 2005-06
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Figure 141. Oscar Bonilla, "Puntos de Fuga." Photographs, 2006
Senegalese artist Doust creates a world that comes from his observations of the
development of urban life in Africa. His gouaches are imprinted with a sensitivity and brightness
rarely found. His video-animations are made with pieces of paper on a sandy beach. In a day of
work, Doust created a city out of small pieces of paper, first a village –but and at the end of the
day the grown city is washed away by the rising ocean. The crumpling image of a Third World
city, with a sound-track made especially for the piece, works as an apocalyptical but poetical
vision. Popular culture, history, religiosity, and the market are fused in digital photographs by
Bolivian artist Raquel Schwartz. She presented the multiple faces of a society that debates its
cultural identity in a project of reconciliation between tradition and contemporaneity in the midst
of a convulsed political process. Miguel Alvear’s photos are devoted to the same issue. Trained
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as film maker, the Ecuadorian artist displayed images that work as still-frames from baroquesoap operas or postmodern revisions of colonial art.
The exhibition venues were also full of images of city-scapes, showing and commenting
on how the city is almost a syndrome in the art world. It has been outlined in a masterful way by
critics and writers throughout the centuries, like Baudelaire and Benjamin on Paris (or in the
novel The Perfume by Patrick Suskind), Alejo Carpentier’s Havana in his “Century of Lights”,
or Naguib Mafuz’s Cairo in the “Alley of Miracles”, or Lisbon in José de Saramago’s “The
Death of Ricardo Rei,” among others. Many cityscapes were present during this biennial. These
are some of them. Spanish artist Jordi Colomer’s moving city-models were performatic and
playful embodiments of urban centers of the global net (Barcelona, Brasilia, Bucarest, Osaka) in
his series titled “Anarquitekton.” The FA+ collective (Ingrid Falk and Gustavo Aguerre) applied
gold leaf to little filth spots on the streets of Old Havana. Cuban Carlos Fernández Montes de
Oca produced t-shirts and baseball-cups reading “El arte purifica” that were worn by men
walking the streets with garbage cans and brooms. Dolores Cáceres, from Argentina, presented
darkened metal plates in which she tells a dramatic chronology of her country from the 60´s up
to the present. Each piece, which may be read while the spectators sit on chairs with printed
maps of the streets in Buenos Aires, coincided with her childhood and growing up times, and
which she entitled “Dolores de Argentina” (Pains of Argentina), the title makes a double
reference, biographical and historical simultaneously. Alejandro Ramírez’ video of Costa Rica’s
national anthem, in which the lyrics are made out of graffiti interventions in the capital city, San
José, worked on new constructions of citizenship in the global age. Cuban Roberto Diago
demonstrated the precariousness of housing in the neighborhoods and cities of the island by
means of an installation that consisted of replicas of slums on a reduced scale. Urban growth by
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displacement from rural areas is a sign of the harsh times Cuba has suffered. Its social, cultural
and economic consequences are striking the major cities, in particular Havana, that has a
population of more than 2 million people (more than 20% of the total population of Cuba). This
work comes out of his participation in the California workshops during the Eight Biennale. Liu
Guanyung, a Chinese artist based in Germany, displayed in a joyful way the new night
experiences that certain cities of his gigantic Asian country experience today, due to a delirious
mixture of outdoor meals, tai chi, improvised musicians, dancers, and magicians, all mixed in the
same street for the joy and curiosity of passers-by and occasional consumers. The Passer By
Museum (in the tradition of Duchamp, Broodthaders, and the Street Museum, etc..) of María
Alós and Nicolás Dumit (México and the Dominican Republic) created a temporary pedestrian
museum at various points in the city, by placing a dismountable booth that would welcome
inside it all those things that pedestrians wanted to donate, so as to form a future collection of
personal belongings (in Havana, it was not successful, since the material conditions are still
dire). Chilean Pablo Guevara placed a series of small images in several venues, showing
watchtowers (like the ones that still exist in several Chilean cities) to remind viewers of the
presence of surveillance over all movement.
Approximately seventy artists from various countries (invited and not) participated in
urban intervention projects. As in the case of Jamainitas, Cuban artists José Fuster transformed
his house and the entire area into a sculpture park. The train station near Old Havana was also
taken by art students and the few street vendors (always persecuted by the police) were asked to
interact with travelers. Fashion workshops and shows took place in several places, in particular
in the Cuban Pavilion and the central train station; they look more like a fairs than art
exhibitions.
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Figure 142. Fashion workshops and related events in the Cuban Pavilion
Carey Lovelace also wrote a note for Artnet titled “Art amid the Rubble.” In it Lovelace
describes an apocalyptical view of Havana, the Castro regime (he actually calls the Cuban
President something of an installation artist because of the monument in front of the U.S.
embassy), and the Biennale. 585 Lovelace argues that, “things indeed felt disturbingly quiet” and
when referring to the absence of collectors (something that she connects with the new restrictions
on event humanitarian trips) and Americans in general during the opening, observes that “maybe
all those well-heeled museum groups and flavor-of-the-month collectors who could have come if
they really, really tried had known something that we hadn’t (where they at the Sotheby’s
auction of Chinese art?)”. 586
The Swedish magazine Heterogenésis also published a complete report of the Biennale in
its Fall edition of 2006. In it, the curators of the event made an evaluation of their work and the
general performance of the Biennale (in 2003 and 2006). The self critical tone used by curators
envisaged radical changes for the future of the Biennale, its reach and impact on contemporary
art and culture. 587
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Figure 143. Participation by World areas Havana Biennale 1997 – 2006
The support by European agencies is attested to in the increasing participation of artists
coming from Northern Europe which increased from 5% in the First Biennale, to 6% in the Fifth,
to 17% by the last edition. Asian and Middle Eastern artists have a constant percentage of
participation (around 4 to 6 percent for Asian and 3 to 5 percent for Middle Eastern). Africa has
decreased from a high of 15% in the Fifth to a low of 9% in the last edition. The peak of North
American artists was reached during the fifth, dropping from a 14% to a 4% by the ninth. Latin
America and the Caribbean have maintained a constant proportion of participation.
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6.0
CONCLUSION
“Biennial Exhibitions do not have to resemble one another; do not have to be similar so as to complement a universal
referential framework that increasingly shows its internal differences: They have to build their own voices around them, and
contribute to the universal culture that should be everybody’s heritage based on them.”
Nelson Herrera Ysla
Incidents such as those mentioned at different points of this review of the nine editions of
the Biennale, which invariably lead to rumors around how the Biennale handled difficult
situations, create a climate of suspicion and mistrust. The problem is that these incidents can be
magnified to become the whole picture of an event that remains necessary in an increasingly
homogenous world of art. The banner of the “global” and the planetary artist can eclipse the
important questions that need to be addressed from a critical and peripheral view. A critical
distance is important, even if it comes with an ingredient of subversive and sometimes vague
rhetoric. The Havana Biennale implies the establishment of micro-politics, where a bunch of
human relations are supported in micro-utopias, which produced an image of how the world may
look like. It was the Biennale’s early task and objective to generate an alternative with the global
conversation because the voice of the “other” did not have a place in the centers of power that
defined the nature of contemporary art, centers that governed the production, reception,
consumption, and significance of innovative culture.
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This fact underlines the contradictory stand that the event took on from its inception.
Ideas of modernity and modernism, of postmodernity and postmodernism, and the postcolonial
were used by Third World artist and intellectuals in the constitution of new spaces and practices
of visibility. At first, the event tried to survey the South in a sort of self-ethnography, very much
in the fashion of the West, as a mirror albeit in reverse. Apparently, the curators understood the
implication of the creation of new taxonomies, and that they were not exempt from hierarchies.
They have been fighting this challenge ever since. From national representations to regional
perspectives to global pictures, they have changed the route several times but the problem
persists. This implies that Cuba is not free from its colonial past and continues to build
knowledge in the shadow of modernity. The curators understand the achievements of the
revolutionary process of 1959; like all Cubans they know that the struggle for the decolonization
of the mind is a long-term battle. Since their fight for independence, and later for the
revolutionary process, the early alliance with the now extinct Second World and from its
leadership of the non-aligned Cuba has become a prime target for the different forces at play. 588
Dan Cameron has argued that “the Biennale meant by the time, for the Cuban
Government, a tool to present a reading, a look at Cuba that was especially favorable to the idea
of cultural development and cultural progressiveness.” The Biennale has opened up a forum for
that possibility, and it is still in the state of pure potentiality (in Deulezian terms), virtuality is its
double and the real is its objective. The work of art still needs a place to confront openly the
horizon of its ideas, ideologies, histories, and stories. The Havana Biennale has opened a door
towards that new field of knowledge and practice in which honest exchanges have taken place,
although sometimes, when made in isolation and under pressure, they seem ever elaborate or
unimportant. The Biennale, like many other such exhibitions, is a space for open dialogue that
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has been and still is as necessary today as it was in the beginning. Nonetheless, the Biennale
suffers the same problems as those other mega-shows. Without taking into account the
“ideological” dimension behind it, it is a sprawling event, as argued by Guy Brett “impossible to
digest in one visit.” Often, it has required more direction, documentation, and guidance. The
Biennale, also, without intending to, establishes market niches for new art and emerging
hierarchies for regional or individual practitioners. Additionally, it suffers from misuse by the
kind of politics of representation at stake when asking for support from official entities and/or
institutions in similar countries in the Third World.
Luis Camnitzer evaluates the Havana Biennale in these terms. On the positive side, the
Biennale has been: “Creating a forum for artists who find it difficult to enter the mainstream;
stressing the intellectual exchange among the participating and with Cuban artists in general by
giving prominence to courses, symposia, and public events at a par or over the exhibition itself;
breaking down the effects the U.S. blockade had on art; and helping to create a cultural selfawareness to the periphery at large over nation-state chauvinist constraints.”
He notes also that, “the process reached a peak with the 3rd and 4th biennials and reached
a plateau with the 5th.” Camnitzer have not seen the following biennials, but from his
participation, connections, and interaction with artists, curators, and scholars he concludes that
“the Biennale has gone down hill.” This is explained by him, partially, and not in order of
importance: “The difficulty for the Cuban population to access the dispersed exhibition spaces
due to poor transportation; The consequent transformation of the Biennale into an event for
foreign art tourists; the proliferation of other biennials on the periphery that followed the Havana
model and made Havana somewhat obsolete; The change of the art scene in Havana favoring the
capitalist model of the individualist self-promoting artist.” Camnitzer affirms that the Biennale
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evolved into a showcase to appeal collectors and critics, rather than continue its cultural
formation task. He concludes adding, “the tiredness of the biennial model internationally.” 589
Therefore, while many of the initial concepts that informed the creation of the Biennale
are still valid and relevant, among them: Space – Location – Locale. Neither Cuba nor the
institution has been able to maintain them on the same level as time has changed the rules of the
artworld and the Cuba itself.
The Biennale’s contradictory nature (its ups and downs, its adjustments and flexibility,
because of the changing political, economic, and aesthetic circumstances) is proof of how
relevant it is as a space of confrontation. The active role of the event not only in artistic issues,
but in raising academic interest in the art of the South and its counter-historical narratives, as
well as its disentanglement from the artworld – by its conscious pushing for a relational aesthetic
right from the beginning, which has brought to light the work of artists from Latin America,
Africa, and Asia – are perhaps the only way to reconcile such inner contradictions. Is that
contradiction that the postcolonial world (including contemporary Latin America) suffers, one
that makes it pre and postmodern at the same time; a contradiction that had produced some of the
most interesting art in recent decades. The re-narration of the many histories of the Global South
and the confrontation with the contemporary conditions of production makes of the Biennale a
space of possibility, not of definition. The necessity of a new imperative and a new moral and
ethical constitution for an art event that was born in a clearly polarized world and that evolved to
be part of the mainstream is just an echo of what can be accomplished with the tenacity and
activist perspectives of individuals, collectives, and institutions that have supported, and
accompanied the Biennial in its more than twenty-five years of existence.
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Figure 144. Pascale Marthine Tayou (Cameroon). In-situ installations, 6th and 9th Havana Biennale,
1997 - 2006
These pieces by Tayou, suggest an artist attempting to reconcile local traditions with global ones. Their
ritualistic tone seems echoed in the use of space as a performatic of movement, adaptation, and placement (of local
found objects and personal memorabilia). His work is a reflection of his nomadic life as an African artist who travels
the world. Globalism, nationalism, and localism are topics often present in his installations.
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As noted in the introduction, some critics have argued that, after the accomplishments of
Documenta11, there is little that Havana can do for the art of the so-called Global South.
Nonetheless, the symbolic centrality and the global impact of Documenta makes a comparison
with the humble, but extraordinary efforts made by Havana quite unfair. Documenta11
recognized the artistic production of the “postcolonial constellation” (a term used by Okwui
Enwezor) during the second half of the 1990s and presented it to the global audience in Kassel in
2002 (platform five of the event). 590 It also brought to the fore what other local, regional, and
international events, such as those in São Paulo, Cairo, Dakar, Istanbul, Johannesburg, etc., have
done for the global circuit in recent decades. Today the assertion of the inclusion of the arts
coming from the margins of the art world (in geographical, theoretical, and artistic terms) is
fundamental to the understanding of the art of the 21st century.
We might grasp the achievements of events such as the Havana Biennale more clearly if
we compare it to the much celebrated Documenta11 for the sake of historical inflection on
contemporary art history. The curatorial discourse around Documenta11 was strongly set against
all forms of simplistic antinomies, responding also clearly to the reductive focus of other events
in the past, such as Primitivism and Magiciens (among others). Enwezor’s take on the issue, in
part informed by his open mind and collaborative spirit, challenged Magiciens and other views
based on the notion of critical-distance, preferring a “world of proximities.” It is possible to
argue that Enwezor has been influenced by people (working in Latin American art) such as
Gerardo Mosquera, with whom he worked for the second Johannesburg Biennial in 1998, and by
his interaction with other young curators such as Carlos Basualdo and Octavio Zaya – twin
brother of Antonio Zaya, important collaborator in Havana since 1994 – who introduced him to
artists such as Lam, Oiticica, Clark, Getino, and Solanas, in addition to the new contingent of
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contemporary artists coming out in the 1990s from the region. 591 In shaping his view of Latin
American and Caribbean art, Enwezor had been informed by an important faction of postcolonial
art and theoretical production. In 1996, Mosquera argued for the anti-taxonomic universality of
Lam’s oeuvre working from a Third Word perspective. This approach breaks the bipolar,
oppositional way of thinking which supposedly has condemned Latin America and, by extension,
Africa’s modernization to a back seat in the progression of the mainstream narrative. While
events such as Magiciens de la terre legitimized its curatorial choices through a cult of
individual expression following modern canons, the Havana Biennale and later Documenta11
sought to give voice to the multitude. In the introductory text for Documenta11, Enwezor
advocates an “anthropology of proximity,” probably informed by Havana as presented earlier in
this text. Enwezor has been called a reformer in curatorial practice for his propositions in
Johannesburg (Trade Routes: History and Geography, October – December 1997) and
Documenta11 (June – September 2002), as well as in his many exhibitions, publications, and
cultural projects. It is possible to argue that Havana’s methodology of the curator-scholar,
curator-traveler, curatorial-collective, and open-laboratory (that has followed the wandering of
hybrid producers along these years) was important in some definitions of Documenta11. What
many critics contended regarding Documenta11 was how its low discourses – regarding identity
politics, basic products, and dire aesthetics attempted to destroy the “quality” and “materiality”
of the work of art. 592 These concerns informed criticisms of the literalist approach and taxonomic
impulses of artists in Documenta 11 such as On Kawara, Dieter Roth, Hanne Darboven, and
Joelle Tuerlinck. “They also undermined the efficacy of Yinka Shonibare's installation, in which
he exchanged a sophisticated critique of Victorian claims of racial and cultural purity for a
melodramatic focus on explicit scenes of Victorian debauchery.” 593 Documenta11 got rid of
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provenance, professional training, and sophistication of technique (without risking quality) for
content, discourse, and substance, something Havana has always done.
The idea of setting the exhibition in a series of five platforms promoted the paradigm of a
multi-center event and the curator as explorer. Havana had done the same when participating as
an institution in the consolidation of events in Africa, Central America, the Caribbean, and South
America during and after consolidating its network of friends and support around the world. In
Documenta11, the first four platforms were interdisciplinary critical explorations of art, politics,
and society (and took place on four continents). The fifth platform was the exhibition itself in
Kassel. Havana has always been a place of inter- and multi-disciplinary debates were discussions
are not necessarily based on the specificities of art but in the conditions of life, and, by extension,
the cultural production of the areas of the world in question. The exhibitions since 1989 have
been characterized by the same dialogues and debates.
In 2002, Documenta11 addressed at the core the crucial discussion on the problematic
sense of totality delivered in modern exhibitions, blockbusters, and art biennials (the image of a
black box contesting the history of the white, pristine, space of art was widely discussed).
Havana had shown in its no less problematic and sometimes gratuitous fragmentation of the
exhibition complex the dissemination of artists and spectators around and across Havana city,
and sometime across the shores of the Caribbean and Florida’s Keys, obstructing any sense of
totality. That impossibility of grasping the whole is deliberately produced, on the one hand, to
demonstrate a sort of world view; on the other, as a response to an overwhelming production that
cannot possibly be contained in a single event. As noted by Rasheed Araeen, spite of its radical
attempts to rethink the discourse of contemporary art, Documenta11 did not succeed in
disrupting the West's drive for global hegemony – the same happens with the Havana Biennale.
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“Its interrogation of the possibility of avant-garde action was criticized as a very conservative
and institutional interpretation of contemporary culture, one that emphasized precisely the
occidental paradigms that Documenta11 targeted in its counter narrative.” 594
The Havana Biennale as part of the new Cuban economy helped establish a market for
new art, producing emerging hierarchies for regional or individual practitioners. Today it is
trying to regain its past strength as a space of resistance. Perhaps to contest or complete what
Enwezor’s “The Unhomely: Phantom scenes in global society,” his exhibition for the 2006
Seville Biennial (BIACS2) attempted. On the issue Luis Camnitzer notes:
The (Havana) Biennale has tried to maintain politicized topics (and I have contributed
essays for some of the catalogues), but generally speaking I think the issue of politics in art is
much more complex than a topic, a title or the narrative content of a piece. All this would be a
long discussion that escapes these questions. What always was remarkable in the Havana
Biennial is its lack of dogmatism or directives to the artists. The art exhibited was always
determined by the artist and there probably is as much formalist stuff in the Biennale as there is
anywhere else. The Biennale always was a showcase and not a pamphlet. The critique I may be
performing is toward the use and function of the showcase format. 595
Figure 145. Las Cartujas convent, site for the BIACS2 (Seville, Spain). Discussion about the biennial in 2006
(Enwezor at the center of the table)
391
Has the Havana Biennale been responding to the changing conditions of art production in
the so-called Global South, or, as some argue, is it just a platform for Cuban artists for the global
market? How can it improve its reach of new art (if needed)? Camnitzer notes:
Again, I should not give an uninformed answer here. My possibly irresponsible
impression is that there is a need to rigorously analyze the mission of the Bienal and find a new
format to revitalize it. Liverpool decided that the function of its Biennial is not to compete with
others, but to look at the city and reactivate an urban center that was dying after the port was
reorganized by the container traffic. The Bienal do Mercosul in Porto Alegre decided to
address the local public and become a pedagogical tool instead of continuing the fetishism of
objects. I don’t know if Havana took stock and redesigned itself sufficiently…
More than before, I do believe in the local function of both artists and exhibitions. The
global notion favors people that can travel and further affirms the affluent middleclass as
public and generator of values. The first five Biennales seemed to discard that narrow public
and sponsor an affirmation of cultural identity that in turn helped resist hegemonic values. I do
believe that both Liverpool and Porto Alegre are starting to deal with this and they may
provide the alternative to the mega-gallery. Networks today are not any more reduced to
geography; they are what I call infographic. The biennials, if they want to really do something,
have to identify their networks and take responsibility for their choices. 596
The tenth edition, which will celebrate the twenty-fifth anniversary of its foundation, has
called for a new meeting in Havana in 2009 under the banner of “Integration and Resistance in
the Global Age.” In light of the new conditions of life on the planet, the Biennale fights back
with a call for a political and ethical position of the Global South with respect to the
homogenizing forces acting now on a planetary scale. 597
6.1
LAST WORD. TENTH HAVANA BIENNALE
From March 27th to April 30th, 2009 the Havana Biennale returned to celebrate its 25th
anniversary. On this occasion the event has been called together under the curatorial theme
“Integration and Resistance in the Global Era”. Up to 300 artists from 44 countries were present
and the event returned to its most glorious days. If size matters, the 2009 edition spoke lauder to
392
its critics, unfortunately it also opened the space to see through its crevices to notice how it has
come back to the spectacular rather than the insightful. With the return of politics as usual in
Cuba (the Castro brothers more stringent than ever in which has been call the retrorevolution). 598 Spaces for dissent are still scarce in the Island and Internet has become a forum in
which bloggers find ways to says what they think. During one of the opening events of the
Biennale a performance was schedule in the Lam Center, a double feature: Tania Brugera and
Guillermo Gomez-Peña would perform ‘live’ for the big crowd gather in Havana (among them
Gerardo Mosquera).
On Monday March 30, 2009 an open microphone (and echo of Brugera’s 2003 piece)
was settle in the central patio of the Lam Center. In a sort of public exercise of her “Catedra de
Conducta” (featured in the Biennale in Galería Habana) was ready to start. The first to come to
speak was Yoani Sanchez, the most important blogger of Cuba (her blog Generacion Y has been
ranked in the top 10th of the New York Times). A day after her public (physical) declaration she
wrote “An unforgettable night yesterday at the Wifredo Lam Center, thanks to the performance
artist Tania Bruguera. A podium with microphones, in front of an enormous red curtain, formed
part of the interactive installation in the central courtyard. Everyone who wanted to could use
the podium to deliver—in just one minute—any rousing speech they pleased. As microphones
are rare, certainly I never met up with any in my time as a Young Pioneer reciting patriotic
verses; I took the opportunity of the occasion. Advised ahead of time by friends in the know, I
prepared a speech on freedom of expression, censorship, blogs, and that elusive tool that is the
Internet”. 599
In front of the lenses of national television and several dozen of international video
cameras protecting ‘free speech’ many Cubans and foreign guests called for Freedom and
393
Democracy, a white dove was placed in the shoulders of every speaker reminding the one that
landed on Fidel’s shoulders fifthly years ago. Simultaneously, Gomez-Peña was performing his
counter-colonial piece with less attention in the following room. 600
Figure 146. March 30th, 2009. Center Wifredo Lam, Performance by Tania Brugera, from
her series "El susurro de Tatlin". (Bottom: Rachel Weiss and Gerardo Mosquera)
Grandiloquence, an important budget, several sponsors (mostly from Spain -which has
economic interest in the Island), thousands of visitors (from Europe and the U.S.), several
394
important intellectuals and artists invited, high quality publications, and a surprising production
for the many exhibitions, gave the event an aura of permanence. However, for the ones that
know the Biennale’s history it was another attempt to install it into an official cultural policy. In
addition, with the topic of the year “Integration and Resistance in the Global Era”, it was more a
contradictory stand than a real radical departure from the Euro-American (Western) models of
cultural and political practice that the event and its organizers has always promoted. 601 For sure
this anniversary edition accomplished what Nelson Herrera called, “Havana the largest gallery in
the world”.
395
Figure 147. Malecon in Havana City
396
Image Credits
Figure 1. my chart
Figure 2. my chart
Figure 3. OSPAAL archives
Figure 4. OSPAAL archives
Figure 5. my photo
Figure 6. my photo
Figure 7. my photo
Figure 8. my chart
Figure 9. my photo
Figure 10. my photo
Figure 11. WLC archives
Figure 12. my photos
Figure 13. my chart
Figure 14. my chart
Figure 15. my chart
Figure 16. my photos
Figure 17. my photo
Figure 18. Photo by Rafael Pacheco
Figure 19. © Universe in Universe (1997) and © artnet
Figure 20. WLC archives
Figure 21. WLC archives
Figure 22. Museo de Bellas Artes, Argentina
Figure 23. Bohemia, November 11, 1993 (WLC archives) and my photo
Figure 24. My chart
Figure 25. Bohemia, March 9, 1993 (WLC archives)
Figure 26. El País, May 15, 1994 (WLC archives)
Figure 27. my photo
Figure 28. © Fernando Arias (my archive)
Figure 29. Antonio Zaya, published in Atlántica June 1994 (WLC archives)
Figure 30. WLC archives
Figure 31. My photo and © Jorge Albán
Figure 32. my photo (Material provided by Magali Espinosa)
Figure 33. my photo
Figure 34. My chart
Figure 35. OSPAAL archives
Figure 36. my chart
Figure 37. my chart
Figure 38. my chart
Figure 39. my chart
Figure 40. © Jorge Albán (fragment)
Figure 41. my chart
Figure 42. my chart
Figure 43. my photos
Figure 44. my photo
Figure 45. my photo
Figure 46. my chart
Figure 47. my chart
Figure 48. my chart
Figure 49. my chart
Figure 50. WLC archives
Figure 51. published in 1st Havana Biennale catalog WLC archives
Figure 52. published in 1st Havana Biennale catalog WLC archives
Figure 53. published in 1st Havana Biennale catalog WLC archives
Figure 54. my photo of the cover and internal page of Art in America
Figure 55. my chart
Figure 56. my chart
Figure 57. my chart
Figure 58. WLC archives
Figure 59. WLC archives
397
Figure 60. my photo
Figure 61. my photo of African Arts, Vol. 20, No. 3 (May, 1987) p. 83
Figure 62. my charts
Figure 63. my photo
Figure 64. WLC archive (my chart translation)
Figure 65. WLC archive (my chart translation)
Figure 66. © Photo Rachel Weiss
Figure 67. © Magnum photo archives
Figure 68. WLC archives
Figure 69. given by Ministry of Culture, Colombia. Visual Arts archive
Figure 70. my photo cover Art in America
Figure 71. my photos
Figure 72. Latin American Collection of the Jack S. Blanton Museum of Art .
Figure 73. given by Ministry of Culture, Colombia. Visual Arts archive
Figure 74. my chart
Figure 75. my photo
Figure 76. New York Times, Sunday June 12, 1994. WLC archive
Figure 77. Ximena Narea, © Heterogenésis & Nina Menocal Gallery (Mexico)
Figure 78. © Bonanza group (photo provided by Alexis Leyva)
Figure 79. New York Times, Sunday June 12, 1994. (WLC archive)
Figure 80. my photo (Art Nexus, No. 22 Oct. – Dec. 1994)
Figure 81. my photo (Art Nexus, No. 22 Oct. – Dec. 1994)
Figure 82. my photo
Figure 83. my photo
Figure 84. my photo
Figure 85. my photo
Figure 86. my photos
Figure 87. my photo
Figure 88. my chart
Figure 89. my photos
Figure 90. my photo
Figure 91. © universes in universe
Figure 92. my photo & © universes in universe
Figure 93. my photos
Figure 94. my photos
Figure 95. my photo
Figure 96. my photos
Figure 97. my photos
Figure 98. © universes in universe
Figure 99. my photo
Figure 100. my charts
Figure 101. my photo
Figure 102. my photos
Figure 103. my photo
Figure 104. my photos
Figure 105. my photo
Figure 106. my photos
Figure 107. © universes in universe
Figure 108. © Jennifer Allora - Guillermo Calzadilla & my photo
Figure 109. © José Alejandro Restrepo
Figure 110. © universes in universe
Figure 111. © universes in universe
Figure 112. my photo
Figure 113. my photo
Figure 114. my photo
Figure 115. my photo
Figure 116. my photo
Figure 117. my photos
Figure 118. my photo
Figure 119. my photo
Figure 120. my photo
Figure 121. my photo
398
Figure 122. my photo
Figure 123. my photo
Figure 124. my photo
Figure 125. my photo
Figure 126. my photo
Figure 127. my photo
Figure 128. my photo
Figure 129. © Alvaro Ricardo Herrera, my photos
Figure 130. © Berlin Beam Boys & my photos
Figure 131. © Black Hole Factory
Figure 132. © OMNI-Zona Franca & my photos
Figure 133. my photos
Figure 134. my photos
Figure 135. my photos
Figure 136. my photo
Figure 137. my photos
Figure 138. my photos
Figure 139. my photos
Figure 140. my photos
Figure 141. my photos
Figure 142. my photos
Figure 143. my chart
Figure 144. my photos
Figure 145. my photos
Figure 146. my photos
Figure 147. © Jorge Albán
WLC = Wifredo Lam Center archives
399
APPENDIX
400
401
402
LIST OF ARTISTS HAVANA BIENNALE 1984 – 2006
NAME
COUNTRY
Cáceres, Dolores
YEAR
Argentina
Cartele - Silberman, Gastón - Mendieta, Machi
& Seimandi, Esteban
Argentina
González y Sinzinger
Argentina
2006
Maguid, Rosalía
Argentina
2006
Messing, Laura
Argentina
2006
Molina, Mariano
Argentina
2006
Siquier, Pablo
Argentina
2006
Strada, Elisa
Argentina
2006
Dubrovsky, Irene
Argentina
2006
Juan, Andrea
Argentina
2006
Kuitca, Guillermo
Argentina
2006
Oduber, Ryan
Aruba
2006
Steidinger, Anja
Aruba
2006
Glick, Rodney
Australia
2006
Rudd, Cameron
Australia
2006
Voevodin, Lynnette
Australia
2006
Cal, Santiago - Holder, Richard
Belice
2006
Musa, Yasser
Belice
2006
North Front Street Project
Belice
2006
Gaba, Meschac
Benin
2006
Schwartz, Raquel
Bolivia
2006
Narda, Fabiola
Bolivia
2006
2006
2006
Arquivo Brasilia - Kim , Lina & Wesely, Michael
Brazil
2006
Canella, Rogério
Brazil
2006
Colectivo Hoztilzinhos
Brazil
2006
Guaraci, Gabriel
Brazil
2006
Guedes, José
Brazil
2006
Marcelle, Cinthia
Brazil
2006
Montijo, Giulianno
Brazil
2006
Neuenschwander, Rivane
Brazil
2006
Santos, Eder
Brazil
2006
Srur, Eduardo
Brazil
2006
A Revolucão Não Será Televisionada
Brazil
2006
Bambozzi, Lucas
Brazil
2006
BijaRi
Brazil
2006
C.O.B.A.I.A
Brazil
2006
Contra File
Brazil
2006
Coringa
Brazil
2006
403
Elegante
Brazil
2006
Esqueleto Coletivo
Brazil
2006
Marcelus
Brazil
2006
Olivetti, Maines
Brazil
2006
Os Gemeos - Pandolfo, Otavio & Gustavo
Pandolfo, Nina Carina
Brazil
Brazil
2006
2006
Territorio São Paulo
Brazil
2006
TrancaRua
Brazil
2006
Tayou, Pascale Martine
Cameron
2006
BGL
Canada
2006
Duchesneau, Mario
Canada
2006
Sáez, César
Canada
2006
Becerra, Yenniferth
Chile
2006
Fierro, Claudia del
Chile
2006
Rivera, Pablo
Chile
2006
Rosenfeld, Lotti
Chile
2006
Guangyund, Liu
China
2006
Xuan, Kan
China
2006
Avila, Jaime
Colombia
2006
Herrera, Álvaro Ricardo
Colombia
2006
Pineda, Margarita
Colombia
2006
Matute, Andres
Colombia
2006
Magema, Michele
Congo
2006
Barrantes, Errol
Costa Rica
2006
Ramírez, Alejandro
Costa Rica
2006
Solano, Karla
Costa Rica
2006
Abascal, Pedro
Cuba
2006
Acevedo, Carlos
Cuba
2006
Alvarez, Franklin
Cuba
2006
Cabrera Pérez, Adolfo
Cuba
2006
Camejo, Luis Enrique
Cuba
2006
Catellañanos, Yasser
Cuba
2006
Cordero, Raúl
Cuba
2006
del Dago, Duvier
Cuba
2006
Diago, Roberto
Cuba
2006
Escalona Carrillo, David
Cuba
2006
Fernández Montes de Oca, Carlos
Cuba
2006
García, Eduardo Rubén
Cuba
2006
González, Alejandro
Cuba
2006
Hechavarría, Edgar
Cuba
2006
Julian González, Nilo
Cuba
2006
Martínez, Joel
Cuba
2006
Mena, Rigoberto
Cuba
2006
Miranda, Ibrahim
Cuba
2006
Omni Zona Franco
Cuba
2006
Pachecho del Monte, Amaury
Cuba
2006
Pérez González, Jorge
Cuba
2006
Pérez Merino, Luis Eligio
Cuba
2006
Ponjúan, Eduardo
Cuba
2006
Ramírez, Guillermo
Cuba
2006
Reyes Rodríguez, Olver
Cuba
2006
Serrano, Ramón
Cuba
2006
404
Soto Kessel, Natividad
Cuba
2006
Tamayo, Reynerio
Cuba
2006
Valdéz Dilla, Damian
Cuba
2006
Vidal, Gonzalo
Cuba
2006
CUBABRASIL
Cuba-Brazil-Germany
2006
Díaz, Polibio
Dominican Republic
2006
El Museo Peatonal - Estévez, Nicolas
Dominican Republic
2006
Vilorio Villanueva, Limber
Dominican Republic
2006
Alvear, Miguel
Ecuador
2006
El-Gowely, Hany
Egipt
2006
Reda, Hamdy
Egipt
2006
Vega, Simon
El Salvador
2006
Nouvel, Jean
France
2006
Poirier, Anne & Patrick
France
2006
BerlinBeamBoys - Petersen Christoph & Peters, Torge
Germany
2006
Black Hole Factory
Germany
2006
Glassford, Thomas
Germany
2006
Jankowski, Christian
Germany
2006
Kuhn, Anette
Germany
2006
Naijar, Michel
Germany
2006
Ottjorg, A.C
Germany
2006
Peschke, Valeska
Germany
2006
Stone
Germany
2006
Strauss, Peter
Germany
2006
Thiel, Frank
Germany
2006
Toledo, Diego
Germany
2006
Anausui, El
Ghana
2006
Flecha, Olivia
Great Britain
2006
Orta, Lucy
Great Britain-France
2006
Tsoublekas, Dimitris
Grece
2006
Caja Lúcida
Guatemala
2006
Paz, Alejandro
Guatemala
2006
Stephenson, Roberto
Haiti
2006
Gupta, Shilpa
India
2006
Tallur N.L
India
2006
Neshat, Shirin
Iran-USA
2006
Rinn, Rivka
Israel
2006
Galliano, Daniele
Italy
2006
Ogi: no Knauss - Conti, Manuela - Lancuba,
Michele - Tripodi, Lorenzo
Leki, Ananias Dago
Italy
2006
Ivory Coast
2006
Simpson, Dionne
Jamaica
2006
Ideta, Goh
Japan
2006
Saade, Amal
Lebanon
2006
Andrionomearisoa, Joel
Madagascar
2006
Calderón, Miguel
Mexico
2006
Constantini, Arcangel
Mexico
2006
Cuevas, Minerva
Mexico
2006
Edeza, Iván
Mexico
2006
Escobedo, Helen
Mexico
2006
Martinez, Cesar
Mexico
2006
Romero, Betsabe
Mexico
2006
Agua - Waser
México
2006
405
Colectivo Tercerunquinto
México
2006
El Museo Peatonal - Alós, María
México
2006
Hernández, Jonathan
México
2006
Moris
México
2006
Nortec (no participate)
México
2006
Zamora, Héctor
México
2006
Agua - Waser
Mexico-Germany
2006
Mabunda, Goncalo
Mozambique
2006
Akinbiyi, Akinbode
Nigeria
2006
Dilomprizulike
Nigeria
2006
Berge, Kjetill Ingvar
Norway
2006
Carson, Gillian
Norway
2006
Tolaas, Sissel
Norway
2006
Viskum, Morten
Norway
2006
Fajardo, Eric R.
Panama
2006
Harker, Jonathan
Panama
2006
Lozano, Iván
Perú
2006
Miranda, Andrea
Perú
2006
Zegarra, Santi
Perú
2006
Rosado Sijo, Chemi
Puerto Rico
2006
Fosso, Samuel
Republic of Central Africa
2006
Fainaru, Belu-Simion
Romania
2006
Douts - N'doye, Mahamadou
Senegal
2006
Khoury, Mony
Siria
2006
Botes, Conrad
South Africa
2006
Langa, Moshekwa
South Africa
2006
Trinity Sessions - Hobbs, Stephen & Neustetter, Marcus
South Africa
2006
Van Veuring, Mocke & Collins, Theresa
South Africa
2006
Williamson, Sue
South Africa
2006
Ballesteros, Joel
Spain
2006
Brito, Segio
Spain
2006
Camarasa, Javier
Spain
2006
Colomer, Jordi
Spain
2006
Martinez, Angela - Quiles, Daniel (Anavia)
Spain
2006
Miralda, Antoni
Spain
2006
Pérez, Joel - García Pérez, Elena e Iván
Spain
2006
Saura, Carlos
Spain
2006
FA+ - Falk Ingrid - Aguerre, Gustavo
Sweden
2006
Hadeed, Abigail
Trinidadad & Tobago
2006
Kazma, Omer Ali
Turkey
2006
Sahinler, Fuat
Turkey
2006
Sahinler, Murat
Turkey
2006
Bonilla, Oscar
Uruguay
2006
Lacasa, Jacqueline
Uruguay
2006
Rosales, Juliana
Uruguay
2006
Tiscornia, Ana
Uruguay
2006
Coco 14 - Gualtieri, Robert
USA
2006
Kez 5 - Sánchez, Nestor
USA
2006
Leong, Sze Tsung
USA
2006
Mico - Ramírez, Jaime
USA
2006
Tunick, Spencer
USA
2006
Ciudad Video
Various
2006
406
Castro Oroztegui, Jaime
Venezuela
2006
Maneiro, Sara
Venezuela
2006
Navarro, Maggy & Bonadies, Angela
Venezuela
2006
Rojas, Carlos Germán
Venezuela
2006
Kotzé, John
Zimbabwe
2006
Behar, Roberto
Argentina
2003
Costantino, Nicola
Argentina
2003
Madanes, Edgardo
Argentina
2003
Marcaccio, Fabián
Argentina
2003
Marquardt, Rosario
Argentina
2003
Orta, Jorge
Argentina
2003
Rivas, Silvia
Argentina
2003
Taller La Estampa
Argentina
2003
Valansi, Gabriel
Argentina
2003
Piccinini, Patricia
Australia
2003
Walsh, Craig
Australia
2003
Müller, Ariane
Austria
2003
Nimmerfall, Karina
Austria
2003
Gilvano, Swasey
Belize
2003
Yasser, Musa,
Belize
2003
Dominique, Zinkpe
Benin
2003
Bezerra, José Patrício
Brazil
2003
Campo, Guaraci Gabriel
Brazil
2003
Chelpa Ferro
Brazil
2003
Dias, Mauricio
Brazil
2003
Franco, Siron
Brazil
2003
Grupo Bijarí
Brazil
2003
Lima, Daniel
Brazil
2003
Lopes, Jarbas
Brazil
2003
Neto, Ernesto
Brazil
2003
Pazé
Brazil
2003
Riedweg, Walter
Brazil
2003
Smith, Courtney
Brazil
2003
Salloum, Jayce
Canada
2003
Castillo, Juan
Chile
2003
Correa, Claudio
Chile
2003
Hamilton, Patrick
Chile
2003
Preece, Sebastián
Chile
2003
Ping, Qiu
China
2003
Arias Gaviria, Fernando
Colombia
2003
Castaño, Alejandro
Colombia
2003
Grupo Nómada
Colombia
2003
Macià, Oswaldo
Colombia
2003
MMJ
Colombia
2003
Olano, Beatriz
Colombia
2003
Posada, Libia
Colombia
2003
Quintero, Guillermo
Colombia
2003
Suárez, Alfonso
Colombia
2003
Herrero, Federico
Costa Rica
2003
Capetillo, Geysell
Cuba
2003
Capote, Iván
Cuba
2003
Capote, Yoan
Cuba
2003
407
Castillo, Liset
Cuba
Colectivo Enema
Cuba
Departamento de Intervenciones Públicas
Cuba
2003
2003
2003
García, Aimée
Cuba
2003
Guerra, Alexander
Cuba
2003
Hernández, Diango
Cuba
2003
León, Glenda
Cuba
2003
Mariño, Armando
Cuba
2003
Pino, Alain
Cuba
2003
Prieto, Wilfredo
Cuba
2003
Ramírez, Nelson
Cuba
2003
Ríos, Ángel Ricardo
Cuba
2003
Rumbaut, Adrián
Cuba
2003
Santana, Jorge Luis
Cuba
2003
Sardiñas, David
Cuba
2003
Velazco, Liudmila
Cuba
2003
Vincench, José Ángel
Cuba
2003
Oleaga, Darío
Dominican Republic
2003
Paiewonsky, Raquel
Dominican Republic
2003
Pineda, Jorge
Dominican Republic
2003
Artes No Decorativas S.A.
Ecuador
2003
Abla, Mohamed
Egypt
2003
Naim, Sabah
Egypt
2003
Kaikkonen, Kaarina
Finland
2003
Levêque, Claude
France
2003
AnArchitektur
Germany
2003
Griffiths, Helga
Germany
2003
Hopf, Judith
Germany
2003
Meyer, Jens J.
Germany
2003
Pesh, Katrin
Germany
2003
Theoretical TV
Germany
2003
James, Gareth
Great Britain
2003
Norman, Nils
Great Britain
2003
Tegala, Simon
Great Britain
2003
Escobar, Darío
Guatemala
2003
Altaf, Navjot
India
2003
Gupta, Subodh
India
2003
Open Circle
India
2003
Ghazel
Iran
2003
Grupo A12
Italy
2003
Koko-Bi, Jems Robert
Ivory Coast
2003
Ward, Nari
Jamaica
2003
Attard, Norbert Francis
Malta
2003
Breleur, Ernest
Martinique
2003
Alejo, Mauricio
Mexico
2003
Grupo Torolab
Mexico
2003
Guzik, Ariel
Mexico
2003
Helguera, Pablo
Mexico
2003
Moszka, Richard
Mexico
2003
Romero, Betsabeé
Mexico
2003
Smith, Melanie
Mexico
2003
Basto, Luis
Mozambique
2003
408
Ferreira, José
Mozambique
2003
Reyers, Zeger
Netherlands
2003
Nkanga, Otobong
Nigeria
2003
Udemba, Emeka
Nigeria
2003
Araujo, Gustavo
Panama
2003
Vélez, Humberto
Panama
2003
Ceuppens, Christian
Paraguay
2003
González Brun, Adriana
Paraguay
2003
Migliorisi, Ricardo
Paraguay
2003
García Zapatero, Luis
Peru
2003
Santiesteban, Emilio
Peru
2003
Quinto, Alma
Philippines
2003
Irigoyen, Rosa
Puerto Rico
2003
Juhasz-Alvarado, Charles
Puerto Rico
2003
Morales, Arnaldo
Puerto Rico
2003
Rivera, Carlos
Puerto Rico
2003
Ndiaye, Ousmane (Dago)
Senegal
2003
Kaur, Noni
Singapore
2003
Amaler-Raviv, Arlene
South Africa
2003
Mthethwa, Zwelethu
South Africa
2003
Nhlengethwa, Sam
South Africa
2003
Place, Rodney
South Africa
2003
Yudelman, Dale
South Africa
2003
Arni-Olafsson, Oláfur
Spain
2003
Barba, Lluis
Spain
2003
Martín, José A.
Spain
2003
Pérez, Libia
Spain
2003
Sicilia, Javier
Spain
2003
Torrens, Néstor
Spain
2003
Barros, Fabiana de
Switzerland-Brasil
2003
Sailer, Yute
Taiwan-Austria
2003
Kunavichayanont, Sutee
Thailand
2003
Kusolwong, Surasi
Thailand
2003
Oranniwesna, Nipan
Thailand
2003
Phaosavasdi, Kamol
Thailand
2003
Altay, Can
Turkey
2003
Karamustafa, Gülsun
Turkey
2003
Oda Projesi
Turkey
2003
Senturk, Levent
Turkey
2003
Tenger, Hale
Turkey
2003
Turkylmaz, Mürüvvet
Turkey
2003
Maggi, Marco
Uruguay
2003
Sastre, Martin
Uruguay
2003
Díaz, Alejandro
USA
2003
González, Nan
Venezuela
2003
López, José Luis
Venezuela
2003
Monteagudo, Mariana
Venezuela
2003
Brazier, David
Zimbabwe
2003
Dondo, Calvin
Zimbabwe
2003
Gutsa, Tapfuma
Zimbabwe
2003
Aslán, Nora
Argentina
2000
Banfi, Enrique
Argentina
2000
409
Barreda, Fabiana
Argentina
2000
Bony, Oscar (cancelled)
Argentina
2000
Erlich, Leandro (lives USA)
Argentina
2000
Ferrari, León
Argentina
2000
Grupo Escombros
Argentina
2000
Macchi, Jorge
Argentina
2000
Pearl, Silvana
Argentina
2000
Porter, Liliana (Lives USA)
Argentina
2000
Ríos, Miguel Angel
Argentina
2000
Romano, Gustavo
Argentina
2000
Romero, Juan Carlos
Argentina
2000
Sacco, Graciela
Argentina
2000
Werthein, Judi (Lives USA)
Argentina
2000
Abath, Cirilio Julien (Ciro)
Aruba
2000
Martínez, Alida
Bolivia
2000
Bambozzi, Lucas
Brazil
2000
Carvalho, Valia
Brazil
2000
Cassaro, Franklin
Brazil
2000
Climachauska, Paulo
Brazil
2000
Costi, Rochelle
Brazil
2000
Domingues, Diana
Brazil
2000
Furlong, Patricia
Brazil
2000
Leirner, Jac
Brazil
2000
Menna Barreto, Jorge
Brazil
2000
Monnerat, Rosana
Brazil
2000
Nador, Mónica
Brazil
2000
Omar, Arthur
Brazil
2000
Paes Leme, Shirley
Brazil
2000
Ribenboim, Ricardo
Brazil
2000
Tavares, Ana María
Brazil
2000
Zerbini, Luiz
Brazil
2000
Kabjo, Godfried (Goody Leyé)
Cameroon
2000
MPah Dooh, Joel Claude
Cameroon
2000
Cabezas, Rodrigo
Chile
2000
Galería Metropolitana (Luis Alarcon, Ana María Saavedra)
Chile
2000
García, María Francisca
Chile
2000
Goic, Andrea
Chile
2000
Mezza, Gonzalo
Chile
2000
Salinas, Carolina
Chile
2000
Silva, Cristian
Chile
2000
Truffa, Bruna
Chile
2000
Zamudio, Enrique
Chile
2000
Arango, Ana María
Colombia
2000
Blanco, Carlos
Colombia
2000
Cifuentes, Adolfo
Colombia
2000
Echeverri, Clemencia
Colombia
2000
Facundo, Rodrigo
Colombia
2000
Gaviria, Alejandra
Colombia
2000
González, Beatriz (did not participate)
Colombia
2000
Grupo Grafito
Colombia
2000
Iregui, Jaime (Espacio Vacío)
Colombia
2000
Medina, María Angélica
Colombia
2000
410
Posada Velez, Gloria María
Colombia
2000
Uribe, Carlos
Colombia
2000
Arrieta, Pedro
Costa Rica
2000
Asociación Incorpore
Costa Rica
2000
Cardona, Alexander
Costa Rica
2000
Chanto Quesada, Sila
Costa Rica
2000
Irwin, Drew
Costa Rica
2000
Jiménez, Marisel
Costa Rica
2000
Siliezar, Adolfo
Costa Rica
2000
Abdalá, Yaquelín (lives in the Netherlands)
Cuba
2000
Arrechea, Alexandre
Cuba
2000
Barroso, Abel
Cuba
2000
Betancourt, Juan
Cuba
2000
Bruguera, Tania
Cuba
2000
Castellanos, Marlon
Cuba
2000
Castillo, Marco A.
Cuba
2000
Choy, José Antonio
Cuba
2000
Cordero, Raúl
Cuba
2000
Estévez, Carlos
Cuba
2000
Fernández, Antonio Eligio (TONEL)
Cuba
2000
Gabinete Ordo Amoris
Cuba
2000
Galería Dupp
Cuba
2000
García, Juan
Cuba
2000
Gómez Fresquet, José (Frémez)
Cuba
2000
Gómez, Luis
Cuba
2000
Los Carpinteros
Cuba
2000
Pérez, William
Cuba
2000
Rodríguez, Dagoberto
Cuba
2000
Segura, Esterio
Cuba
2000
Volta, Páris
Cuba
2000
Zumbado Retana, Manuel
Cuba
2000
Carrilho, Nelson (lives in the Netherlands)
Curaçao
2000
Spijkstra, Ellen Francien (lives in the Netherlands)
Marzouk, Mona
Curaçao
Egypt
2000
2000
Fleischer, Alain
France
2000
Messager, Annette
France
2000
Raynaud, Jean Pierre
France
2000
Donkor, Godfried
Ghana
2000
Hiller, Susan
Great Britain
2000
López, Aníbal
Guatemala
2000
Solares, Diana Lisette de
Guatemala
2000
Prezeau, Barbara
Haiti
2000
Aguilar Pinel, Regina María
Honduras
2000
Chhachhi, Sheba
India
2000
Dube, Anita
India
2000
Kallat, Jitish
India
2000
Malani, Nalini
India
2000
Parekh, Manisha
India
2000
Bagja Dermawan, Irwan (Iweng)
Indonesia
2000
Dono, Heri
Indonesia
2000
Murti, Krisna
Indonesia
2000
Bauman, Tuly
Israel
2000
411
Efrat, Benni (lives in Belgium)
Israel
2000
Raz, Guy
Israel
2000
Reeb, David
Israel
2000
Sonnenschein, Eliezer
Israel
2000
Jonás, Anomán
Ivory Coast
2000
Chong, Albert (lives in USA)
Jamaica
2000
Iwai, Shigeaki (lives in Netherlands)
Japan
2000
Burke, Alex (Lives in France)
Martinique
2000
Guodin-Thebia, Serge
Martinique
2000
Alÿs, Francis (lives in Belgium)
Mexico
2000
Artigas, Gustavo
Mexico
2000
Bliesner, Jim (USA)
Mexico
2000
Camacho, Luz (lives in the USA)
Mexico
2000
Gómez-Peña, Guillermo (not participate - lives USA)
González Casanova, José Miguel
Mexico
Mexico
2000
2000
Grupo RevArte (Mexico/USA)
Mexico
2000
Gutiérrez, Rubén
Mexico
2000
Hammond, James R. (USA)
Mexico
2000
Herrera, Ana María
Mexico
2000
López Aranda, Julieta (lives USA)
Mexico
2000
Lozano-Hemmer, Rafael (lives Canada)
Martínez, César
Mexico
Mexico
2000
2000
Poeter, Irma Sofía
Mexico
2000
Ramírez (Erre), Marcos
Mexico
2000
Suter, Gerardo
Mexico
2000
Toledo, Diego
Mexico
2000
Zacarías, Alejandro
Mexico
2000
Belli, Patricia (Lives USA)
Nicaragua
2000
Oguibe, Olu (Lives USA)
Nigeria
2000
Udé, Iké
Nigeria
2000
Barrail, Pedro
Paraguay
2000
Casarino, Claudia
Paraguay
2000
González Brun, Adriana
Paraguay
2000
González, Mónica
Paraguay
2000
Salerno, Osvaldo
Paraguay
2000
McCarthy, Anamaría
Peru
2000
Aquilizan, Alfredo
Philippines
2000
Aquilizan, Isabel
Philippines
2000
Gómez Hildawa, Sid
Philippines
2000
Pilapil, Impy
Philippines
2000
Solito, Auraeus
Philippines
2000
Tence Ruíz, José
Philippines
2000
Yee Jr, Luis (Junyee)
Philippines
2000
Allora, Jennifer (Born USA)
Puerto Rico
2000
Calzadilla, Guillermo (born Cuba)
Puerto Rico
2000
Cruz, José A.
Puerto Rico
2000
Otero, Néstor
Puerto Rico
2000
Rivera, Dhara
Puerto Rico
2000
Salabarrías, Aaron I.
Puerto Rico
2000
Suárez, Jaime
Puerto Rico
2000
Beng-Thi, Jack Damien
Réunion
2000
Cissé, Soly
Senegal
2000
Senegal
2000
Dibá, Viyé
412
Lo, Ndary Mbathio
Senegal
2000
Seidy, Mamady
Senegal
2000
Heng Liang Ngim, Amanda
Singapore
2000
Alexander, Jane
South Africa
2000
Boshoff, Willem
South Africa
2000
Brand, Kevin
South Africa
2000
Brice, Lisa
South Africa
2000
Marcos, Angel
Spain
2000
Muntadas, Antoni
Spain
2000
Kentridge, William
Surinam
2000
Cozier, Christopher
Trinidad & Tobago
2000
Jungerman, Remy (lives in Netherlands)
Dweik, Youssef
Trinidad & Tobago
United Arab Emirates
2000
2000
Ibrahim, Mohammed Ahmed
United Arab Emirates
2000
Kazem, Mohamed
United Arab Emirates
2000
Minshall, Peter
United Arab Emirates
2000
Sharif, Hassan
United Arab Emirates
2000
Bassi, Javier
Uruguay
2000
Cibils, Osvaldo
Uruguay
2000
Lanzarini, Ricardo
Uruguay
2000
Padín, Clemente
Uruguay
2000
Romero, Nelbia
Uruguay
2000
Uribe, Pablo
Uruguay
2000
Ben-Tré, Howard
USA
2000
Bliesner, Jim
USA
2000
Camacho, Luz (Mexico, lives in the USA)
Hammond, James R.
USA
USA
2000
2000
Herrera, Ana María (Mexico)
USA
2000
Poeter, Irma Sofía (Mexico)
USA
2000
Zacarías, Alejandro (Mexico)
USA
2000
Azcárate, Emilia
Venezuela
2000
Balteo, Alessandro
Venezuela
2000
Benaim, Ricardo
Venezuela
2000
Molina Pantin, Luis
Venezuela
2000
Perna, Claudio
Venezuela
2000
Viera, Conny (Lives in the USA)
Venezuela
2000
Koraïchi, Rachid
Algeirs
1997
Alvim, Fernando
Angola
1997
Ole, Antonio
Angola
1997
Aranovich, Claudia
Argentina
1997
Benedit, Luis
Argentina
1997
Binder, Pat
Argentina
1997
Bony, Oscar
Argentina
1997
Conte, Guillermo
Argentina
1997
Del Río, Claudia
Argentina
1997
Fernández, Roberto
Argentina
1997
Gallardo, Carlos
Argentina
1997
García, Daniel
Argentina
1997
Katz, Leandro
Argentina
1997
Kuki, Benski
Argentina
1997
López, Marcos
Argentina
1997
Medici, Eduardo
Argentina
1997
Moujan, Marcela
Argentina
1997
413
Niveiro, Luis
Argentina
1997
Ontiveros, Daniel
Argentina
1997
Portillos, Alfredo
Argentina
1997
Ríos, Miguel Angel
Argentina
1997
Sacco, Graciela
Argentina
1997
Schuffer, Diana
Argentina
1997
Stolkiner, Raúl
Argentina
1997
Weber, Martín
Argentina
1997
Heyleger, Glenda
Aruba
1997
López, Elvis
Aruba
1997
Muyale, Osaira
Aruba
1997
Parr, Mike
Australia
1997
Hazoumé, Romuald
Benin
1997
Mateo, Sol
Bolivia
1997
Ugalde, Gastón
Bolivia
1997
Antunes, Arnaldo
Brazil
1997
Barreto, Lia Mena
Brazil
1997
Costi, Rochelle
Brazil
1997
De Mello, Vicente
Brazil
1997
Flemming, Alex
Brazil
1997
Freiberger, Angela
Brazil
1997
Geiger, Ana Bella
Brazil
1997
Ghomes, Rogerio
Brazil
1997
Goulart, Claudio
Brazil
1997
Kogut, Sandra
Brazil
1997
Longo, Dora
Brazil
1997
Moraes, Nina
Brazil
1997
Musatti, Jeanette
Brazil
1997
Neves, Eustaquio
Brazil
1997
Palazyan, Rosana
Brazil
1997
Pons, Flavio
Brazil
1997
Rennó, Rosangela
Brazil
1997
Rufino, José
Brazil
1997
Saggese, Antonio
Brazil
1997
Trope, Paula
Brazil
1997
Viriato, Edilson
Brazil
1997
Xavier, Marcia
Brazil
1997
Betote, Bill Akwa
Cameron
1997
Bidjocka, Billy
Cameron
1997
Tayou, Pascal Martín
Cameron
1997
Altamirano, Carlos
Chile
1997
Casas, Francisco
Chile
1997
Duclos, Arturo
Chile
1997
Frigerio, Ismael
Chile
1997
Jarpa, Voluspa
Chile
1997
Lemebel, Pedro
Chile
1997
Oñate, Macarena
Chile
1997
Szdylowski, Ian
Chile
1997
Arbeláez, Edith
Colombia
1997
Bravo, Patricia
Colombia
1997
Laignelet, Victor
Colombia
1997
Martínez Cañas, Germán
Colombia
1997
414
Morelos, Delcy
Colombia
1997
Múnera, Ana Claudia
Colombia
1997
Muñoz, Oscar
Colombia
1997
Pradilla, Eduardo
Colombia
1997
Robledo, Víctor
Colombia
1997
Van Wong, Pablo
Colombia
1997
Monge, Priscilla
Costa Rica
1997
Alom, Juan Carlos
Cuba
1997
Bejarano, Agustín
Cuba
1997
Brito, Yamilys
Cuba
1997
Estévez, Carlos
Cuba
1997
Fors, José Manuel
Cuba
1997
Garaicoa, Carlos
Cuba
1997
Irigoyen, Rosa
Cuba
1997
Jiménez, Lidzie Alvisa
Cuba
1997
Leyva, Alexis (Kcho)
Cuba
1997
Mariño, Armando
Cuba
1997
Mendive, Manuel
Cuba
1997
Pacheco, Ramón
Cuba
1997
Peña, René
Cuba
1997
Ponjuan, Eduardo
Cuba
1997
Pujol, Ernesto
Cuba
1997
Rodríguez, René Francisco
Cuba
1997
Saavedra, Lázaro
Cuba
1997
Toirac, José Angel
Cuba
1997
Ramírez, Belkis
Dominican Republic
1997
Tolentino, Inés
Dominican Republic
1997
Chiriboga, Lucía
Ecuador
1997
Jaramillo, Jenny
Ecuador
1997
Paredes, Luis
El Salvador
1997
Boltanski, Christian
France
1997
Ankomah, Owusu
Ghana
1997
Woodrow, Bill
Great Britain
1997
González Palma, Luis
Guatemala
1997
Benjamín, Mario
Haiti
1997
Duval Carrié, Edouard
Haiti
1997
Biswas, Sutapa
India
1997
Sundaram, Vivan
India
1997
Adipurnomo, Nindityo
Indonesia
1997
Arahmaiani
Indonesia
1997
Manik, Andar
Indonesia
1997
Marintan, Sirait
Indonesia
1997
Suwage, Agust
Indonesia
1997
Boxer, David
Jamaica
1997
Facey, Laura
Jamaica
1997
Morrison, Petrona
Jamaica
1997
Sato, Tokihiro
Japan
1997
Latamie, Marc
Maritinique
1997
Almeida, Lourdes
México
1997
Anderson, Laura
México
1997
Martínez, César
México
1997
Parcero, Tatiana
México
1997
415
Ramírez, Marcos
México
1997
Rodríguez del Paso, Joaquín
México
1997
Serrano, Teresa
México
1997
Yovanovich, Vida
México
1997
Belkahia, Farid
Morroco
1997
Ennadre, Touhami
Morroco
1997
Camp, Sokari Douglas
Nigeria
1997
Salerno, Osvaldo
Paraguay
1997
Spatuzza, Carlos
Paraguay
1997
Yaluk, Karina
Paraguay
1997
Bedoya, Juan E.
Peru
1997
De la Torre, Milagros
Peru
1997
Huarcaya, Roberto
Peru
1997
MacCarthy, Ana María
Peru
1997
Paredes, Cecilia
Peru
1997
Piazza, María Cecilia
Peru
1997
Tokeshi, Eduardo
Peru
1997
Torres, Susana
Peru
1997
Aquilizan, Alfredo
Philipines
1997
Arellano, Agnes
Philipines
1997
Reamillo & Juliet
Philipines
1997
Irigoyen, Rosa
Puerto Rico
1997
Osorio, Pepón
Puerto Rico
1997
Vázquez, Victor
Puerto Rico
1997
Ben Thi, Jack
Réunion
1997
Gayé, Amadou
Senegal
1997
Seye, Bouma Medoune
Senegal
1997
Sy, Djibril
Senegal
1997
Chandrasekaran
Singapore
1997
Victor, Suzann
Singapore
1997
Weng, Lee
Singapore
1997
Cruise, Wilma
South Africa
1997
Kentridge, William
South Africa
1997
Langa, Moshekwa
South Africa
1997
Siopis, Penny
South Africa
1997
Roig, Bernardí
Spain
1997
Jugerman, Remy
Surinam
1997
Rawanchaikul, Navin
Thailand
1997
Driss, Hichem
Tunes
1997
Conde, Pablo
Uruguay
1997
Goldwasser, Gerardo
Uruguay
1997
Iturria, Ignacio
Uruguay
1997
Lanzarini, Ricardo
Uruguay
1997
Soto, Jorge Francisco
Uruguay
1997
Vila, Ernesto
Uruguay
1997
Zinno, Alvaro
Uruguay
1997
Lowell, Whitfield
USA
1997
Welch, Roger
USA
1997
Álvarez, Esso
Venezuela
1997
Apóstol, Alexander
Venezuela
1997
Bárcenas, Eduardo
Venezuela
1997
Fiallo, Gloria
Venezuela
1997
416
Machado, Oscar
Venezuela
1997
Moreno, Edgar
Venezuela
1997
Moya, Antonio
Venezuela
1997
Szinetar, Vasco
Venezuela
1997
Talmor, Lihie
Venezuela
1997
Dimitrijevic, Braco
Yugoslavia(Ex)
1997
Ben Yahia, Samta
Algiers
1994
Bazán, Sergio
Argentina
1994
Benski, Kuki
Argentina
1994
Binder, Pat
Argentina
1994
Boullosa, Marcelo
Argentina
1994
Dietzsche, Duna
Argentina
1994
Dragota, Susana
Argentina
1994
Ferrari, Leon
Argentina
1994
Fortuny, Hugo
Argentina
1994
Freistav, Luís
Argentina
1994
Fuertes, Rosana
Argentina
1994
García Uriburu, Nicolás
Argentina
1994
Girón, Mónica
Argentina
1994
Grippo, Victor
Argentina
1994
Herrero, Alicia
Argentina
1994
Iommi, Enio
Argentina
1994
Moujoubi, Akila
Argentina
1994
Ontiveros, Daniel
Argentina
1994
Paez, Walter
Argentina
1994
Pont, Fernando
Argentina
1994
Puente, Osvaldo
Argentina
1994
Romano, Tulio
Argentina
1994
Kupieri, Stan
Aruba
1994
López, Elm
Aruba
1994
Martínez, Alida
Aruba
1994
Bumside, Stanley
Bahamas
1994
Akyem, Ras
Barbados
1994
Davis. Annalee
Benin
1994
lshi Butcher, Ras
Bolivia
1994
Aguessi-Vognon, Pierre
Brazil
1994
Baltar, Brígida
Brazil
1994
Barrao
Brazil
1994
Borges, José Francisco
Brazil
1994
Cipis, Marcelo
Brazil
1994
Cunha, Chico
Brazil
1994
Fana, Francisco
Brazil
1994
Freire, Jadir & Guimaraes, Rossana
Brazil
1994
Lui Ernesto
Brazil
1994
Magalhaes Sergio
Brazil
1994
Mourao, Tunga
Brazil
1994
Pinto, Sabino
Brazil
1994
Pons, Flavio
Brazil
1994
Renno, Rosangela
Brazil
1994
Rio Branco, Miguel
Brazil
1994
Silveira, Regina
Brazil
1994
Soglo Lucien, Seraphin
Brazil
1994
417
Tucci, Sandra
Brazil
Urban, Joao
1994
Brazil
1994
Ngetchopa, Jean-Baptiste
Cameron
1994
Berlanga, Miguel Angel
Canada
1994
Bordier, Marion
Canada
1994
Mansilla Miranda, José
Canada
1994
Díaz, Gonzalo
Chile
1994
Errázuriz, Paz
Chile
1994
Rojas, Eduard
Chile
1994
Vargas, Eugenia
Chile
1994
Arias Gaviria, Fernando
Colombia
1994
Botero, Germán
Colombia
1994
Castro, Luz Elena
Colombia
1994
Echevarri, Andrea
Colombia
1994
Facundo, Rodrigo
Colombia
1994
Herrán, Juan Fernando
Colombia
1994
Martínez Cañas, Germán
Colombia
1994
Mayer, Becky
Colombia
1994
Ospina, Nadín
Colombia
1994
Restrepo, José Alejandro
Colombia
1994
Rodríguez, Ofelia
Colombia
1994
Uribe, Carlos
Colombia
1994
Alvarado, Marco
Costa Rica
1994
Astorga, Leda
Costa Rica
1994
González, Leonel
Costa Rica
1994
Rodríguez del Paso, Joaquín
Costa Rica
1994
Stagno, Bruno
Costa Rica
1994
Urbina, Florencia
Costa Rica
1994
Zumbado, Manuel
Costa Rica
1994
Aguilera, Carlos René
Cuba
1994
Álvarez, Pedro
Cuba
1994
Arrechea, Alexander
Cuba
1994
Barroso, Abel
Cuba
1994
Bruguera, Tania
Cuba
1994
Castillo, Marco
Cuba
1994
Fernández, Antonio Eligio (Tonel)
Cuba
1994
Garaicoa, Carlos García, Eduardo Rubén
Cuba
1994
Leyva, Alexis (Kcho)
Cuba
1994
Martínez, Raúl
Cuba
1994
Piña, Manuel
Cuba
1994
Ponjuán, Eduardo
Cuba
1994
Ramos, Sandra
Cuba
1994
Rodríguez Brey, Ricardo
Cuba
1994
Rodríguez Falcón, Fernando
Cuba
1994
Rodríguez, Dagoberto
Cuba
1994
Rodríguez, Rene Francisco
Cuba
1994
Rojas, Rolando
Cuba
1994
Segura. Esterio
Cuba
1994
Yero, Osvaldo
Cuba
1994
Kirindongo, Yubi
Curaçao
1994
Cuevas, Alonso
Dominican Republic
1994
Hernández, Mariano
Dominican Republic
1994
418
Imbert, Oscar
Dominican Republic
1994
López, Martín
Dominican Republic
1994
Lora Read, Marcos
Dominican Republic
1994
Recío, Raul
Dominican Republic
1994
Varela. Fernando
Dominican Republic
1994
El Anatsui
Ghana
1994
Araeen, Rasheed
Great Britain
1994
Gupta, Sunil
Great Britain
1994
Hatoum, Mona
Great Britain
1994
Himid, Lubaina
Great Britain
1994
Jantjes, Gavin
Great Britain
1994
Kumari, Chila
Great Britain
1994
Patti, Symrath
Great Britain
1994
Piper, Keith
Great Britain
1994
Alet, Thierry
Guadalupe
1994
González Palma, Luís
Guatemala
1994
Ang, Tiong
Holland
1994
De Rooy, Félix
Holland
1994
Essarnba, Angele Etoundi
Holland
1994
Goulart, Claudio
Holland
1994
Semah, Joseph
Holland
1994
Varkevisser, Emst
Holland
1994
Padilla, Ezequiel
Honduras
1994
Christiano, Dadang
Indonesia
1994
Supria, Dede Eri
Indonesia
1994
Deghati, Manoocher
Iran
1994
Deghati, Reza
Iran
1994
Efrat, Benni
Israel
1994
Brown, Everald
Jamaica
1994
Cookhome, Robert A
Jamaica
1994
Spiro, Tina
Jamaica
1994
Mbuno, Kivuthi
Kenya
1994
Sukuro, Etale
Kenya
1994
Daou, Annabel
Lebanon
1994
Aguirre, Carlos
Mexico
1994
Castillo, Mónica
Mexico
1994
Cauduro, Rafael
Mexico
1994
Cruz-Villegas, Abraham
Mexico
1994
Ehrenberg, Felipe
Mexico
1994
Escobedo, Hellen
Mexico
1994
Garza, Javier de la
Mexico
1994
Gonzalez Lobo, Carlos
Mexico
1994
Grobet, Lourdes
Mexico
1994
Gutiérrez, Yolanda
Mexico
1994
Nuñez, Dulce María
Mexico
1994
Quiñones, Néstor
Mexico
1994
Fernández, Fatima
Mozambique
1994
Gbadegesin, Sangodare
Nigeria
1994
Jawando, Olaseni
Nigeria
1994
Nelson, Emily
Nigeria
1994
Centurion, Feliciano
Paraguay
1994
Migliorisi, Ricardo
Paraguay
1994
419
Castilla B., Jorge
Peru
1994
Runcie-Tanaka, Carlos
Peru
1994
Areilano, Agnes
Philipines
1994
Cuizón, Noel
Philipines
1994
Miguel Mago, Félix
Philipines
1994
Villanueva, Roberto
Philipines
1994
Hernández, Anaida
Puerto Rico
1994
Irizarry, Carlos
Puerto Rico
1994
Pérez, Enoc
Puerto Rico
1994
Váquez, Victor
Puerto Rico
1994
Ben-Thi, Jack
Reunion
1994
Diallo, Amadou Mallos
Senegal
1994
Sarnb, Issa
Senegal
1994
Goba, John
Sierra Leone
1994
Alexander, Jane
South Africa
1994
Bester, Willie
South Africa
1994
Catherine, Norman
South Africa
1994
Cheifitz, Jann
South Africa
1994
Cruise, Wilma
South Africa
1994
Crump, Alan
South Africa
1994
Germond, Graeme
South Africa
1994
Hatting, Michael
South Africa
1994
Kendell Geers, Peter
South Africa
1994
Koloane, David
South Africa
1994
Murray, Bret
South Africa
1994
Nhlengethwa, Sam
South Africa
1994
Schutz, Peter
South Africa
1994
Segogela, Johannes
South Africa
1994
Sihiali, Durant
South Africa
1994
Siopis, Penny
South Africa
1994
Williamson, Sue
South Africa
1994
Kim, Yongtai
South Korea
1994
Park, Buldong
South Korea
1994
Boonma, Montien
Thailand
1994
Lertchaiprasert, Kamin
Thailand
1994
Watuya, Niti
Thailand
1994
Sokemawou. Komi
Togo
1994
Cozier, Christopher
Trinidad & Tobago
1994
Avsar, Vahap
Turkey
1994
Capelán, Carlos
Uruguay
1994
Romero, Nelbia
Uruguay
1994
Sagradini, Mario
Uruguay
1994
Soto, Jorge Francisco
Uruguay
1994
Atkinson, Karen
USA
1994
Bereal, Ed
USA
1994
Cheng, Carl
USA
1994
Chin, Mel
USA
1994
Chong, Albert
USA
1994
Coleman, Johnny
USA
1994
Glazer Danay, Richard
USA
1994
Lebron, Michael
USA
1994
Millar, Robert
USA
1994
420
Outterbrige, John
USA
1994
Saar, Alison
USA
1994
Saar, Betye
USA
1994
Saar, Lesley
USA
1994
Sánchez, Juan
USA
1994
Troeller, Linda
USA
1994
Williams, Pat
USA
1994
Abad, Pacita
USA (residents)
1994
Bahc, Mo
USA (residents)
1994
Bessouet, Norma
USA (residents)
1994
Cardillo, Rimer
USA (residents)
1994
Cardoso, María Fernanda (col)
USA (residents)
1994
Chu, Ken
USA (residents)
1994
Damast, Elba
USA (residents)
1994
Hongtu, Bang
USA (residents)
1994
Kang, Ik-Joong
USA (residents)
1994
Martorell, Antonio
USA (residents)
1994
Osorío, Pepon (Puerto Rico)
USA (residents)
1994
Soon Min, Yong
USA (residents)
1994
Toral, Tabo
USA (residents)
1994
Baroni, Rafaela
Venezuela
1994
Becerra, Milton
Venezuela
1994
Benaín Ricardo
Venezuela
1994
Fuenmayor, Hector
Venezuela
1994
Garrldo, Nelson
Venezuela
1994
Gasparini, Paolo
Venezuela
1994
Hernández Diez, José Antonio
Venezuela
1994
Irazábal, Victor Hugo
Venezuela
1994
Obregón, Roberto Talmor, Lihe
Venezuela
1994
Kingelez, Bodys Isek
Zaire
1994
Bickle, Berry
Zimbabwe
1994
Musorowembudzi, Morgan
Zimbabwe
1994
ANDRADE, ZAN
Angola
1991
BEN BELLA, MAJHOUB
Angola
1991
KORAICHI, RACHID
Angola
1991
MALEK, SALAH
Angola
1991
MOUHOUBI, AKILA
Angola
1991
ARANOVICH, CLAUDIA
Argentina
1991
BEDEL, JACQUES
Argentina
1991
BEDOYA, FERNANDO
Argentina
1991
BENEDIT, LUIS
Argentina
1991
CAUSA, MARIA ALEJANDRA
Argentina
1991
ELIA, ROBERTO
Argentina
1991
FRAIRE, CRISTlNA
Argentina
1991
GLUSBERG, JORGE
Argentina
1991
GRIPPO, VICTOR
Argentina
1991
IGLESIAS, EDUARDO
Argentina
1991
KUROTPAWA, ALEJANDRO
Argentina
1991
LANDEM, PATRICIA
Argentina
1991
MALER, LEOPOLDO
Argentina
1991
PAEZ, OSCAR
Argentina
1991
PEREZ BECERRA, ALEJANDRO
Argentina
1991
421
PORTILLOS, ALFREDO
Argentina
1991
SAGASTIZABAL, TULIO
Argentina
1991
SCHNITMAN, JORGE
Argentina
1991
SIQUIER, PABLO
Argentina
1991
STOLKINER, R.
Argentina
1991
TESTA, CLORINDO
Argentina
1991
CHAKRADORTY, HASHI
Bangladesh
1991
RAHMAN, WAKI LUR
Bangladesh
1991
SARWAR-E-KAVIR, GOLAM
Bangladesh
1991
GAHOU, KOFFI
Benin
1991
VALCARCEL, ROBERTO
Bolivia
1991
AMARAL, ZULMIRA
Brazil
1991
ANDRE, MARCUS
Brazil
1991
BARAVELLI, LUIZ PAULO
Brazil
1991
BENEDICTO, NAIR
Brazil
1991
BRITO, CYNTHJA
Brazil
1991
CHAVES, MARCUS
Brazil
1991
CIPIS, MARCELO
Brazil
1991
CYTRYNOWICZ, SALOMON
Brazil
1991
FELIX, NELSON
Brazil
1991
FINGERMAN, SERGIO
Brazil
1991
FRANCO, SIRON
Brazil
1991
KOLUMBAN, HESS
Brazil
1991
LAMBRETH, KARIM
Brazil
1991
MARCHEZI, FULVIA
Brazil
1991
MARTINS, DELFIM
Brazil
1991
REZENDE, GUSTAVO
Brazil
1991
ROCHA, ADRIANA
Brazil
1991
SIMONETTI, MAURICIO
Brazil
1991
SOARES, VALESKA
Brazil
1991
VALENTIM, RUBEM
Brazil
1991
VILLANOVA ARTIGAS, JUAN BAUTISTA
Brazil
1991
BELANGER, LANCE
Canada
1991
BELMORE, REBECA
Canada
1991
CISNEROS, DOMINGO
Canada
1991
DAVID, JOSEPH
Canada
1991
MARTEL, RICHARD
Canada
1991
NOGANOSH, RON
Canada
1991
POITRAS, EDWARD
Canada
1991
ALTAMIRANO, CARLOS
Chile
1991
BRUGNOLI, FRANCISCO
Chile
1991
DAVILA, JUAN
Chile
1991
DIAZ, GONZALO
Chile
1991
DITTBORN, EUGENIO
Chile
1991
DUCLOS, ARTURO
Chile
1991
ERRAZURIZ, VIRGINIA
Chile
1991
GONZALEZ, NURY
Chile
1991
SORO, MARIO
Chile
1991
ZAMUDIO, ENRIQUE
Chile
1991
Various artists
China
1991
CARDOSO, MARIA FERNANDA
Colombia
1991
CASTELLANOS, JAIME
Colombia
1991
422
COMBARIZA, MARTHA
Colombia
1991
HINCAPIE, MARIA TERESA
Colombia
1991
JARAMILLO, ENRIQUE
Colombia
1991
LIZARAZO, ANGELA
Colombia
1991
POSADA, JULIAN
Colombia
1991
SALCEDO, DORIS
Colombia
1991
URIBE, RAMON
Colombia
1991
ZAPATA, HUGO
Colombia
1991
ZAPATA, LUIS FERNANDO
Colombia
1991
JIMENEZ DEREDIA, JORGE
Costa Rica
1991
ROJAS, JOSE MIGUEL
Costa Rica
1991
STANLEY, RODOLFO
Costa Rica
1991
ACOSTA, GUSTAVO
Cuba
1991
AGUILERA, ALEJANDRO
Cuba
1991
AYON, BELKIS
Cuba
1991
BETANCOURT, WALTER
Cuba
1991
CAMPOS, MAGDALENA
Cuba
1991
CASTRO, HUMBERTO
Cuba
1991
FINALE ALDECOA, MOISES
Cuba
1991
GARCIA, LAZARO
Cuba
1991
GOMEZ, LUIS
Cuba
1991
GONZALEZ DE ARMAS, JESUS
Cuba
1991
JOVERT, JOEL
Cuba
1991
LAM, WIFREDO
Cuba
1991
LOPEZ MARIN, ROGELIO
Cuba
1991
LOZANO, EDUARDO
Cuba
1991
LUNA, CARLOS
Cuba
1991
MIRANDA, IBRAHIM
Cuba
1991
MIYARES, BARBARO
Cuba
1991
PEREZ, MARTA MARIA
Cuba
1991
RODRIGUEZ, RAUL
Cuba
1991
CAPELLAN, TONY
Dominican Republic
1991
CUEVAS, ALONSO
Dominican Republic
1991
DESANGLES, JESUS
Dominican Republic
1991
GUADALUPE, ANTONIO
Dominican Republic
1991
LORA, MARCOS
Dominican Republic
1991
MEJIA, RADHAMES
Dominican Republic
1991
ULLOA, VICTOR
Dominican Republic
1991
CARDOSO, PABLO
Ecuador
1991
JACOME, RAMIRO
Ecuador
1991
ROMAN, NELSON
Ecuador
1991
AL WESHAHY, ABDEL HADY
Egypt
1991
DUNGA CABANGIS, JOSE MARIA
Ethiopia
1991
EPISTOLA FERRARIS, NELSON E.
Ethiopia
1991
JUNYEE
Ethiopia
1991
MAGTIBAY, WILLIAM B.
Ethiopia
1991
YEMTGETA. ZERIHUN
Ethiopia
1991
TIAN-SIO-PO, THIERRY
French Guyana
1991
GLOVER, ABLADE
Ghana
1991
AAREEN, RASHEED
Great Britain
1991
ADRUS, SAID
Great Britain
1991
BOYCE, SONIA
Great Britain
1991
423
HATOUM, MONA
Great Britain
1991
JANAH, SUNIL
Great Britain
1991
PATTI, SYMRATH
Great Britain
1991
PHAOPHNIT, VONG
Great Britain
1991
PIPER, KEITH
Great Britain
1991
POLLARD, INGRID
Great Britain
1991
ROVELAS, MICHEL
Guadalupe
1991
BARRIOS, MOISES
Guatemala
1991
DIAZ, LUIS
Guatemala
1991
CORREA, CHARLES
India
1991
DEVRAJ, DAKOJI
India
1991
GUJRAL, SATISH
India
1991
HUSAIN, M.F.
India
1991
JANAH, SUNIL
India
1991
KHANNA, KRISHEN
India
1991
RIMZON, N.N.
India
1991
SUBRAMANYAN, K.G.
India
1991
SUNDARAM, VIVAN
India
1991
SWAMINATHAN, J.
India
1991
AMBAR, IENE
Indonesia
1991
AZZAWI, DIA
Iraq
1991
STITA, MOHAMED A.
Libia
1991
PIYADASA, REDZA
Malasia
1991
SHAN MUGHALINGAM, NIRMALA
Malasia
1991
Various artists
Mali
1991
HELENON, SERGE
Martinique
1991
LAOUCHEZ, LOUIS
Martinique
1991
ACEVES NAVARRO, GILBERTO
Mexico
1991
ALVAREZ BRAVO, LOLA
Mexico
1991
ALVAREZ BRAVO, MANUEL
Mexico
1991
ANDRADE, YOLANDA
Mexico
1991
ANGUIA, RICARDO
Mexico
1991
BARRAGAN, LUIS
Mexico
1991
CRUZ, MARCOS ANTONIO
Mexico
1991
CUELLAR, ROGELIO
Mexico
1991
DONIZ, RAFAEL
Mexico
1991
ESCALERA, JANITZIO
Mexico
1991
GARAY, ANDRES
Mexico
1991
GARCIA, HECTOR
Mexico
1991
GROBET, LOURDES
Mexico
1991
HARTZ, FRIDA
Mexico
1991
HERNANDEZ, SERGIO
Mexico
1991
ITURBIDE, GRACIELA
Mexico
1991
LOPEZ, NACHO
Mexico
1991
MARTINEZ, JOSE ESTEBAN
Mexico
1991
MATA, FRANCISCO
Mexico
1991
MAYA, LUCIA
Mexico
1991
ORTIZ MONASTERIO, PABLO
Mexico
1991
RUBINSTEIN MALAMUD, MAURICIO
Mexico
1991
SALCEDO, JORGE
Mexico
1991
VALTIERRA, PEDRO
Mexico
1991
VILLASENOR, ELENA
Mexico
1991
424
YOVANOVICH, VIDA .
Mexico
1991
ZENIL, NAHUN
Mexico
1991
BELKAHIA, FARID
Morroco
1991
KACIMI, MOHAMED
Morroco
1991
CHISSANO, ALBERTO
Mozambique
1991
MARTINS, ISABEL
Mozambique
1991
EL ANATSUI
Nigeria
1991
UTOMI EKPEI, PIUS
Nigeria
1991
MIAN IRANI,ASKANI
Pakistan
1991
URENA RAMOS, ARISTIDES
Panama
1991
CASARI ISASI, ALBERTO
Peru
1991
CASTRO, FERNANDO
Peru
1991
DEUSTUA, JORGE
Peru
1991
FANTOZZI, ROBERTO
Peru
1991
PACHECO, JUAN
Peru
1991
RUNCIE TANAKA, CARLOS
Peru
1991
TOKESHI, EDUARDO
Peru
1991
WIESSE, RICARDO
Peru
1991
YAKER, MOICO
Peru
1991
HERNANDEZ CRUZ, LUIS
Puerto Rico
1991
IRRIZARRIZ, CARLOS
Puerto Rico
1991
PEREZ, ENOC
Puerto Rico
1991
QUIJANO, NICK
Puerto Rico
1991
SUAREZ, JAIME
Puerto Rico
1991
DIME, MOUSTAPHA
Senegal
1991
TRAORE, BABACAR
Senegal
1991
FITZGERALD, BABETTE
South Africa
1991
SEBIDI, HELLEN
South Africa
1991
WILLIAMSON, SUE
South Africa
1991
APICHATKRIENKRAI, WIJIT
Thailand
1991
KOMI, SOKEMAWOU
Togo
1991
CABRAL, FRANCISCO
Trinidad and Tobago
1991
EL KAMEL, RAFlK
Tunes
1991
TRIKI, GOUIDER
Tunes
1991
BATEGGAZORE, MIGUEL
Uruguay
1991
CAMNITZER, LUIS
Uruguay
1991
DIAZ VALDEZ, WILFREDO
Uruguay
1991
FERNANDEZ, GUSTAVO
Uruguay
1991
ISARRUALDE, MARCELO
Uruguay
1991
ITURRIA, IGNACIO
Uruguay
1991
LOPEZ LAGE, FERNANDO
Uruguay
1991
NANTES, HUGO
Uruguay
1991
PELAYO, JOSE MARIA
Uruguay
1991
RAMOS, NELSON
Uruguay
1991
DAWESTASHY, ESMAT
USA
1991
EMMANUEL, CRISTINA
USA
1991
HEDAYAH, SAID
USA
1991
HENEIN, ADAM
USA
1991
HENRY, CARYL
USA
1991
KANO, BETTY
USA
1991
LONGVAL, GLORIA.
USA
1991
SOON MIN, YONG
USA
1991
425
VILLA, CARLOS
USA
1991
WASHINGTON, BISA
USA
1991
BECERRA, MILTON
Venezuela
1991
CABRUJAS, MARTA
Venezuela
1991
GASPARINI, PAOLO
Venezuela
1991
LAZO, ANTONIO
Venezuela
1991
MACHADO, OSCAR
Venezuela
1991
MAESTRE, GUSTAVO
Venezuela
1991
MENDOZA, CARLOS
Venezuela
1991
MORENO, EDGARD
Venezuela
1991
MOYA, ANTONIO
Venezuela
1991
TERAN, PEDRO
Venezuela
1991
VILLANUEVA, CARLOS RAUL
Venezuela
1991
ZERPA, CARLOS
Venezuela
1991
AKUDA, FANIZANI
Zimbabwe
1991
BICKLE, BERRY
Zimbabwe
1991
GUTSA, TAPFUMA
Zimbabwe
1991
JACK, RICHARD
Zimbabwe
1991
LIEROS, HELEN
Zimbabwe
1991
MARIGA, JORAM
Zimbabwe
1991
NYANHONGO, AGNES
Zimbabwe
1991
WILLIAMS, STEPEHN
Zimbabwe
1991
BENYAHIA, Samta
Algiers
1989
CHOUKRI, Mesli
Algiers
1989
KARIM, Sergoua
Algiers
1989
KORAICHI, Rachid
Algiers
1989
LARBI, Arezki
Algiers
1989
MARTINEZ, Denis
Algiers
1989
SILEM, Ali
Algiers
1989
TEIXEIRA, Victor (Viteix)
Algiers
1989
ZAN ANDRADE, José
Algiers
1989
OLE, Antonio
Angola
1989
ALTAMIRANDA, Rodolfo E.
Argentina
1989
ASLAN, Nora
Argentina
1989
BIRRI, Fernando
Argentina
1989
BONGLIANI, Beatriz
Argentina
1989
BUJALTER, Mimi
Argentina
1989
CADELLI, Luis A.
Argentina
1989
CAPATACO SANJURJO, Daniel
Argentina
1989
CORREAS, Nora
Argentina
1989
CORUJEIRA, Alejandro
Argentina
1989
CUTULI, Gracia
Argentina
1989
DOMPE, Hernán
Argentina
1989
FARCO, Raúl
Argentina
1989
FERNANDEZ, Mario Alberto
Argentina
1989
FOGEL, Alejandro
Argentina
1989
FUNES, María Lujan
Argentina
1989
GOMEZ, Norberto
Argentina
1989
GRINBERG, Liliana
Argentina
1989
GUTIERREZ MARX, Graciela
Argentina
1989
HERMIDA, Graciela
Argentina
1989
HERRADA, María
Argentina
1989
426
INIESTA, Nora
Argentina
1989
LOMBARDO, Susana
Argentina
1989
MATSCHKE, Lutz
Argentina
1989
MAUDERLI, Alfredo
Argentina
1989
NEGROTTI, Luis
Argentina
1989
NICORA, Julio
Argentina
1989
NIEDERMAIER, Alejandra
Argentina
1989
ORTA, Jorge
Argentina
1989
PATERNOSTO, César
Argentina
1989
PAZ, Hilda
Argentina
1989
POLESELLO, Rogelio
Argentina
1989
PUENTE, Alejandro
Argentina
1989
ROMERO, Juan Carlos
Argentina
1989
RUBINSON, Rut
Argentina
1989
SACHS, Tana
Argentina
1989
SEGURA, Carola
Argentina
1989
SIELBURGER, Silvia
Argentina
1989
SIGWALD, Pablo
Argentina
1989
SIGWALD, Vicky
Argentina
1989
TESTA, Clorindo
Argentina
1989
VIGO, Eduardo
Argentina
1989
VIGO, Tania
Argentina
1989
WALL, Joan
Argentina
1989
ABAYI, Philippe Victorien
Benin
1989
CORDOVA, Inés
Bolivia
1989
MEDEIROS ANAYA, Gustavo
Bolivia
1989
ROJAS LAM, Hugo
Bolivia
1989
UGALDE CASTRO, Gastón
Bolivia
1989
VALCARCEL, Roberto
Bolivia
1989
ZILVETI. Luís
Bolivia
1989
ALMEIDA, Marcio
Brazil
1989
BONI LICHT, Amari
Brazil
1989
BREVIAN, Maria Elena
Brazil
1989
BRITO, Bartolomeu
Brazil
1989
BRITTO, Estevan
Brazil
1989
BRUSCKY, Paulo
Brazil
1989
BURGER, Marita
Brazil
1989
CAMPOS GRILLO, Rubén
Brazil
1989
CAPISTRANO, Franklin
Brazil
1989
CAVALCANTI LUNDGREU, Dilza
Brazil
1989
CERZO, Celso Diniz Braga
Brazil
1989
CROCCO. Heloisa
Brazil
1989
DE ARAUJO, A
Brazil
1989
DIVOZ, Carlos
Brazil
1989
DOREA, Juraci
Brazil
1989
FABRE, Eleonora
Brazil
1989
GORINI, Berenice
Brazil
1989
HARTER, Eugenia
Brazil
1989
HUNGRIA, Clemente
Brazil
1989
LEDA MACEDO, María
Brazil
1989
LOURO, Maria Tereza
Brazil
1989
MAGNO, Montez
Brazil
1989
427
MIRANDA, Lenir de
Brazil
1989
MOELLER, Sonia
Brazil
1989
NASSAR, Enmanuel
Brazil
1989
NOBREGA, Alexandre
Brazil
1989
NOROGRANDO, Ana María
Brazil
1989
PARODI, Pierluigi
Brazil
1989
PETRY, Andre
Brazil
1989
POTEIRO, Antonio
Brazil
1989
PRADO, Gilberto
Brazil
1989
RIO BUNCO, Miguel
Brazil
1989
SALGADO, Sebastian
Brazil
1989
SCALDAFERRI, Sante
Brazil
1989
SILVA, Falves
Brazil
1989
SILVA, Tarcisio
Brazil
1989
VALENTIM, Rubén
Brazil
1989
VASCONCELLOS, Bia
Brazil
1989
GNILE, Tiaho
Burkina Faso
1989
OUEDRAOGO, Noufou
Burkina Faso
1989
ALTAMIRANO VALENZUELA, Carlos
Chile
1989
BALMES, José
Chile
1989
BERCHENKO, Gregorio
Chile
1989
CAMPO, Julieta
Chile
1989
CERDA, Rogelio
Chile
1989
CHARLIN, Ivón
Chile
1989
DAVILA, René
Chile
1989
DEISLER, Guillermo
Chile
1989
DIAZ ESPINOSA, Eduardo
Chile
1989
DIAZ, Gladys
Chile
1989
DITTBORN, Eugenio
Chile
1989
ERRAZURIZ, Paz
Chile
1989
ESCOBAR, Manuel
Chile
1989
GEWOLB MAYANZ, Nancy
Chile
1989
HOPPE, Álvaro
Chile
1989
HUGHES, Helen
Chile
1989
JANISZAWSKI, Jorge
Chile
1989
KUHN SEPULVEDA, Jorge
Chile
1989
LARREA, Miguel Ángel
Chile
1989
MENESES, Pedro
Chile
1989
MONTES DE OCA, Carlos
Chile
1989
NAVARRO, E. Luís
Chile
1989
OLHAGARAY, César
Chile
1989
ORELLANA, Fernando
Chile
1989
SILVA CASTERON, Osvaldo
Chile
1989
STAY, Patricio
Chile
1989
TELLEZ, Eugenio
Chile
1989
TRIVIEO, Jorge
Chile
1989
UGARTE, Marco
Chile
1989
VEGA, N. Luis
Chile
1989
WEINSTEIN, Luís
Chile
1989
YRARRAZAVA, Carolina
Chile
1989
ALARCON, Ezequiel
Colombia
1989
AZOUT, Lydia
Colombia
1989
428
GRANADA, Carlos
Colombia
1989
GRAU, Enrique
Colombia
1989
LLANO GARCIA, María
Colombia
1989
LUNA MATIZ, Luís
Colombia
1989
MIRANDA, Olivia
Colombia
1989
OSPINA, Nadin
Colombia
1989
RAMIREZ VILLAMIZAR, Eduardo
Colombia
1989
RAMIREZ ZAPATA, Marta
Colombia
1989
RENDON, Fabian
Colombia
1989
RESTREPO, Tulio
Colombia
1989
RUEDA, Ana María
Colombia
1989
TELLO MURILLO, Walter Orlando
Colombia
1989
BELLA
Congo
1989
BOKOTAKA, Cyrille
Congo
1989
CRISPIN, Jean
Congo
1989
ELENGA
Congo
1989
HOKI, Francois
Congo
1989
ITOVA, Jean
Congo
1989
MANGONANDZA, Sylvestre
Congo
1989
MPO, Yerly
Congo
1989
NGAOUKA, Daniel
Congo
1989
NTOTA
Congo
1989
ONDONGO, Nicholas
Congo
1989
POTO-POTO, Escuela de
Congo
1989
TAGUA, Maurice
Congo
1989
WAMASSOUMOUNA
Congo
1989
ZIGOMA, Jacques
Congo
1989
APUY, Otto
Costa Rica
1989
FABA LOPEZ, Rolando
Costa Rica
1989
LIZANO DUARTE, Roberto
Costa Rica
1989
MORENO BLANCO, Alberto
Costa Rica
1989
ORTIZ STRADTMANN, Paulina
Costa Rica
1989
SOLIS, Otton
Costa Rica
1989
AGUILAR LABRADA, Roger S.
Cuba
1989
AGUILERA GONZALEZ, Alejandro
Cuba
1989
BEDIA, José
Cuba
1989
BLANCO, Othon
Cuba
1989
BORBONET, Tomás
Cuba
1989
BORGES DELGADO, Pablo
Cuba
1989
BUERGO, Adriano
Cuba
1989
CABRERA HERNANDEZ, Luís
Cuba
1989
CANET, Antonio
Cuba
1989
CARBALLO PEREZ, Oscar
Cuba
1989
CASTRO GARCIA, Umberto
Cuba
1989
CEBALLOS OBAYA, Sandra
Cuba
1989
CONTINO PEREZ, José M.
Cuba
1989
CUE GONZALEZ, Alejandro
Cuba
1989
DIAGO, Roberto
Cuba
1989
DIAZ LEYVA, Mario
Cuba
1989
EIRIZ, Antonia
Cuba
1989
ESSON, Tomás
Cuba
1989
FABELO PEREZ, Roberto
Cuba
1989
429
FERNANDEZ, Antonio Eligio
Cuba
1989
FORS, José Manuel
Cuba
1989
FRANC0 CODINACH, José
Cuba
1989
GALLARDO, Mario
Cuba
1989
GARCIA DIAZ, Osneldo
Cuba
1989
GARCIA PEiiA, Ernesto
Cuba
1989
GARCIA, Victor Manuel
Cuba
1989
GARCIANDIA, Flavio
Cuba
1989
GOMEZ FRESQUET, José
Cuba
1989
GONZALEZ DE ARMAS, Jesús
Cuba
1989
GONZALEZ MORALES, Rolando Paciel
GUTIERREZ, Pedro Juan
Cuba
Cuba
1989
1989
HERNANDEZ VALDES, Manuel
Cuba
1989
JIMENO, Isabel
Cuba
1989
JRISTOVA, Bojidara (Dara)
Cuba
1989
LAM MARIMON, Augusto O.
Cuba
1989
LEAL JIMENEZ, César
Cuba
1989
LOPEZ DIAZ, Minerva
Cuba
1989
MARTINEZ BLANCO, Enrique
Cuba
1989
MENDIVE HOYOS, Manuel
Cuba
1989
MORALES AJUBEL, Alberto
Cuba
1989
MOYA HERNANDEZ, Ramón
Cuba
1989
NOVOA VIAN, Glexis
Cuba
1989
NUEZ ROBAINA, Rene de la
Cuba
1989
NUEZ, Gilberto de la
Cuba
1989
PEÑA, Umberto
Cuba
1989
PEREZ, Martha Maria
Cuba
1989
POSADA, José Luís
Cuba
1989
QUERT ALVAREZ, Pablo
Cuba
1989
QUINTANA, Ciro
Cuba
1989
RAMIREZ ROQUE, Angel
Cuba
1989
RIO, Zaida del
Cuba
1989
ROCA ZALAZAR, Eduardo
Cuba
1989
RODRIGUEZ BREY, Ricardo
Cuba
1989
RODRIGUEZ CARDENAS, Carlos
Cuba
1989
RODRIGUEZ OLAZABAL, Santiago
Cuba
RODRIGUEZ PEREZ, Bienvenido Alberto
Cuba
1989
1989
RONDA RIVERO, Félix Vicente
Cuba
1989
SAAVEDRA GONZALEZ, Lázaro
Cuba
1989
SANCHEZ REQUEIRO, Tomás
Cuba
1989
SIMANCA TIRADO, Osmani
Cuba
1989
SOSABRAVO, Alfredo
Cuba
1989
SOTO ORTIZ, Leandro
Cuba
1989
TAMAYO, Madelin
Cuba
1989
TORRES LLORCA, Rubén
Cuba
1989
TORRES, José Omar
Cuba
1989
URIBAZO GARRIDO, Carlos R.
Cuba
1989
VALDES, Luis Miguel
Cuba
1989
VENT DUMOIS, Lesbia
Cuba
1989
VIDAL, Antonio
Cuba
1989
VILLAR ALEMAN, Carlos Julio (Carlucho)
Cuba
1989
VILLAR, Juan Pablo
Cuba
1989
ZARZA, Rafael
Cuba
1989
430
BATISTA, Domingo
Dominican Republic
1989
LOPEZ REYES, Martin José
Dominican Republic
1989
PIMENTEL, Thimo
Dominican Republic
1989
SANGIOVANNI, Carlos
Dominican Republic
1989
SOTO DE GUTIERREZ, Jacqueline
Dominican Republic
1989
ALVARADO LOPEZ, Marco Antonio
Ecuador
1989
BENITEZ A., Cecilia
Ecuador
1989
CARRASCO, Victoria
Ecuador
1989
CUESTA CAPUTI, Francisco
Ecuador
1989
GARCIA CAPUTI, Mariela
Ecuador
1989
PROAÑO, Francisco
Ecuador
1989
EL GHEBALI, Hussein
Egypt
1989
EL RAZZAZ, Mostafa
Egypt
1989
FARGALI, Abdel Hafiz
Egypt
1989
FOUAD SELIM, Ahmed
Egypt
1989
MANOSUR, Sabry
Egypt
1989
MOHAMED NADA, Hamed
Egypt
1989
NAWAR, Ahmed
Egypt
1989
REDA ABD SALAM, Mohamed
Egypt
1989
SALAM EID, Abdel
Egypt
1989
SHEHATA, Farouk
Egypt
1989
WAHBA, Ahmed Abdul
Egypt
1989
WAHBA, Farouk
Egypt
1989
WECHAHI, Abd-Hadi
Egypt
1989
ROMEO GALDAMEZ, Jesús
El Salvador
1989
IELASHEW, Solomon
Ethiopia
1989
GLOVER, Ablade
Ghana
1989
BERRY, Arakima
Guinea
1989
CAMARA, Mohamed
Guinea
1989
CAMARA, Ousmane
Guinea
1989
DIALLO, Rabiaka
Guinea
1989
GOUMAH, Mamadoul:
Guinea
1989
KABA, Kabinet
Guinea
1989
OFORI-DUODU, Seth Asiedu
Guinea
1989
SANKON, Mamadouba
Guinea
1989
SOUMAH, Ansouname
Guinea
1989
SURENA, Monique Athenaise
Guinea
1989
LOCKE, Do
Guyana
1989
ALVARADO JUAREZ, Francisco
Honduras
1989
AHHILLAR, J. K.
India
1989
BHASKARAN, R. B.
India
1989
CHANDRASHEKARA, C.
India
1989
CHOYAL, P. N.
India
1989
CHOYAL, Shail
India
1989
DAS, Sunil
India
1989
DENGLE, Diwakar
India
1989
DHUMAL, Rini (Dasgupta)
India
1989
DUTTA RAY, Shymal
India
1989
KUMAR, Anil
India
1989
MISTRY, C. D.
India
1989
REDDY, Den
India
1989
VIDYA SANKAR STHAPATHY, S. G. Thiry
India
431
1989
AL ALI, Salah
Iraq
1989
AL-SAID, Shakir Hassan
Iraq
1989
AZZAWI, Dia
Iraq
1989
ABDUL RASOUL, Salam Ibrahim
Kuwait
1989
KHAZAAL, Hameed Ismael
Kuwait
1989
HATOUM, Mona
Lebanon
1989
BADRAN, Samira
Libia
1989
CHOONG, Kam-Kow
Malasia
1989
MAMADOU, Diane
Mali
1989
HAMID, Moulferdi
Martinique
1989
JERAMA, Alain
Martinique
1989
NIVOR BERTIN, Rigobert
Martinique
1989
FRANCOIS, Sergio
Martinique
1989
AGUILAR, José Luís
Mexico
1989
ALFIN, Alberto
Mexico
1989
ALMEIDA, Lourdes
Mexico
1989
ANAYA, Yosi
Mexico
1989
BELKIN, Arnold
Mexico
1989
BOURCART, Karine
Mexico
1989
BRISAC, Tessa
Mexico
1989
CARMONA, Estrella
Mexico
1989
CASTRO LEBERO, José
Mexico
1989
CASTRO LEÑERO, José
Mexico
1989
DIAZ FLORES, Antonio
Mexico
1989
DONDE, Olga
Mexico
1989
ESCOBEDO, Helen
Mexico
1989
ESPINOSA, César
Mexico
1989
FERNANDEZ, Claudia
Mexico
1989
FIGUEROA, María Eugenia
Mexico
1989
FIGUEROA, Tolita
Mexico
1989
FLORES, Aaron
Mexico
1989
GARCIA CAMNIZAREZ, René
Mexico
1989
GERRI, Lejtik
Mexico
1989
GROBET, Lourdes
Mexico
1989
GRUNER, Silvia
Mexico
1989
GUERRERO, Arturo
Mexico
1989
GUTIERREZ, Marcela
Mexico
1989
HASBACH, Patricia
Mexico
1989
HELLION, Martha
Mexico
1989
ICAZA, Silvia
Mexico
1989
ITURBIDE, Graciela
Mexico
1989
JURADO, Carlos
Mexico
1989
KEMCHS, Arturo
Mexico
1989
KRAUZE BROID, Perla
Mexico
1989
L. DE SANTACRUZ, Maria Clara
Mexico
1989
LAM, Magali
Mexico
1989
LARA, Marisa
Mexico
1989
LAVILLE, Joy
Mexico
1989
LEÑERO, Vicente
Mexico
1989
LINARES, Androna
Mexico
1989
LOPEZ CASTRO, R
Mexico
1989
MALDONADO, Efrén
Mexico
1989
432
MARROQUIN, Rosa Luz
Mexico
1989
MATA ROSAS, Francisco
Mexico
1989
MERCADO, Olinca
Mexico
1989
MONROY, Guillermo
Mexico
1989
MORAN, Teresa
Mexico
1989
MURGIA, Veronica
Mexico
1989
MURRIETA, Rosa Ofelia
Mexico
1989
NARANJO, Rogelio
Mexico
1989
OCHARAN, Leticia
Mexico
1989
PALAU, Martha
Mexico
1989
PATIÑO, Adolfo
Mexico
1989
PEREZ DIAZ, Enrique
Mexico
1989
RABEL, Fanny
Mexico
1989
RAMIREZ, Noemi
Mexico
1989
RANGEL FAZ, Merio
Mexico
1989
RIPPEY, Carla
Mexico
1989
ROBLES, Rosa María
Mexico
1989
ROJO, Vicente
Mexico
1989
ROVNES, Flora
Mexico
1989
SALAZAR SILVA, Leonor
Mexico
1989
SANDOVAL, Mauricio
Mexico
1989
SUTER, Gerardo
Mexico
1989
TAMAYO, Julia
Mexico
1989
TELLEZ, Othon
Mexico
1989
TEMIN, Josefina
Mexico
1989
TOLEDO, Francisco
Mexico
1989
TREVIÑO CHAVEZ, Milburgo
Mexico
1989
TURNBULL, Roberto
Mexico
1989
BELKAHIA, Farid
Morroco
1989
BOUJAMAOUI, Moustapha
Morroco
1989
KACIMI, Mohamed
Morroco
1989
RABI, Abdelkebir
Morroco
1989
AMBELICOLA, Nkabala
Mozambique
1989
NKATUNGA, Rafael Namangue
Mozambique
1989
TOMAS, Celestino
Mozambique
1989
VALINGUE, Miguel
Mozambique
1989
BELLI, Patricia
Nicaragua
1989
MORALES ALONSO, Luís
Nicaragua
1989
QUINTANILLA, Raúl
Nicaragua
1989
BURAIMOH, Jimoh
Nigeria
1989
FAKEYE, Olabisi
Nigeria
1989
ONOBRAKPEYA, Bruce
Nigeria
1989
OSHIGA, Olajide Ifakite
Nigeria
1989
SEVEN SEVEN, Twins
Nigeria
1989
CHANG, Li
North Korea
1989
CHE ZU, Li
North Korea
1989
CHONG YO, Zong
North Korea
1989
HA TEK, Che
North Korea
1989
IN JUAN, Kim
North Korea
1989
POM JA, Zim
North Korea
1989
SOK IO, Lik
North Korea
1989
YONG CHUN, Juang
North Korea
1989
433
YONG ZUN, Juang
North Korea
1989
ZONG CHOL, Jam
North Korea
1989
ZONG SAN, Pak
North Korea
1989
HALABY, Samia A.
Palestine
1989
CONTRERAS, Rubén
Panama
1989
MONTILLA, Manuel
Panama
1989
EIELSON, Jorge Eduardo
Peru
1989
MINKA, Grupo
Peru
1989
NN, Taller RUNCIE TANAKA, Carlos
Peru
1989
TOLA, José
Peru
1989
VAINSTEIN, Esther
Peru
1989
BOSE, Santiago
Philipines
1989
FAJARDO, Brenda
Philipines
1989
FELEO, Roberto
Philipines
1989
MALIWAT, Raymon
Philipines
1989
QUIJANO TORRES, Nick
Puerto Rico
1989
ROCHE RABELL, Arnaldo
Puerto Rico
1989
SOBRINO, Carmelo
Puerto Rico
1989
AHMED, Youssef
Qatar
1989
BAH, Chernor
Sierra Leone
1989
HARDING, John
Sierra Leone
1989
YEO CHEW HONG, Thor
Singapore
1989
BUDAZA, Hamilton k.
South Africa
1989
CLARKE, Peter
South Africa
1989
GUMEDE, Smart
South Africa
1989
HLEZA, Austin
South Africa
1989
KOLOANE, David
South Africa
1989
MANDINI, Billy
South Africa
1989
MAUTLOA, Kagiso Patrick
South Africa
1989
MBATHA, Azarina
South Africa
1989
MBATHA, Derrick
South Africa
1989
MOGANO, P. David
South Africa
1989
MSIMANGO, George
South Africa
1989
MUAFANGEJO, John
South Africa
1989
NLENETHWA, Sam
South Africa
1989
RAKGOATHE, Dan
South Africa
1989
SELEPE, Sydney
South Africa
1989
SHILAKOE, Cyprian
South Africa
1989
SHILALI, Durant
South Africa
1989
SIBIYA, Lucky
South Africa
1989
SIHLALI, Durant
South Africa
1989
TANKI
South Africa
1989
ULU, Vuminkosi
South Africa
1989
ZIQUBU, Ephrain
South Africa
1989
BUDDHISIR KEERTHISE, Sinhalage
Sri Lanka
1989
DIAB, Ahmed Rashid
Sudan
1989
ASSANANCHALEE, Kamol
Thailand
1989
HANONNART, Kiettisak
Thailand
1989
CABRAL, Francisco
Trinidad & Tobago
1989
E MAHDAOUI, Nja
Tunes
1989
KHAMSA CHEDLY, Bel
Tunes
1989
ACOSTA BENTOS, Eduardo
Uruguay
1989
434
AHLIG, Ingrid
Uruguay
1989
AROZTEGUI, Ernesto
Uruguay
1989
BARRAGAN, Rosa
Uruguay
1989
BATTEGAZZORE, Miguel Angel
Uruguay
1989
BERNITT, Silke
Uruguay
1989
BETTOSINI, Maria Mercedes
Uruguay
1989
CARBALLO, Jorge
Uruguay
1989
CASABO, Cristina
Uruguay
1989
CASTELLI, Sonia
Uruguay
1989
DE AGOSTO CASTRO, Jorge
Uruguay
1989
DE PAULA, Raúl
Uruguay
1989
DELFIN0, Nilad
Uruguay
1989
DIAMIANI, Jorge
Uruguay
1989
ECHENIQUE, Jorge
Uruguay
1989
GUASCUE, Ana
Uruguay
1989
GUIDALI MANDIROL, Dora
Uruguay
1989
LADRA, Antonio
Uruguay
1989
NAKLE, Gustavo
Uruguay
1989
OGGERO, Beatriz
Uruguay
1989
OLIVERA, Dilma
Uruguay
1989
PADIN, Clemente
Uruguay
1989
PEREIRA MUÑIZ, Juan Eduardo
Uruguay
1989
SANCHEZ VERA, Magali
Uruguay
1989
SANTOS, Osmar
Uruguay
1989
SOTO, Jorge Francisco
Uruguay
1989
UBILLA, Alicia
Uruguay
1989
VEIROJ, Marta
Uruguay
1989
VERA, Felicia
Uruguay
1989
ALVARADO, Hernán
Venezuela
1989
ARVELO, Solange
Venezuela
1989
BARON, Luís
Venezuela
1989
BARONI DE CABEZAS, Rafael
Venezuela
1989
BASTIDAS, Lorenza
Venezuela
1989
BEJARANO ESCALANTE, Gilberto Ali
Venezuela
1989
BELANDRIA, José
Venezuela
1989
BERMUDEZ, Henry
Venezuela
1989
BONILLA, Chuncho
Venezuela
1989
CASTRO, Carmen
Venezuela
1989
CASTRO, Jacqueline
Venezuela
1989
ELDA LA CRUZ, Mari
Venezuela
1989
ERASO, Gonzalo
Venezuela
1989
FERRAZ, Alberto
Venezuela
1989
GARCIA SOTO, Roseliano
Venezuela
1989
GARCIA, Checarmen
Venezuela
1989
HERRERA, Zulay
Venezuela
1989
LEON, Ernesto
Venezuela
1989
LEON, Luís Adrián
Venezuela
1989
LOBATON, José Eugenio
Venezuela
1989
MARQUEZ, José
Venezuela
1989
MATHEUS GONZALEZ, Jesús
Venezuela
1989
MEDINA, Maria Yolanda
Venezuela
1989
MENDEZ, Juan Ali
Venezuela
1989
435
MOLINA, Francisca
Venezuela
MONTILLA, Agustín
1989
Venezuela
1989
MORENO, José de los Santos
Venezuela
1989
MORENO, Olinto
Venezuela
1989
MORENO, Orangel Antonio
Venezuela
1989
MORENO, Ramon Antonio
Venezuela
1989
MOYA, Antonio
Venezuela
1989
MUNDARAY, Ismael
Venezuela
1989
NUÑEZ MATOS, Isidro
Venezuela
1989
OGAZ, Damaso
Venezuela
1989
PARRA, Edison
Venezuela
1989
PEÑA, José Gregorio
Venezuela
1989
PEREZ, Solita de
Venezuela
1989
QUINTERO, Nerio
Venezuela
1989
RODRIGUEZ, Jesús
Venezuela
1989
RODRIGUEZ, José
Venezuela
1989
ROMERO, Elena
Venezuela
1989
SANCHEZ, Lucio
Venezuela
1989
SERSA ZVAB, Vladimir
Venezuela
1989
TERAN, Nabor
Venezuela
1989
TORRAS, Maria Teresa
Venezuela
1989
ZERZA, Carlos
Venezuela
1989
HUAN, Do
Vietnam
1989
KIM DANG, Hoang
Vietnam
1989
PHAN, Do
Vietnam
1989
TRUC SON, Ly
Vietnam
1989
XUAN HOA, Dang
Vietnam
1989
BENGA, Nzau
Zaire
1989
KALENGA, Kingambi
Zaire
1989
MAYALA, Bayangu
Zaire
1989
MOSENGO, Moke
Zaire
1989
NBIMBA, Samba Wa
Zaire
1989
NDOSIMAU, Nsingi
Zaire
1989
NTOKO, Vuza
Zaire
1989
NTUMBA, Kamanda
Zaire
1989
TAMBA, Ndeme
Zaire
1989
MUKOMBERANGWA, Nicholas
Zimbabwe
1989
Neon
Germany
2006
Sampta Ben, Yahia
Algiers
1986
Dias, Fehat
Algiers
1986
Mohamed, Khadda
Algiers
1986
Ali, Silem
Algiers
1986
Luzolano Dombaxi, Joao De Deus
Angola
1986
Alfonso, Massangui
Angola
1986
Antonio, Ole
Angola
1986
Francisco Domingo, Van-Dunem
Angola
1986
Victor, Teixeira (Vietix)
Angola
1986
Antoro, Octavio
Argentina
1986
Aslan, Nora
Argentina
1986
Bengoechea, Miguel Ange
Argentina
1986
Borio, Mario
Argentina
1986
Brook, Federico
Argentina
1986
436
Caloi, L. Carlos
Argentina
1986
Cantamesa, Pedro F.
Argentina
1986
Castaña, Blas
Argentina
1986
Corral, Ines
Argentina
1986
Cuello, Felix
Argentina
1986
Cutuli, Gracia
Argentina
1986
Delmonte, Alberto
Argentina
1986
Demarco, Hugo
Argentina
1986
Diestefano, Juan Carlos
Argentina
1986
Echevarrieta, Alfredo
Argentina
1986
Eckell, Ana
Argentina
1986
Fontanarrosa, Roberto
Argentina
1986
Fraticelli, Onofe Roque
Argentina
1986
Guifree, Hector
Argentina
1986
Gutero, Juan Jose
Argentina
1986
Jabienski, Gabriel
Argentina
1986
Jozami, Daniela
Argentina
1986
Bessouet, Norma
Argentina
1986
Kosice, Gyula
Argentina
1986
Krasnopolski, Guillermo
Argentina
1986
Logomarsino, Hugo
Argentina
1986
Lasser, Juan Carlos
Argentina
1986
Lopez, Marcos
Argentina
1986
Lipa Burd, Ibrahim
Argentina
1986
Machado, Mauro
Argentina
1986
Manarini, Martha
Argentina
1986
Mantegani, Roger
Argentina
1986
Marcon, Maria Cristina
Argentina
1986
Marcos, Alejandro
Argentina
1986
Martinez, Cristina
Argentina
1986
Medici, Eduardo
Argentina
1986
Mlynazewicz, Ariel
Argentina
1986
Monastirsky, Oscar
Argentina
1986
Nigro, Adolfo
Argentina
1986
Orensanz, Marie
Argentina
1986
Pesce, Ernesto
Argentina
1986
Pino, Felipe
Argentina
1986
Pont Verges, Pedro
Argentina
1986
Porter, Liliana
Argentina
1986
Quiroga, Victor Hugo
Argentina
1986
Reynoso, Cristobal
Argentina
1986
Rosas, Roberto
Argentina
1986
Salvatierra, Enrique
Argentina
1986
Santamarina, Alejandro
Argentina
1986
Sapia, Armando
Argentina
1986
Scafati, Luis
Argentina
1986
Smonje, Oscar
Argentina
1986
Schemper, Alicia
Argentina
1986
Sulic, Susana
Argentina
1986
Tejon, Eduardo
Argentina
1986
Tomatis, Sergio
Argentina
1986
Trigos, Silvana
Argentina
1986
437
Vieytes, Zaira
Argentina
Zabala, Horacio
1986
Argentina
1986
Paternostro, Cesar
Argentina
1986
Ferrari, Leon
Argentina
1986
Garcia Rossi, Horacio
Argentina
1986
Segui, Antonio
Argentina
1986
Tomasello, Luis
Argentina
1986
Demirjian, Jorge
Argentina
1986
Grant, Matilde
Argentina
1986
Lavado, Juaquin (Quino)
Argentina
1986
Gucemas, Nelson
Argentina
1986
Duran Benet, Joan
Belice
1986
Alza Alvarez, Benedicto
Bolivia
1986
Angeles Lopez, David
Bolivia
1986
Argedas Villanueva, Magda
Bolivia
1986
Fabri Crespo, Maria de los Angeles
Bolivia
1986
Fernandez Paton, Javier
Bolivia
1986
Pata, Alfredo de la
Bolivia
1986
Lara Torres, Gustavo
Bolivia
1986
Madeiros Anaya, Gustavo
Bolivia
1986
Medizabal Pelaez, Jimmy
Bolivia
1986
Pedraza Rivero, Herminio
Bolivia
1986
Rojas Lara, Hugo
Bolivia
1986
Secretan de Carrazo, Francine
Bolivia
1986
Torres Pabon, Maria
Bolivia
1986
Ugalde Castro, Gaston
Bolivia
1986
Valdez Fuentes, Carlos
Bolivia
1986
Villazon Vega, Carmen
Bolivia
1986
Alvez, Maria Teresa
Brazil
1986
Andrade, Alecio
Brazil
1986
Beer, Maria Luisa
Brazil
1986
Calasans Neto, Jose Julio
Brazil
1986
Camara Filho, Joao
Brazil
1986
Carpanezzi, Cezira
Brazil
1986
Carrion de Brito, Carlos
Brazil
1986
Carvalho, Josely
Brazil
1986
Souza, Iganacio de
Brazil
1986
Cravo Neto, Mario
Brazil
1986
Esmeraldo, Servulo
Brazil
1986
Facaha Faria,s, Luis
Brazil
1986
Firmo, Walter
Brazil
1986
Flemming, Alex
Brazil
1986
Franco, Siron
Brazil
1986
Golman-Belz, Sara
Brazil
1986
Gomes Garces, Paulo
Brazil
1986
Grimspun, Esther
Brazil
1986
Grostein, Marcia
Brazil
1986
Guto Lacaz, Mario
Brazil
1986
Ianelli, Thomaz
Brazil
1986
Coutinho, Laerte
Brazil
1986
Maritins, Aldemir
Brazil
1986
Nemar, Jose A
Brazil
1986
438
Ostrower, Fayga
Brazil
1986
Penteado, Darcy
Brazil
1986
Pinhero, Oscar
Brazil
1986
Quadros, Ana Letycia
Brazil
1986
Rodriges, Inacio
Brazil
1986
Rossi, Joao
Brazil
1986
Salvador, Gilberto
Brazil
1986
Scliar, Carlos
Brazil
1986
Senise Portella, Daniel
Brazil
1986
Tozzi, Claudio
Brazil
1986
Vallauri, Alex
Brazil
1986
Campos Vasconcellos, Cassio
Brazil
1986
Zaragoza, Jose
Brazil
1986
Katz, Renina
Brazil
1986
Ohtake, Tomie
Brazil
1986
Oliveira, Branca de
Brazil
1986
Pinto de Moraes, Glauco
Brazil
1986
Piza, Arthur Luiz
Brazil
1986
Araujo, Octavio
Brazil
1986
Bonomi, Maria
Brazil
1986
Mascaro, Cristiano
Brazil
1986
Meireles, Cildo
Brazil
1986
Quedraogo, Brinqui Julien
Burkina Fazo
1986
Sawadogo, Raya
Burkina Fazo
1986
Kenfak, Pascal
Camerun
1986
Sayou, Samuel
Camerun
1986
Israel, Patricia
Chile
1986
Kleiner Haas, Lea
Chile
1986
Mariaca Cardozo, Maria
Chile
1986
Maturana Piña, Carlos
Chile
1986
Medina Guzman, Claudio
Chile
1986
Murua, Mario
Chile
1986
Ortizpozo, Anibal
Chile
1986
Parra, Catalina
Chile
1986
Peña Muñoz, Osvaldo
Chile
1986
Dominguez, Irene
Chile
1986
Salvatierra, Luis
Chile
1986
Sepulveda Rosales, Pedro Miguel
Chile
1986
Soza Bustos, Sergio
Chile
1986
Vicuña, Cecilia
Chile
1986
Armas, Ximena
Chile
1986
Balmer Barrios, Concepcion
Chile
1986
Benmayor, Samy
Chile
1986
Berroeta, Eduardo
Chile
1986
Downey, Juan
Chile
1986
Errazuriz, Paz
Chile
1986
Ferreiro, L
Chile
1986
Figeroa L., Patricia
Chile
1986
Garreauld Spencer, Eduardo
Chile
1986
Harmecker Cerda, Ines
Chile
1986
Irrazabal, Mario
Chile
1986
Alcantara, Pedro
Colombia
1986
439
Astudillo, Ever
Colombia
1986
Azout, Lidia
Colombia
1986
Barrera, Antonio
Colombia
1986
Barrios, Alvaro
Colombia
1986
Bernal, Adolfo
Colombia
1986
Caicedo, Carlos
Colombia
1986
Cajellas V., Rodrigo
Colombia
1986
Castles, John
Colombia
1986
Echeverri, Rafael
Colombia
1986
Garcia Botero, Maria Elena
Colombia
1986
Gomez, Consuelo
Colombia
1986
Gonzalez Ceron, Oscar
Colombia
1986
Hernandez, Claudia
Colombia
1986
Hoyos, Ana Mercedes
Colombia
1986
Hoyos, Carlos Enrique
Colombia
1986
Jaramillo, Lorenzo
Colombia
1986
Lis Galindo, Maria Fernanda
Colombia
1986
Loochkart, Angel
Colombia
1986
Munera B., Jorge Mario
Colombia
1986
Mayer, Becky
Colombia
1986
Ortiz, Jorge
Colombia
1986
Ospina, Vicky
Colombia
1986
Panizza, Ricardo Rafael
Colombia
1986
Paz, Luis
Colombia
1986
Restrepo, Raul Fernando
Colombia
1986
Roda, Juan Antonio
Colombia
1986
Rojas O., Miguel A
Colombia
1986
Rueda, Ana Maria
Colombia
1986
Sanin, Fanny
Colombia
1986
Uribe Duque, Alberto
Colombia
1986
Valbuena, Alberto
Colombia
1986
Velasquez, Camilo
Colombia
1986
Velez, Martha Elena
Colombia
1986
Vellojin, Manolo
Colombia
1986
Vieco, Maria Teresa
Colombia
1986
Villegas, Nelson
Colombia
1986
Zalamea Traba, Gustavo
Colombia
1986
Zapata, Hugo
Colombia
1986
Franco, Fernell
Colombia
1986
Rayo, Omar
Colombia
1986
Rojas, Carlos
Colombia
1986
Cogollo, Heriberto
Colombia
1986
Gomez, Maria Clara
Colombia
1986
Gongora, Leonel
Colombia
1986
Obregon, Alejandro
Colombia
1986
Mokoko, Emile
Congo
1986
Mouanga Nkodia, Bernard
Congo
1986
Quassa, Philippe
Congo
1986
Arrieta Salazar, Pedro
Costa Rica
1986
Braci Ramelli, Alvaro
Costa Rica
1986
Carballo Jimenez, Fernando
Costa Rica
1986
Castro, Fernando
Costa Rica
1986
440
Espinoza Morales, Rudy
Costa Rica
1986
Faba, Rolando
Costa Rica
1986
Herrera Martinez, Fabio
Costa Rica
1986
Moreno Blanco, Alfredo
Costa Rica
1986
Prado Vargas, Mariano
Costa Rica
1986
Siliezar Solano, Adolfo
Costa Rica
1986
Rojas Gonzalez, Miguel
Costa Rica
1986
Solis Quiroz, Rafael
Costa Rica
1986
Torijano Chacon, Eduardo
Costa Rica
1986
Acosta, Gustavo
Cuba
1986
Alfaro, Angel
Cuba
1986
Ajubel, Alberto
Cuba
1986
Bedia, Jose
Cuba
1986
Benitez, Adigio
Cuba
1986
Carballo Perez, Oscar
Cuba
1986
Villar Aleman, Carlos
Cuba
1986
Castañeda, Consuelo
Cuba
1986
Castro, Humberto
Cuba
1986
Contino, Jose
Cuba
1986
Cuenca, Arturo
Cuba
1986
Muños Bach, Eduardo
Cuba
1986
Mendive, Manuel
Cuba
1986
Garcia Joya, Mario
Cuba
1986
Haya, Maria Eugenia
Cuba
1986
Lopez Dias, Minerva
Cuba
1986
Lara Franquis, Tomas
Cuba
1986
Llerendoso, Joel Jovert
Cuba
1986
Jay Matamoros, Ruperto
Cuba
1986
Martinez Grandal, Ramon
Cuba
1986
Diaz Pelaez, Jose Antonio
Cuba
1986
Hernandez Valdez, Manuel
Cuba
1986
Nuez, Gilberto de la
Cuba
1986
Gonzalez Delgado, Jose Ramon
Cuba
1986
Garciandia, Flavio
Cuba
1986
Garcia Diaz, Osneldo
Cuba
1986
Frometa, Gilberto
Cuba
1986
Perez, Jorge
Cuba
1986
Franco Codinach, Jose Miguel
Cuba
1986
Willar Aleman, Juan Pablo
Cuba
1986
Fors, Jose Manuel
Cuba
1986
Fong Garcia, Flora
Cuba
1986
Elso Padilla, Juan Francisco
Cuba
1986
Dominguez Cedeño, Nelson
Cuba
1986
Gonzalez, Carlos
Cuba
1986
Posada Medio, Jose Luis
Cuba
1986
Proenza Almaguer, Cosme
Cuba
1986
Quert Alvarez, Pablo
Cuba
1986
Rafat, Jose
Cuba
1986
Ramirez Roque, Angel M
Cuba
1986
Tamayo Zamora, Israel
Cuba
1986
Rio Castro, Zaida del
Cuba
1986
Oses, Pedro
Cuba
1986
441
Rodriguez Brey, Ricardo
Cuba
1986
Romero Cardona, Rigoberto
Cuba
1986
Sanchez, Tomas
Cuba
1986
Sosabravo, Alfredo
Cuba
1986
Gonzalez Alvarez, Jose
Cuba
1986
Nuez Robaina, Rene de la
Cuba
1986
Villa Soberon, Jose
Cuba
1986
Soto Ortiz, Leandro
Cuba
1986
Torres Lorca, Ruben
Cuba
1986
Valdez B,. Julia
Cuba
1986
Fernandez, Antonio Eligio (Tonel)
Cuba
1986
Norniela Angel
Cuba
1986
Darie Llaver, Sandu
Cuba
1986
Fabelo, Roberto
Cuba
1986
Girona, Julio
Cuba
1986
Gonzalez Puig, Ernesto
Cuba
1986
Longa, Rita
Cuba
1986
Lopez Marin, Rogelio
Cuba
1986
Martinez, Raul
Cuba
1986
Martinez, Pedro Luis
Cuba
1986
Rodriguez, Mariano
Cuba
1986
Cañas Boix, Ivan
Cuba
1986
Corral Varella, Raul
Cuba
1986
Gomez Fesquet, Jose
Cuba
1986
Garcia, Manuel
Cuba
1986
Bass, Alberto
Dominican Republic
1986
Diaz, Polibio
Dominican Republic
1986
Lora, Silvano
Dominican Republic
1986
Oviedo, Ramon
Dominican Republic
1986
Constante Parra, Theo
Ecuador
1986
Montesinos Vial, Ricardo
Ecuador
1986
Luziriaga, Camilo
Ecuador
1986
Aguirre, Marcelo
Ecuador
1986
Jacome D., Ramiro
Ecuador
1986
Solis Guerrero, Mario
Ecuador
1986
Iza-Silva, Washington
Ecuador
1986
Guitierrez Moscoso, Judit
Ecuador
1986
Gilbert de Blomberg, Araceli
Ecuador
1986
Galecio Tarnto, Galo
Ecuador
1986
Florez M., Pilar
Ecuador
1986
Endara Crow, Gonzalo
Ecuador
1986
Bustos, Pilar
Ecuador
1986
Bueno, Mauricio
Ecuador
1986
Tabara, Enrique
Ecuador
1986
Abdel Moitie, Mustafa
Egypt
1986
El-Sotoi, Ahmed
Egypt
1986
Taja El-Shimy, Awadallah
Egypt
1986
El-Sheikh, Maamoun
Egypt
1986
Azmy, Ahmed
Egypt
1986
Abdel Aty, Mahamoud
Egypt
1986
El Nashar, Abdel-Rahman
Egypt
1986
Athanatios, Sabry Nashed
Egypt
1986
442
Abdalah, Ismail
Egypt
Hazen Fathallah, Mohammed
1986
Egypt
1986
Mokthar Ahmed, Abdel Kader
Egypt
1986
Salaam, Reda Abdel
Egypt
1986
Romeo Galdamez, Jesus
El Salvador
1986
Huezo, Roberto
El Salvador
1986
Minero, Camilo
El Salvador
1986
Quintanilla, Rene
El Salvador
1986
Reyes, Julio
El Salvador
1986
Caña, Carlos
El Salvador
1986
Yetmgeta, Zerihum
Ethiopia
1986
Goshu, Worku
Ethiopia
1986
Henrich, Annemarie
Germany
1986
Anky-Golloh, Emmanuel
Ghana
1986
Acquaye, Saka
Ghana
1986
Glover, Ablade
Ghana
1986
Kofi-Broni, Kingsley
Ghana
1986
Ofosu- Appeah, Franklin
Ghana
1986
Bartimeus, Albert Osabu
Ghana
1986
Gane, Romain
Guadalupe
1986
Apolinaire Salevor, Alain
Guadalupe
1986
Abularach, Rodolfo
Guatemala
1986
Barrios Carrillo, Estuardo
Guatemala
1986
Cabrera, Roberto
Guatemala
1986
Izquierdo, Cesar
Guatemala
1986
Greaves, Stanley
Guyana
1986
Thompson, Angold
Guyana
1986
Etzer, Charles
Haiti
1986
Alvarado Juarez, Francisco
Honduras
1986
Chowdhury, Jogen
India
1986
Das, Jatiln
India
1986
Das Gupta, Dharmanarayan
India
1986
Giri, G.Y.
India
1986
Kambli, H.R
India
1986
Katt, Latinka
India
1986
Kraul, Brushan
India
1986
Kumar, Vinnet
India
1986
Kumar Das, Swapan
India
1986
Malani, Nalini
India
1986
Mukherjee, Mrinalini
India
1986
Parekh, Manu
India
1986
Patwardhan, Sidhir
India
1986
Prasanna, Shuva
India
1986
Shaw, Lalu Prosad
India
1986
Puri, M. K
India
1986
Rabadia, Jayanti
India
1986
Rai, Narendra
India
1986
Ramachandran, A
India
1986
Patel, Vinod Ray
India
1986
Rowittiya, Rekha
India
1986
Chowdhury, Sarbari Roy
India
1986
Shinde, Deepak
India
1986
443
Sinh, Arpita
India
1986
Soni, Sutaider,
India
1986
Sud, Anupam
India
1986
Sudarm, Vivan
India
1986
Swaroop, Jyoti
India
1986
Tiwari, Vasundhara
India
1986
Vasude, S.G
India
1986
Batla, Ramesh Vedhan
India
1986
Khakkar, Bhupen
India
1986
Bawa, Manjit
India
1986
Broota, Rameshwar
India
1986
Caur, Arpana
India
1986
Harakiyohadi, Eddie
Indonesia
1986
Khorsad, Marzieh
Iran
1986
Samadia, Sifollah
Iran
1986
Shahoroodi, Afshin
Iran
1986
Ziaire, Aligholi
Iran
1986
Al-Albidi, Amir
Iran
1986
Hamoudid, Jamail
Iran
1986
Zangana, Haifa
Iraq
1986
Cookhorne, Robert
Jamaica
1986
Boxer, David
Jamaica
1986
Brown, Everald
Jamaica
1986
Geoge, Milton
Jamaica
1986
Jonhnson, Estrianna
Jamaica
1986
Watson, Osmond
Jamaica
1986
Abdul Reda, Ahmad
Kuwait
1986
Abdulla Amin, Nisreen
Kuwait
1986
Al-Qattan, Khalifa
Kuwait
1986
Al-Shaikh Akeel, Mohamad
Kuwait
1986
Al-radwan, Mahmeed
Kuwait
1986
Aziz Arty, Abdul
Kuwait
1986
Hussain Baqer, Abdul Reda
Kuwait
1986
Chazzal, Hameed
Kuwait
1986
Musaid Al-Behariri, Mohammad
Kuwait
1986
Qamber Qassin, Mohammad
Kuwait
1986
Yassin, Kaseem
Kuwait
1986
Charara, Adrian
Lebanon
1986
Kamai, Hazan
Lebanon
1986
Zaituni, Mufid
Lebanon
1986
Unithan, Dolly
Malasia
1986
Diabate, Ismalia
Mali
1986
Konate, Abdoulaye
Mali
1986
Moutakari Haidara, Mahomed
Mali
1986
Nene Thiam, Dagnoko
Mali
1986
Anicet, Victor
Martinique
1986
Breleur, Ernest
Martinique
1986
Guedon, Henri
Martinique
1986
Charles-Eduard, Francois
Martinique
1986
Nivor, Bertain
Martinique
1986
Anzures Torres, Javier
Mexico
1986
Mexico
1986
Barba, Faustino
444
Mexico
1986
Castro L, Alberto
Bostelmann, Enrique
Mexico
1986
Casto L, Jose
Mexico
1986
Doniz Lechon, Rafael
Mexico
1986
Escobedo, Elen
Mexico
1986
Flores, Helio
Mexico
1986
Garcia, Hector
Mexico
1986
Garcia, Fernando
Mexico
1986
Gironella, Alberto
Mexico
1986
Grobet, Lourdes
Mexico
1986
Guardado, Ismael
Mexico
1986
Hendriz, Jan
Mexico
1986
Hernandez Martinez, Sergio
Mexico
1986
Herrera, Raul
Mexico
1986
Iturbe, Mercedes
Mexico
1986
Iturbe, Graciela
Mexico
1986
Kaminer, Saul
Mexico
1986
Macotela, Grabriel
Mexico
1986
Marroquin, Rosa
Mexico
1986
Morales, Rowena
Mexico
1986
Naranjo U., Humberto
Mexico
1986
Naranjo U., Rogelio
Mexico
1986
Neyra Torres, Jose Luis
Mexico
1986
Palau, Martha
Mexico
1986
Ramirez, Nohemi
Mexico
1986
Rio Garcia, Eduardo del
Mexico
1986
Rocha Palacios, Ricardo
Mexico
1986
Carbajar, Enrique
Mexico
1986
Soriano, Juan
Mexico
1986
Toledo, Francisco
Mexico
1986
Valdez, Remigio
Mexico
1986
Velasquez, Hugo
Mexico
1986
Vanegas Perez, German
Mexico
1986
Von Gutten, Roger
Mexico
1986
Zalce, Alfredo
Mexico
1986
Belkin, Arnold
Mexico
1986
Felguerez, Manuel
Mexico
1986
Flores Olea, Victor
Mexico
1986
Meyer, Pedro
Mexico
1986
Orlando, Felipe
Mexico
1986
Rojo, Vicente
Mexico
1986
Silva, Federico
Mexico
1986
Urueta, Cordelia
Mexico
1986
Patiño, Adolfo
Mexico
1986
Chaibia, Tallal
Morroco
1986
Chichorro, Robert
Mozambique
1986
Chissano, Alberto
Mozambique
1986
Lopes, Bertina
Mozambique
1986
Bateta Gonzalez, Pablo
Nicaragua
1986
castllon, Rafael
Nicaragua
1986
Cerrato, Boaneges
Nicaragua
1986
Gallo, Maria
Nicaragua
1986
445
Guillen Rodriguez, Arnoldo
Nicaragua
1986
Montenegro Altamirano, Carlos
Nicaragua
1986
Medina, Efre
Nicaragua
1986
Moore, George
Nicaragua
1986
Moreira, Gonzalo
Nicaragua
1986
Nuñez, Denis
Nicaragua
1986
Rodriguez M, Oscar
Nicaragua
1986
Rojas Martinez, Cecilia
Nicaragua
1986
Saenz, Leoncio
Nicaragua
1986
Saravia, Fernando
Nicaragua
1986
Sobalvarro, Orlando
Nicaragua
1986
Urbina Rivas, Luis
Nicaragua
1986
Vanegas Rosales, Leonel
Nicaragua
1986
Rivas Alfaro, Juan
Nicaragua
1986
Aguilar Ponce, Luis
Panama
1986
Arias, Susana
Panama
1986
Arias Peña, Estanislao
Panama
1986
Augustine, Aduardo
Panama
1986
Brooke, Alfaro
Panama
1986
Obaldia, Isabel de
Panama
1986
Grimonet Bertrand, Andre
Panama
1986
Icaza Hansen, Teresa
Panama
1986
Jaime de Greitas, Ricardo
Panama
1986
Rodriguez, Justino
Panama
1986
Rodriguez Porcelli, Raul
Panama
1986
Toral, Tabo
Panama
1986
Trujillo, Guillermo
Panama
1986
Acevedo Fernandez, Juan
Peru
1986
Amigo, Alina
Peru
1986
Dominguez Hernandez, Carlos
Peru
1986
Fantozzi, Roberto
Peru
1986
Guzman, Alberto
Peru
1986
Hamann, Johanna
Peru
1986
Laske Rosa, Siegfried
Peru
1986
Lee, Leslie
Peru
1986
Lopez Merino, Patricia
Peru
1986
Llona, Ramiro
Peru
1986
Montenegro, Carlos Alfredo
Peru
1986
Chavez-Fernandez
Peru
1986
Oliva, Felix
Peru
1986
Pastorelli, Juan
Peru
1986
Quintanilla, Alberto
Peru
1986
Shinky, Venancio
Peru
1986
Tola, Jose
Peru
1986
Tovar Semanez, Carlos
Peru
1986
Velarde de la Piedra, Salvador
Peru
1986
Vertiz, Martha
Peru
1986
Vidal Henderson, Mariel
Peru
1986
Braun, Herman
Peru
1986
Gorospe Villanueva, Ben Hur
Philipines
1986
Blanco, Jose
Philipines
1986
Baldemor, Manuel
Philipines
1986
446
Caratig, Norberto
Philipines
1986
Delacruz, Fil P.
Philipines
1986
Drilon, Rock
Philipines
1986
Baens Santos, Pablo
Philipines
1986
Joya, Jose
Philipines
1986
Abad, Pacita
Philipines
1986
Maestro, Lani
Philipines
1986
Ordenario Garcia, Danilo
Philipines
1986
Paz Contreras, Reynato
Philipines
1986
Reyes Miranda, Nemesio
Philipines
1986
Veneracion y Santos, Roy
Philipines
1986
Baldemor, Wilfredo
Philipines
1986
Aboy, Ramon
Puerto Rico
1986
Alfonso, Luis
Puerto Rico
1986
Baez, Myrna
Puerto Rico
1986
Betancout, John
Puerto Rico
1986
Blanco, Sylvia
Puerto Rico
1986
Cabrera, Yvette
Puerto Rico
1986
Collazo, Carlos
Puerto Rico
1986
Colo, Papo
Puerto Rico
1986
Cordero-Mercado, Felix
Puerto Rico
1986
Dimas, Marcos
Puerto Rico
1986
Espinoza, Susana
Puerto Rico
1986
Fantanez, Carmelo
Puerto Rico
1986
Gaztambide Geigel, Jose
Puerto Rico
1986
Gotay, Consuelo
Puerto Rico
1986
Gutierrez, Marina
Puerto Rico
1986
Herrero, Susana
Puerto Rico
1986
Irizarry, Marcos
Puerto Rico
1986
Maldonado Reyes, Wilma
Puerto Rico
1986
Marcial Lopez, Carlos
Puerto Rico
1986
Martorell, Antonio
Puerto Rico
1986
Medin, Frieda
Puerto Rico
1986
Mendez C., Hector
Puerto Rico
1986
Mestey, Oscar
Puerto Rico
1986
Morgado, Victor
Puerto Rico
1986
Navia, Antonio
Puerto Rico
1986
Ordoñez, Maria Antonia
Puerto Rico
1986
Perez, Martha
Puerto Rico
1986
Quijano, Nick
Puerto Rico
1986
Rivera, Rafael
Puerto Rico
1986
Roche, Arnaldo
Puerto Rico
1986
Rodriguez, Cecila
Puerto Rico
1986
Romano, Jaime
Puerto Rico
1986
Sastre, Melquiades
Puerto Rico
1986
Tamborin, Nelson
Puerto Rico
1986
Sanchez, Juan
Puerto Rico
1986
Suarez, Jaime
Puerto Rico
1986
Ballester, Diogenes
Puerto Rico
1986
N'Dan, Genevieve
Senegal
1986
N'Doye, Assne
Senegal
1986
Brioche, Julien
Seychelles
1986
447
Luc, Marc Leonard
Seychelles
1986
Peter, Pierre-Louis
Seychelles
1986
Leon Lois, Wilma
Seychelles
1986
Woodcok, Andre
Seychelles
1986
Al-Bacha, Assam
Siria
1986
Maudaress, Gateh
Siria
1986
Nabaa, Nazir
Siria
1986
Khaled, Ali Salim
Siria
1986
Zayat, Elias
Siria
1986
Fuente, Manuel de la
Spain
1986
Dharmasri, Albert
Sri Lanka
1986
Satath, Sella
Sri Lanka
1986
Winstan Suludagoda, L.W.
Sri Lanka
1986
Nour, Amir
Sudan
1986
Mesrine, Do
Togo
1986
Ainsworth Harris, Carlisle
Trinidad & Tobago
1986
Chen, Willi
Trinidad & Tobago
1986
Iton, Morris Michael
Trinidad & Tobago
1986
Ben Saad, Hammadi
Tunes
1986
Vida, Habib
Tunes
1986
El Mahjoub, Jabeur
Tunes
1986
Hjeri, Ahmed
Tunes
1986
Karray, Raouf
Tunes
1986
Khechine, Abderrazak
Tunes
1986
Labbane, Heidi
Tunes
1986
Jean-Loup, Ange
Tunes
1986
Turki, Heidi
Tunes
1986
Barea, Calos Alfonso
Uruguay
1986
Gejar Traibel, Alfonso
Uruguay
1986
Cabrera, German
Uruguay
1986
Caffera Baru, Carlos
Uruguay
1986
Cardillo, Rimer
Uruguay
1986
Duarte, Elvira
Uruguay
1986
Mines, Diana
Uruguay
1986
Novoa, Leopoldo
Uruguay
1986
Romero, Nelbia
Uruguay
1986
Romeron, Nelson
Uruguay
1986
Sagradini, Mario
Uruguay
1986
Salcosvky Luciani, Ana
Uruguay
1986
Sartore Fraga, Hugo
Uruguay
1986
Seveso Freire, Carlos
Uruguay
1986
Arden Quin, Carmelo
Uruguay
1986
Camnitzer, Luis
Uruguay
1986
Franconi, Antonio
Uruguay
1986
Armas, Enrico
Venezuela
1986
Armas Barrios, Baltazar
Venezuela
1986
Arvelaiz, Maria
Venezuela
1986
Arria, Cristina
Venezuela
1986
Baez, Pedro
Venezuela
1986
Barreto, Pedro
Venezuela
1986
Brito, Luis
Venezuela
1986
Carraquel, Jose Arcadio
enezuela
1986
448
Carrillo Gil, Francisco
Venezuela
1986
Cepeda, Ender
Venezuela
1986
Cisneros, Frank
Venezuela
1986
Colmenarez, Asdrubal
Venezuela
1986
Contreras, Romulo
Venezuela
1986
Este, Gaudi
Venezuela
1986
Fonseca, Edgar
Venezuela
1986
Gabaldon, Teresa
Venezuela
1986
George, Felix
Venezuela
1986
Gomez, Diego
Venezuela
1986
Guerrero, Jose Luis
Venezuela
1986
Hernandez, Enrique
Venezuela
1986
Herrera, Felipe
Venezuela
1986
Huerta, Saul
Venezuela
1986
Hung, Francisco
Venezuela
1986
Jonis Isaac, Pedro
Venezuela
1986
Mendez, Cosuelo
Venezuela
1986
Lobo Sosa, Emiro
Venezuela
1986
Morales, Elsa
Venezuela
1986
Morales, Jose Martin
Venezuela
1986
Moya, Antonio
Venezuela
1986
Nuñez, Isidro
Venezuela
1986
Pachecho Rivas, Isidro
Venezuela
1986
Paez, Jose Miguel
Venezuela
1986
Palacios, Dulce
Venezuela
1986
Pantin, Ana
Venezuela
1986
Parada, Belen
Venezuela
1986
Peña, Rolando
Venezuela
1986
Pujol, Adrian
Venezuela
1986
Salas, Jorge
Venezuela
1986
Sanchez de Leal, Beatriz
Venezuela
1986
Sarmiento, Diego
Venezuela
1986
Silvestro, Domenico
Venezuela
1986
Szinetar, Vasco
Venezuela
1986
Tagliafico, Pedro
Venezuela
1986
Teran, Pedro
Venezuela
1986
Torras, Maria Teresa
Venezuela
1986
Yanes, Oswaldo
Venezuela
1986
Hackshaw y Gonzalez, Jeniffer & Maria Luisa
Venezuela
1986
Nam, Yeni
Venezuela
1986
Zerep, Jorge
Venezuela
1986
Zepa, Carlos
Venezuela
1986
Cruz Diez, Carlos
Venezuela
1986
Otero, Alejandro
Venezuela
1986
Palacios, Alirio
Venezuela
1986
M'Puanga Liyolo, Limbe
Zaire
1986
Tayali, Henry
Zambia
1986
Lieros, H
Zimbabwe
1986
Muli, J
Zimbabwe
1986
Nkomo, T
Zimbabwe
1986
Manyka, D
Zimbabwe
1986
Munyaradzi, H
Zimbabwe
1986
449
Thompson, H
Zimbabwe
1986
Mukarobgwa
Zimbabwe
1986
Mushambi, L
Zimbabwe
1986
AMOROSO BOELCKE, Nicolas Alberto
Argentina
1984
ARA MONTI, Carlos
Argentina
1984
ARTETA, Melita
Argentina
1984
BARBOZA, Justo D.
Argentina
1984
BEER, Maria Luisa
Argentina
1984
BERTANI, Ernesto
Argentina
1984
BETETA GONZALEZ, Pablo
Argentina
1984
BIELINSKI, Claudia
Argentina
1984
BOBBIO, Pablo
Argentina
1984
CAILLET, Danielle
Argentina
1984
CANEVARO, Walter
Argentina
1984
CANOVAS, Fernando
Argentina
1984
CARMONA, Carlos Alberto
Argentina
1984
CARPANI, Ricardo R
Argentina
1984
CATTOLICA, Hector
Argentina
1984
COLOMBRES, Ignacio
Argentina
1984
CROVO, Hilda Esther
Argentina
1984
D'ARIENZO, Miguel Alfredo
Argentina
1984
DAVIDOVICH, Jaime
Argentina
1984
DEBAIROSMOURA, Luis
Argentina
1984
DOBARRO, Nora
Argentina
1984
DOFFO, Juan
Argentina
1984
DOMINGUEZ SALAZAR, Luia
Argentina
1984
DOWNEY, Juan
Argentina
1984
DRUCAROFF, Hugo
Argentina
1984
DUBO'S, Pauline
Argentina
1984
ECKELL, Ana
Argentina
1984
ESTEBAN, Pascual Carlos
Argentina
1984
FERRARI, Leon
Argentina
1984
FRASCONI, Antonio
Argentina
1984
GARCIA ROSSI, Horacio
Argentina
1984
GIUSIANO, Eduardo
Argentina
1984
GONZALEZ VEGA, Sergio
Argentina
1984
GORRIARENA, Carlos Horacio
Argentina
1984
GRINBERG, Mario
Argentina
1984
HOCHBAUN, Nora
Argentina
1984
HOLZER, Arturo
Argentina
1984
JONOUIERES, Eduardo
Argentina
1984
LANGONE, Carlos
Argentina
1984
LANTERO, Charles
Argentina
1984
LUDUENA, Jorge Mario
Argentina
1984
MANARINI, Martha
Argentina
1984
MARCIAL LOPEZ, Carlos Alberto
Argentina
1984
MARCHISIO MEDINA, Gabriel
Argentina
1984
MARTINEZ, Cristina
Argentina
1984
MARTINEZ VvelS, Anabel
Argentina
1984
MENDEZ GUERRERO, Manuel
Argentina
1984
NOE, Luis Felipe
Argentina
1984
OBELAR, Pablo
Argentina
1984
450
OJEDA, Julio
Argentina
1984
PAEZ, Roberto
Argentina
1984
PAGES PFEIFFER, Beatriz
Argentina
1984
PATERNOSTO, Cesar
Argentina
1984
PAZ, Julio Guillsrmo
Argentina
1984
PEREIRA, Carlos Hugo
Argentina
1984
PLANK, Alfredo
Argentina
1984
PONCE, Raiil Antonio
Argentina
1984
PORTER, Liliana
Argentina
1984
POUSA, Maria
Argentina
1984
RAFFO, Susana
Argentina
1984
RE, Carlos Alberto
Argentina
1984
REY, Flora
Argentina
1984
RIVEIRO, Ernesto
Argentina
1984
RUIZ, Francisco
Argentina
1984
SANTA MARIA, Marino
Argentina
1984
SAUL, Victor
Argentina
1984
SAUNIER, Hector
Argentina
1984
SCHNEIDER, Maria (Maria Elisa Maggtora de Schneidar)
SCHWARTZ, Marcia
Argentina
Argentina
1984
1984
SESSANO, Carlos
Argentina
1984
S1CARDI, Cristina
Argentina
1984
SIMPSON, Mario
Argentina
1984
SOBISCH, Enrique
Argentina
1984
STROCEN, Stefan
Argentina
1984
SUTER, Gerardo
Argentina
1984
SZMULEWICZ, Pablo
Argentina
1984
TOMASELLO, Luis
Argentina
1984
TORRES, Jorge Oscar
Argentina
1984
VAÑARSKY, Jack
Argentina
1984
VEGA, Ines
Argentina
1984
WALTER, Ines María
Argentina
1984
TOMASELLI CIRNE LIMA, Marta
Austria
1984
ADRIAZOLA GUILLEN, Carlos
Bolivia
1984
ANGLES LOPEZ, David
Bolivia
1984
AQUIM DE SANTALLA, Rosario
Bolivia
1984
ARANDIA QUIROGA, Edgar
Bolivia
1984
ARNAL, Enrique
Bolivia
1984
ARUQUIPA CHAMBI, Max
Bolivia
1984
AVILA. Julio Efrain
Bolivia
1984
BARRAGAN ROCHA, J. Dan
Bolivia
1984
BAYRO CORROCHANO, Mauricio
Bolivia
1984
BELTRAN, Norha
Bolivia
1984
CARDOSO SUBIETA, Aldo
Bolivia
1984
FERNANDEZ FERNANDEZ, Carlos
Bolivia
1984
JORDAN CORDOVA, Cesar
Bolivia
1984
MAMANI, Juan
Bolivia
1984
MEDINA .MENDIETA, Alberto
Bolivia
1984
MORALES BARRERA, Diego
Bolivia
1984
OBLITAS MONROY, Angel
Bolivia
1984
ORTUNO, Efrain
Bolivia
1984
OSTRIA, Jose
Bolivia
1984
451
PENALOZA ROCHA, Silvia
Bolivia
1984
PEREZ ALCALA, Ricardo
Bolivia
1984
PORTUGAL, Pedro
Bolivia
1984
ROJAS ARISPE, Vladimir
Bolivia
1984
ROJAS LARA, Hugo
Bolivia
1984
ROMERO GONZALEZ, Walter Solon
Bolivia
1984
SALGLIEIRO MONTOYA, Javier
Bolivia
1984
SANTALLA BARRIENTOS, David
Bolivia
1984
VALCARCEL, Roberto
Bolivia
1984
VARGAS PEREZ, David
Bolivia
1984
VELASCO RECKEWEG, Arturo
Bolivia
1984
ZILVETI, Luis
Bolivia
1984
ALEGRIA, Ana Luiza
Brazil
1984
AMARAL, Antonio Henrique
Brazil
1984
ANDRADE, Alecio de
Brazil
1984
BARATA, Fernando
Brazil
1984
BETTIOL, Zoravia
Brazil
1984
BINA FONYAT, Jose
Brazil
1984
BIRNFELD ROHNELT, Marlo Alberto
Brazil
1984
BRUSCKY, Paulo
Brazil
1984
CABOT, Roberto de Fonseca
Brazil
1984
CALDAS JUNIOR, Waltercio
Brazil
1984
CAMARGO, Tito
Brazil
1984
CASTHANO, Eduardo
Brazil
1984
CATUNDA, Leda
Brazil
1984
COZZOLINO, Giro
Brazil
1984
CRAVO NETO, Mario
Brazil
1984
CHAVES BARCELLOS, Vera
Brazil
1984
DAIBERT, Arlindo
Brazil
1984
DARDOT, Liliane
Brazil
1984
DENIZART, Hugo
Brazil
1984
DOMINGUES, Diana M. G.
Brazil
1984
ESPINDOLA Miranda, Humberto
Brazil
1984
FELIZARDO, Luis Carlos
Brazil
1984
FINGERMANN, Sergio
Brazil
1984
GERCHMAN, Rubens
Brazil
1984
GRANATO, Ivald
Brazil
1984
GRINSPUN, Ester
Brazil
1984
GROSTEIN, Marcia
Brazil
1984
GUANAES NETTO, Gontran
Brazil
1984
HUDINILSON JR (Urbano Hudinilson Junior)
Brazil
1984
KURTZ, Milton 1
Brazil
1984
MACHADO, Loris
Brazil
1984
MANINHO(Roberto Cerne Fernandez de Abreu Filho)
Brazil
1984
MOURA, Lidice (Lidice Romano de Moural
OLIVEIRA, Branca de
Brazil
Brazil
1984
1984
PAPPALARDO, Arnaldo
Brazil
1984
PINHEIRO GUIMARAES, Pedro
Brazil
1984
PIZA. Arthur Luis
Brazil
1984
ROTH, Otavio
Brazil
1984
SARUBBI, Valdir
Brazil
1984
SCHILLER, Beatriz
Brazil
1984
452
SILVA, Marcio da
Brazil
SILVEIRA, Regina
1984
Brazil
1984
TAVARES, Ana Maria
Brazil
1984
TOZZI, Claudio
Brazil
1984
BELKIN, Arnold
Canada-Mexico
1984
AZOCAR, Jaime
Chile
1984
BARRIOS, Gracia
Chile
1984
BERNAL PONCE, Juan
Chile
1984
BERROETA REYES, Eduardo
Chile
1984
CARVAJAL ALTAMIRANO, Eduardo Luis
Chile
1984
CHUAOUI JAHIATT, Soledad
Chile
1984
DIAZ BRAVO, Mariano
Chile
1984
DONIZ LECHON, Rafael
Chile
1984
FERREIRO, Antonia
Chile
1984
HERNANDEZ CASTILLO, Francisco Javier
Chile
1984
LABBE, Lautaro
Chile
1984
LOREDO, Humberto
Chile
1984
MARTINEZ ALVARADO, Jose Mario
Chile
1984
NUNEZ, Guillermo
Chile
1984
PALACIOS MELLEA, Sergio Ivan
Chile
1984
PELI (Julio C. Zuniga Valenzuela)
Chile
1984
RIVERA SCOTT, Hugo
Chile
1984
SILVA ROJAS, Carmen
Chile
1984
TELLEZ MARTINEZ, Eugenio
Chile
1984
TORAL, Mario y
Chile
1984
TRIVINO, Jorge
Chile
1984
VERA, Adolfo
Chile
1984
YOUNG, Jean-Louis
Chile
1984
ALCANTARA, Pedro
Colombia
1984
ALFONSO RAMIREZ, Luis
Colombia
1984
ASTUDILLO DELGADO, Ever
Colombia
1984
BARF1IOS, Alvaro
Colombia
1984
BOTERO, Olga de
Colombia
1984
CABALLERO, Luis
Colombia
1984
CAICEDO, Fanny
Colombia
1984
CASTRO CAMPOS, Hector
Colombia
1984
CERON CORREA, Gilberto
Colombia
1984
COGOLLO, Heriberto
Colombia
1984
CORTES, Maria Cristina
Colombia
1984
DUNCAN, Gloria de
Colombia
1984
ELJAIEK, Abdu
Colombia
1984
ESPARZA MEJIA, Eduardo Emilio
Colombia
1984
ESTRADA, Manuel
Colombia
1984
GALVIZ ORTIZ, Maria Esther
Colombia
1984
GARCIA BOTERO, Maria Elena
Colombia
1984
GARCIA PAGANESSI, Ligia
Colombia
1984
GONZALEZ, Beatriz
Colombia
1984
GONZALEZ FERNANDEZ, Francisco
Colombia
1984
GRANADA, Carlos
Colombia
1984
GUTIERREZ SILVA, Saul
Colombia
1984
HERNAND,EZ, Manuel
Colombia
1984
JARAMILLO, Luciano
Colombia
1984
453
JARAMILLO JARAMILLO, Jorge
Colombia
1984
JARAMILLO TRUJILLO, Cosme
Colombia
1984
JARAMILLO VAZQUEZ, Oscar
Colombia
1984
LEON, Phanor
Colombia
1984
LOOCHKARTT, Angel
Colombia
1984
MALDONADO RODRIGUEZ, Fernando
MARIN VIECO, Alvaro
Colombia
Colombia
1984
1984
MAZUERA GOMEZ, Diego
Colombia
1984
MIRANDA HERNANDEZ, Olivia
Colombia
1984
MOLINOS, Rosario
Colombia
1984
MONSALVE PINO, Margarita Maria
Colombia
1984
MONSALVE PINO. Oscar
Colombia
1984
MUNOZ, Oscar
Colombia
1984
PAZ, Luis
Colombia
1984
PELAEZ GALEANO, Luis Fernando
Colombia
1984
PINZON BARRERA, Betty
Colombia
1984
POSADA CANO, Gonzalo
Colombia
1984
POSADA CORREA. Julian Eduardo
Colombia
1984
POTES VARGAS, Ricardo
Colombia
1984
POUPARD, Gloria
Colombia
1984
PRIETO LEON. Alberto
Colombia
1984
QUIJANO ACERO, Alfonso
Colombia
1984
RAMIREZ OCAMPO, Juliana
Colombia
1984
RAYO, Omar
Colombia
1984
RIVEROS SALCEDO, Jorge
Colombia
1984
ROCCA LYNN, Francisco
Colombia
1984
ROORIGUEZ, Marta
Colombia
1984
RODRIGUEZ AMAYA, Fabio Alberto
ROJAS, Hernando
Colombia
Colombia
1984
1984
SALCEDO, Helio
Colombia
1984
SILVA BAUTISTA, Edgar
Colombia
1984
SUAREZ BAYONA, Gabriel
Colombia
1984
TAKEHISA, Nobu
Colombia
1984
TAPIAS GIL, Victor Manuel
Colombia
1984
TEJADA, Lucy
Colombia
1984
TEJADA SAENZ, Hernando
Colombia
1984
URIBE, Gloria
Colombia
1984
VALBUENA, Alvaro
Colombia
1984
VALENCIA DE MORENO, Stella
Colombia
1984
VALENCIA ECHEVARRY, Henri
Colombia
1984
VALLEJO JARAMILLO, Maria C
Colombia
1984
VELASCO GUARDIAS, Joselín
Colombia
1984
VELASQUEZ, Rodolfo
Colombia
1984
VELEZ MEJIA, Guillermo
Colombia
1984
VILLEGAS NARANJO, Nelson
Colombia
1984
VITERI, Alicia
Colombia
1984
ZALAMEA TRABA, Gustavo
Colombia
1984
ZIRO, Edilberto Sierra Rodriguez
Colombia
1984
APUY SIRIAS, Otto
Costa Rica
1984
LIZANO DUARTE, Jose Roberto
Costa Rica
1984
LOPEZ ESCARRE, Jose Luis
Costa Rica
1984
ROJAS GONZALEZ, Jose Miguel
Costa Rica
1984
ACOSTA PEREZ, Gustavo
Cuba
1984
454
AGUILAR LABRADA, Roger
Cuba
1984
ALFARO ECHEVARRIA, Angel
Cuba
1984
ALlS PUERTA, Rene
Cuba
1984
ALVAREZ RIOS, Roberto
Cuba
1984
BARRETO SARDINA, Concha
Cuba
1984
BEDlA VALDES, Jose
Cuba
1984
BENITEZ JIMENO, Adigio
Cuba
1984
BORGES DELGADO, Pablo
Cuba
1984
CABRERA HERNANDEZ, Luis
Cuba
1984
CARAS BOIX, Ivan
Cuba
1984
CAROL YANIZ, Alberto Jorge
Cuba
1984
CASTAMEDA CASTELLANOS, Consuelo
CASTELLANOS, Toa
Cuba
Cuba
1984
1984
CASTELLANOS LOPEZ, Manuel
Cuba
1984
CASTRO GARCIA, Humberto
Cuba
1984
CONTRERAS,Carlos
Cuba
1984
CORRALES (Paul Corral Varela)
Cuba
1984
CRUZ BOIX, Carlos
Cuba
1984
CUENCA SIGARRETA, Arturo
Cuba
1984
CHOCO (Eduardo Roca Salazar)
Cuba
1984
DIAZ LEYVA, Mario Rene
Cuba
1984
DOMINGUEZ, Irene
Cuba
1984
ELSO PADILLA, Juan Francisco
Cuba
1984
FABELO PEREZ, Roberto
Cuba
1984
FEIJOO RODRIGUEZ, Samuel
Cuba
1984
FERNANDEZ NOGUERA, Ernesto
Cuba
1984
FERRER MORTIMOR, Mario M.
Cuba
1984
FIGUEROA DANIEL, Jose Alberto
Cuba
1984
FINALE ALDECOA, Moises de los Santos
Cuba
1984
FONG GARCIA, Flora
Cuba
1984
FONSECA CERVINO, Ever
Cuba
1984
FRANCO CODINACH, Jose Miguel
Cuba
1984
FREMEZ (Jose Gomez Fresquet)
Cuba
1984
FROMETA FERNANDEZ, Gilberto
Cuba
1984
GALLARDO MUNOZ, Mario
Cuba
1984
GARCIA FAYAT, Abigail
Cuba
1984
GARCIA HERRERA, Eduardo Ruben
Cuba
1984
GARCIA PEMA, Ernesto
Cuba
1984
GARCIANDIA ORAA, Flavio
Cuba
1984
GIRONA FERNANDEZ, Julio
Cuba
1984
GONZALEZ IGLESIAS, Carmelo
Cuba
1984
GONZALEZ PLUG, Ernesto
Cuba
1984
GORY(Rogelio Lopez Marin)
Cuba
1984
GRANDAL (Ramon Martinez Grandal) 115
JAM IS BERNAL, Fayad
Cuba
Cuba
1984
1984
JAN (Juan Pablo Villar Aleman)
Cuba
1984
JAY MATAMOROS, Ruperto
Cuba
1984
KORDA (Alberto Diaz Gutierrez)
Cuba
1984
LEAL JIMENEZ, Cesar
Cuba
1984
LOBAINA BORGES, Miguel Angel
Cuba
1984
LOPEZ DIAZ, Minerva
Cuba
1984
LOPEZ MARTINEZ, Nelida
Cuba
1984
LOPEZ-NUSSA, Leonel
Cuba
1984
455
LOPEZ OLIVA, Manuel
Cuba
1984
MARTINEZ, Mayra A.
Cuba
1984
MARTINEZ GONZALEZ, Raul
Cuba
1984
MARTINEZ PEDRO, Luis Dario
Cuba
1984
MARUCHA (Maria Eugenia Haya)
Cuba
1984
MAYITO (Mario Garcia Joya)
Cuba
1984
MENDIETA OTI, Ana
Cuba
1984
MENDIVE HOYO, Manuel
Cuba
1984
MENfNDEZ GONZALEZ, Aldo Dario
Cuba
1984
MILIAN PONS, Raul
Cuba
1984
MOREIRA BENCOMO, Juan
Cuba
1984
OCHOA NODAL, Ernesto
Cuba
1984
OLIVA RODRIGUEZ, Pedro Pablo
Cuba
1984
OROZCO VEGA, Raimundo
Cuba
1984
ORTIZ BORRELL, Benito
Cuba
1984
PANDOLFI GIL, Roberto
Cuba
1984
PANECA CANO, Francisco Rafael
Cuba
1984
PELAEZ, Jose A.
Cuba
1984
PEREZ MONZON, Gustavo
Cuba
1984
PEREZ TRIANA, Enrique
Cuba
1984
PIROLE (Luis M. Fernandez)
Cuba
1984
PORTOCARRERO VILLIERS, René
Cuba
1984
OUERT ALVAREZ. Pablo Paul
Cuba
1984
RAMIREZ ROQUE. Angel M.
Cuba
1984
RIO CASTRO, Zayda
Cuba
1984
RODRIGUEZ ALVAREZ, Mariano
Cuba
1984
RODRIGUEZ BREY, Ricardo
Cuba
1984
RODRIGUEZ TOLEDO, Tomas
Cuba
1984
SALAS FREIRE, Osvaldo
Cuba
1984
SANCHEZ REOUEIRO, Tomas
Cuba
1984
SANTOSERPA, Raul Santos Serpal
Cuba
1984
SIRGO HALLER, Otto
Cuba
1984
SOSABRAVO. Alfredo
Cuba
1984
SOTO ORTIZ, Leandro
Cuba
1984
TITO ALVAREZ (Jose Gonzalez Alvarez)
TONEL (Antonio Eligio Fernaridez Rodriguez)
Cuba
Cuba
1984
1984
TORRES LLORCA, Ruben
Cuba
1984
VALDES BORRERO, Julia Emilia
Cuba
1984
VALDES MORALES, Luis Miguel
Cuba
1984
VENT DUMOIS, Lesbia
Cuba
1984
VIDAL HERNANDEZ, Juan José
Cuba
1984
LESCAY MERENCIO, Alberto
Cuba
1984
NEUMAN, Giti
Czechoslovakia
1984
DANICEL (Danilo de los Santos)
Domican Republic
1984
ALVAREZ ENCARNACION, Rafael
Dominican Republic
1984
BIDO, Candido
Dominican Republic
1984
BONNELLY, Johnny
Dominican Republic
1984
GARCIA CORDERO, Jose R.
Dominican Republic
1984
GUADALUPE, Antonio E.
Dominican Republic
1984
KUMA (Ignacio Rincon Valverde)
Dominican Republic
1984
LORA, Silvano
Dominican Republic
1984
MARELLA, Tete
Dominican Republic
1984
MERCADER, Jose
Dominican Republic
1984
456
NOVA, Luis
Dominican Republic
1984
NUNEZ, Elsa
Dominican Republic
1984
OVIEDO HERASME, Ramon
Dominican Republic
1984
PELLERANO, Soucy de
Dominican Republic
1984
PIANTINI GUZMAN, Adolfo
Dominican Republic
1984
PIMENTEL. Vicente
Dominican Republic
1984
SANGUIOVANNI, Carlos
Dominican Republic
1984
YARYURA BONETI, Camilo
Dominican Republic
1984
ANDRADE FAINI, C h a r
Ecuador
1984
BUENO, Mauricio
Ecuador
1984
BUSTOS ROMALEROUX, Pilar
Ecuador
1984
CAMPO, Antonio del
Ecuador
1984
CARRANZA SALAZAR, Cesar Gustavo
CARRASCO ARTEAGA, Edgar
Ecuador
Ecuador
1984
1984
CIFUENTES NAVARRO, Hugo
Ecuador
1984
CHAUVET, Marcel
Ecuador
1984
DIAZ NAVARRETE. Guido
Ecuador
1984
ENDARA CROW, Gonzalo
Ecuador
1984
GARCIA DE MANRIQUE, Mariella
Ecuador
1984
GILBERT DE BLOMBERG, Araceli
Ecuador
1984
GUTIERREZ MOSCOSO, Hilda Judith
Ecuador
1984
JACOME DURANGO, Ramiro
Ecuador
1984
LUZURIAGA ARIAS, Camilo
Ecuador
1984
MALDONADO AGUAYO, Estuardo
Ecuador
1984
MORENO HEREOIA, Oswaldo
Ecuador
1984
MAURIEL BRAVO, Luis Guillermo
Ecuador
1984
PAREDES MADRID. Napoleon
Ecuador
1984
OUINTANA D., Eduardo F.
Ecuador
1984
ROMAN CHACON, Nelson
Ecuador
1984
TEJADA ZAMBRANO, Leonardo
Ecuador
1984
ZAPATA, Jaime
Ecuador
1984
ZUÑIGA ALBAN, Hernan
Ecuador
1984
CORTEZ LARA, Adolfo Eduardo
El Salvador
1984
GALDAMEZ ESCOBAR, Jesus Romeo
El Salvador
1984
MINERO, Camilo
El Salvador
1984
RUIZ, Roberto
El Salvador
1984
ALVARADO, Antonio
France
1984
BAGOT, Vargas de
France
1984
CHAVES, Fernando
France
1984
FEUILLET, Claude
France
1984
PREUX LERNAU, Pedro Pablo
France
1984
BESS COURVCISIER. Ruth
Germany
1984
COSTA, Olga
Germany
1984
COWRIE, Christa
Germany
1984
HANFESTENGEL, Renata Von
Germany
1984
RICHTER, Luisa K.
Germany
1984
CAMNITZER, Luis
Germany- Uruguay
1984
ROJAS AZURDIA, Elmar Renis
Guatemala
1984
GREAVES, Stanley
Guyana
1984
MOORE, Philip Alphonso
Guyana
1984
CARRETA, Anna
Italy
1984
MAIOLINO, Anna Maria
Italy
1984
457
SALVATORE, Rafael
Italy
1984
OHTAKE, Tomie
Japan
1984
SHIRO, Flavio
Japan
1984
LATAMIE, Marc
Martinique
1984
ACEVES NAVARRO, Gilberto
Mexico
1984
ACOSTA FALCON, Leo
Mexico
1984
AGUILAR LLANO, Jorge Pablo de
Mexico
1984
ALAMILLA NUnEZ, Miguel Allgel
Mexico
1984
ALMEIDA. Lourdes
Mexico
1984
ANDRADE, Yolanda
Mexico
1984
ANGUIA BECERRIL, Ricardo
Mexico
1984
ANGULO COSIO, Anibal
Mexico
1984
ARGUDIN ALLERECA, Luis Jesus
Mexico
1984
ASCENCIO MATEOS. Pedro
Mexico
1984
AVILA SOEERANES, Oscer
Mexico
1984
BLANCO, Lazaro
Mexico
1984
BODEK, Adrian
Mexico
1984
BOSTELMANN, Enrique
Mexico
1984
CAMPOS MORALES, Susana
Mexico
1984
CANTU, Gerardo
Mexico
1984
CARDENAS FONSECA. Eduardo Martin
Mexico
1984
CARRION SAMANIEGO, Hector Enrique
CASTANEDA, Juan
Mexico
Mexico
1984
1984
CASTRO LENERO, Alberto
Mexico
1984
CASTRO LENERO, Francisco
Mexico
1984
CASTRO LENERO, Jose
Mexico
1984
CASTRO LENERO, Miguel
Mexico
1984
CERDA, Kary
Mexico
1984
COEN, Arnaldo
Mexico
1984
COHEN DABAH, Eduardo
Mexico
1984
CONTRERAS DE OTEYZA ,Carlos
Mexico
1984
CORA, Vladimir
Mexico
1984
COSSIO POMAR, Angel
Mexico
1984
CRUZ RODRIGUEZ, Aaron
Mexico
1984
CUELLAR RAMIREZ, Rogelio
Mexico
1984
CUEVAS, Jose Luis
Mexico
1984
CHAPOU VIDEGARAY, Claudia
Mexico
1984
CHAVES MORADO, Jose
Mexico
1984
CHEN CHARPENTIER, Gilberto
Mexico
1984
DIAZ VAZQUEZ, Mario
Mexico
1984
DIMAYUGA, Joaquin
Mexico
1984
DOMPE, Hernan
Mexico
1984
DONIS, Roberto
Mexico
1984
EHRENBERG, Felipe
Mexico
1984
ESCOBEDO, Helen
Mexico
1984
ESTRADA, Enrique
Mexico
1984
FELGLTEREZ, Manuel
Mexico
1984
FERNANDEZ ALONSO, Marisol
Mexico
1984
FIGUEROA FLORES, Gabriel
Mexico
1984
FLORES SANCHEZ, Fernando
Mexico
1984
FRAUSTO FLORES, Gloria
Mexico
1984
GALAN ROMO, Julio
Mexico
1984
458
GARCIA, Hector
Mexico
1984
GARCIA ESTRADA, Carlos
Mexico
1984
GARCIA PONCE, Fernando
Mexico
1984
GARDUNO YANEZ, Flor
Mexico
1984
GONZALEZ RODRIGUEZ, Gregorlo
Mexico
1984
GROBET, Lourdes
Mexico
1984
GUARDADO, Ismael M.
Mexico
1984
GUIJOSA AGUIRRE, Vicente Julio
Mexico
1984
GUTIERREZ GOMEZ, Luis Jesús
Mexico
1984
GUTMAN, Oscar
Mexico
1984
GUZMAN VELAZQUEZ, Victor Javier
Mexico
1984
HERNANDEZ AMEZCUA, Jose Antonio
Mexico
1984
HERNANDEZ MARTINEZ, Sergio
Mexico
1984
HERNANDEZ VARGAS, Jose Antonio
HERRERA, Radi
Mexico
Mexico
1984
1984
HERSUA
Mexico
1984
HINOJOSA CORDOVA, Oliverio
Mexico
1984
HINOJOSA HINOJOSA, Javier
Mexico
1984
ITURBE ARGUELLES, Mercedes
Mexico
1984
ITURBIDE, Graciela
Mexico
1984
JABER, Elfas
Mexico
1984
JIMENEZ VERNIS, Sarah
Mexico
1984
JUAREZ DOMINGU'EZ, Martin
Mexico
1984
JURADO DELMAR, Carlos
Mexico
1984
KALB, Leticia
Mexico
1984
KENT MARQUEZ, Daniel William
Mexico
1984
LABASTIDA CASTRO, Pablo
Mexico
1984
LACH SCHOENFELO, David
Mexico
1984
LAMOYI, Marcos Tulio
Mexico
1984
LEAL PERNANDEZ, Felipe
Mexico
1984
LECONA DIAZ, Fausto
Mexico
1984
LOPEZ CORTES, Eloy Tarcisio
Mexico
1984
LUNA LOYO, Eugenio
Mexico
1984
MACOTELA, Gabriel
Mexico
1984
MACIEL, Leonel
Mexico
1984
MARTINEZ ALVAREZ, Jose de Jesus
Mexico
1984
MENDICUTI NAVARRO, Teresa
Mexico
1984
MINOR ARRIAGA, Flor
Mexico
1984
MORA SANCHEZ, Raul
Mexico
1984
MORAN, Teresa
Mexico
1984
NECOECHEA GRACIA, Oscar
Mexico
1984
NEYRA TORRES, Jose Luis
Mexico
1984
NUNEZ. Dulce Maria
Mexico
1984
NUNEZ GUERRA, Mario
Mexico
1984
OCHARAN, Leticia
Mexico
1984
OLACHEA BOUCSIEGUEZ, Jose Carlos
ORLANDO GARCIA, Felipe
Mexico
Mexico
1984
1984
OROZCO RIVERA, Mario
Mexico
1984
PALACIOS FLORES, Irma
Mexico
1984
PAVON DE FREYRIA, Herminia
Mexico
1984
PEREA DE LA CABADA, Rafael
Mexico
1984
PEREZ CUEVAS, Segundo Gerardo
Mexico
1984
QUINTEROS, Adolfo
Mexico
1984
459
RAMIREZ JUAREZ, Arturo
Mexico
1984
RANGEL FAZ, Mario F.
Mexico
1984
REAL DE LEON, Roberto
Mexico
1984
RIESTRA ORTIZ, Adolfo
Mexico
1984
RIVERA VELAZQUEZ, Mariano
Mexico
1984
ROCHA PALACIOS, Ricardo
Mexico
1984
RODRIGLEZ ENRIOUEZ, Oscar
Mexico
1984
RODRIGUEZ HERRERA. Jose Francisco
ROMERO DUARTE, Benjamin
Mexico
1984
1984
Mexico
SANCHEZ - LAUREL ZUNIGA, Herlinda
Mexico
1984
SANDOVAL AVILA, Mauricio Antonio
Mexico
1984
SAURET RANGEL, Nunik
Mexico
1984
SERRANO GUERRERO, Saul
Mexico
1984
SESMA SANCHEZ, Raymundo
Mexico
1984
SIERRA, Susana
Mexico
1984
SIGAL, KIRSH, Isaac
Mexico
1984
SILVA, Federico
Mexico
1984
SOTO CURIEL, Guillermo
Mexico
1984
TAMARIZ, Eduardo
Mexico
1984
TAMES BATHA. Fernando
Mexico
1984
TOLEDO, Francisco
Mexico
1984
TOLEDO CROW, Diego
Mexico
1984
VALTIERRA R., Pedro
Mexico
1984
VALLE PERALTA, Guillermo
Mexico
1984
VIDAL BONIFAZ, Carlos Alberto
Mexico
1984
YAVOVICH, Vida
Mexico
1984
ZALATHIEL VARGAS Perez
Mexico
1984
ZENIL, Nahum Bernabe
Mexico
1984
AROSTEGUI REAL. Alejandro
Nicaragua
1984
BEER, June
Nicaragua
1984
GORDILLO CASTELLON, Ena
Nicaragua
1984
SOBALVARRO MENA, Orlando
Nicaragua
1984
URBINA RIVAS, Luis
Nicaragua
1984
VANEGAS ROSALES, Leonel
Nicaragua
1984
VOLG, Hilda
Nicaragua
1984
AGUILAR PONCE, Luis
Panama
1984
AGUSTINE, Eduardo
Panama
1984
ARIAS PEÑA, Etanislao
Panama
1984
ELETA, Sandra
Panama
1984
ICAZA HANSEN, Teresa
Panama
1984
MONTILLA, Manuel E.
Panama
1984
RIVERA DEGRACIA, Adonai
Panama
1984
VELASQUEZ HERRERA, Julián
Panama
1984
ALBERT, Teresa
Peru
1984
ANGULO LAFOSSE, Lucy
Peru
1984
ARIAS VERA, Luis Alberto
Peru
1984
BRAUN, Herman
Peru
1984
CACERES MOREANO, Romulo
Peru
1984
CAJAHUARINGA, Milner
Peru
1984
GUILLEN MARCOS, Heraclito Franklin
Peru
1984
HASTING Y MUJICA, M.
Peru
1984
JIMENEZ LOPEZ, Gilberto
Peru
1984
460
OLIVA, Felix
Peru
PAZOS PARRO. Luis Hernan
Peru
POLANCO CARVAJAL, Carlos Enrique
Peru
1984
1984
1984
QUINTANILLA, Alberto
Peru
1984
RAMOS GALVEZ, Jose Carlos
Peru
1984
RODRIGUEZ HUACHIN. Herbert
Peru
1984
RODRIGUEZ-LARRAIN BALTA, Emllio
VAINSTEIN GABEL, Esther
Peru
Peru
1984
1984
VALLADARES FALEN, Juan
Peru
1984
WIESSE REBAGLATI, Ricardo
Peru
1984
WILLIAMS DIAZ, Armando
Peru
1984
YAYA, Daniel
Peru
1984
JATIVA-DIVILE, Carmen Polonia
Poland
1984
KRAJCBERG, Frans
Poland
1984
MORAWITZ. Gabriela
Poland
1984
RABEL, Fanny
Poland
1984
URBACH, Jose
Poland
1984
BARRIO, Artur
Portugal
1984
ALICEA, Jose R.
Puerto Rico
1984
ALONSO MERCADO, Luis E.
Puerto Rico
1984
BAEZ, Myrna
Puerto Rico
1984
BERNAL, Isabel
Puerto Rico
1984
CAJIGA LUGO, LUIS German
Puerto Rico
1984
CORDOBA AMY, Mayra Luz
Puerto Rico
1984
CRUZ VILLANUEVA, Miguel Angel
Puerto Rico
1984
FERNANDEZ ZAVALA, Margarita
Puerto Rico
1984
GOTAY, Consuelo
Puerto Rico
1984
GUZMAN VELEZ, Ramon
Puerto Rico
1984
HOMAR GELABERT, Lorenzo
Puerto Rico
1984
IRIZARRY, Marcos
Puerto Rico
1984
LANDING GORDON, Haydee
Puerto Rico
1984
LEON CASTRO, Pedro
Puerto Rico
1984
MAISONET RAMOS, Luis
Puerto Rico
1984
MALDONADO SERRANO, Antonio
Puerto Rico
1984
MARTORELL, Antonio
Puerto Rico
1984
MERGAL LOPEZ, Isaura
Puerto Rico
1984
MORAZA BORRELL, Alfonso Antonio
Puerto Rico
1984
PASTRANA FUENTES, Yolanda
Puerto Rico
1984
ROSA CASTELLANO, Jose
Puerto Rico
1984
DARIE LAVER, Sandu
Romania
1984
BALMES, Jose
Spain
1984
GARCIA, Wilfredo
Spain
1984
MARA, Oscar Cesar
Spain
1984
MARCOS, Jesus
Spain
1984
MEYER, Pedro
Spain
1984
MORENO CAPDEVILA, Francisco
Spain
1984
NOVOA, Leopoldo
Spain
1984
PALAU BOSCH, Marta
Spain
1984
PEREZ, Mary Carmen
Spain
1984
POSADA MEDIO. Jose Luis
Spain
1984
PUJOL, Adrian
Spain
1984
RIO BRANCO (Miguel da Silva Paranhos)
CRETON, Franklin
Spain
1984
1984
Surinam
461
TOSARI, Rene D.
Surinam
1984
SJ6LANDER, Waldemar
Sweden
1984
AMEAL PEREZ, Jorge 22
Uruguay
1984
ARDEN - QUIN, Carmelo
Uruguay
1984
BERGALLO, Armando
Uruguay
1984
BOLIVAR, Bolivar Gaudin
Uruguay
1984
CAPELAN. Carlos
Uruguay
1984
CARROZZINO, Jorge
Uruguay
1984
COLLINS FIGUEREDO, Eduardo Daniel
Uruguay
1984
CONTRERAS DE OTEYZA, Carlos
Uruguay
1984
CRUZ, Pedro da
Uruguay
1984
DARNET, Eugenio
Uruguay
1984
FERRANDO FERREIRA, Jorge Federico
FONSECA, Gonzalo
Uruguay
Uruguay
1984
1984
GAMARRA, Jose
Uruguay
1984
GONZALEZ, Leonilda
Uruguay
1984
EL GRUPO (Jorge Ameal, Eduardo Collina, Carlos Contreras, Adrian Perez)
Uruguay
1984
HERNANDEZ RIOS, Anhelo
Uruguay
1984
LEITES COSSIO, Nelson
Uruguay
1984
LIARD BAS, Jose L.
Uruguay
1984
PALLEIRO PALLEIRO, Carlos Miguel
PEREZ, Adrian
Uruguay
Uruguay
1984
1984
RODRIGUEZ SALDARINI, Carlos
Uruguay
1984
VILCHE, Hector
Uruguay
1984
ARMIJO, Richerd R.
USA
1984
DAVILA, Jose Antonio
USA
1984
ESCOBAR ALMOGUERA, Maria Mercedes
USA
1984
HUTCHINSON DE SALCEDO, Claudia
MAGGI HOLLANDS, Jacqueline
USA
USA
1984
1984
MALIO MAZZINI, Elda di
USA
1984
MOSIO, Jacqueline
USA
1984
RADFORD, Robert
USA
1984
RIOS BRITO, Jesse de los
USA
1984
RIPPEY, Caria
USA
1984
SANCHEZ, Juan
USA
1984
ABREU, Mario
Venezuela
1984
ARAUJO, Herhan
Venezuela
1984
ARMAS BARRIOS. Balthazar
Venezuela
1984
ARNAL, Luis
Venezuela
1984
ARTEAGA RODRIGUEZ, Jorge
Venezuela
1984
ARVELAIZ GORDON, Maria
Venezuela
1984
BECERRA, Zulay
Venezuela
1984
BETANCOURT. Jose de 1os Santos
Venezuela
1984
BRACHO, Gabriel
Venezuela
1984
CAMPOS TORTOLERO, Rafael
Venezuela
1984
CARRASQUEL VILERA, Jose Arcadio
CARRENO RODRIGUEZ, Omar R
Venezuela
Venezuela
1984
1984
CISNEROS R. RIVAS, Frank
Venezuela
1984
COLMENAREZ, Asdrubal
Venezuela
1984
CRUZ DIEZ, Carlos
Venezuela
1984
DEBOURG, Narciso
Venezuela
1984
DOMINGUEZ CEDENO, Nelson
Venezuela
1984
FEBRES CORDIDO, Humberto
Venezuela
1984
462
FERNANDEZ-LUNARDI, Antonio
Venezuela
1984
GARCIA CASTRO, Alvaro A.
Venezuela
1984
GERMAN ROJAS, Carlos
Venezuela
1984
GRUPO CONFRONTACCION
(Eneko, Ortizpozo, Peli, Mary Carmen Pérez, Gilberto, Ramirez, Edmundo Vargas)
Venezuela
GUEVARA MORENO, Luis
Venezuela
1984
HERAS, Eneko las
Venezuela
1984
HERNANDEZ D'JESUS, Enrique
Venezuela
1984
HERRERA, Octavio
1984
Venezuela
1984
HERRERA RIVAS, Felipe
Venezuela
1984
LEON ZAPATA, Pedro
Venezuela
1984
LOPEZ, Abel Nairn
Venezuela
1984
MATTATIA, Doris
Venezuela
1984
MENDE, Consuelo
Venezuela
1984
MENESES, Gladys
Venezuela
1984
MORALES, Elsa
Venezuela
1984
MORALES RUJANO, Jose Martin
Venezuela
1984
NUNEZ MATOS, Isidro Eduardo
Venezuela
1984
PALACIOS, Luisa
Venezuela
1984
PAOLINI VALDERRAMA, Juan
Venezuela
1984
PEREZ, Regulo
Venezuela
1984
PIZZANI CAMPINS, Jorge Eliecer y Milton Becerra
Venezuela
1984
QUILICI, Pancho
Venezuela
1984
OUINONES, Azalea
Venezuela
1984
RAMIREZ, Gilberto
Venezuela
1984
RAVELO, Juvenal
Venezuela
1984
REY (Reyes, Anibal Olivares)
Venezuela
1984
RIVODO, Carlos
Venezuela
1984
SARMIENTO CARDOSO, Diego
Venezuela
1984
SUBERO, Osvaldo
Venezuela
1984
SZINETAR GABALDON, Vasco
Venezuela
1984
TORO, Alejandro
Venezuela
1984
VARGAS, Edmundo
Venezuela
1984
ZERPA SCHWARZEMBERG, Carlos A
Venezuela
1984
463
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486
NOTES
1
Nelson Herrera Ysla, “Comunicación en tiempos difíciles: Uno más cerca del otro” (Communication in difficult
times: Closer to each other). In Nelson Herrera Ysla, eds., Coordenadas de arte contemporáneo (Coordinates in
Contemporary Art). Havana: Arte Cubano Editions, 2003. p. 23.
2
Kevin Power has recently published a book in partnership with Magaly Espinosa titled, “El nuevo arte cubano:
Antología de textos críticos (2007). Rachel Weiss has recently stated that she is working on a book about the Cuban
art in the 1990s. (She had recently published two articles on Cuban art, one in particular on the Biennale.) See
Rachel Weiss, “Visions, Valves, and Vestiges: The Curdled Victories of the Bienal De la Habana,” Art Journal, Vol.
66, 2007. p. 10-27.
3
More or less critical of the official establishment and regime, these publications give an account of the various
intellectual movements taking place on the island during the past three decades. Among others, Gerardo Mosquera,
Exploraciones en la plástica cubana (1983);…, Contracandela ensayos sobre kitsch, identidad, arte abstracto y
otros temas calientes; Margarita González, Tania Parson, and José Veigas, Déjame que te Cuente. Antología de la
crítica en los 80s (2002); Nelson Herrera, Coordenadas de Arte Contemporáneo (2003); Adelaida de Juán, Abriendo
Ventanas: Textos críticos (2006); Luz Merino Acosta, Graziella Pogolotti; experiencia de la crítica (2003), among
others.
4
Angela McRobbie, “All the World’s a Stage, Screen or Magazine: when culture is the logic of late capitalism”
Media, Culture & Society Vol.18, No. 2 (1996), p. 335-342.
5
Magazines such as Flash Art, whose motto is “internationalism”, did not cover the Havana Biennale until 1997
(and in a very deceptive and reductive way) while actively covering (and helping to create) other Biennials in
proximity to Europe and the U.S. Artforum has published only a handful of reports on Cuban art (1986 and 1991)
and only after 1997 on the Biennale, while publishing massively and repeatedly on other similar surveys. Art in
America has published more systematic reports with emphasis on American and Cuban artists, but has remained
silent about the participation of artists from the rest of the world areas represented. A common denominator of many
of the reports is the absence of the idea of alternative cosmopolitanism and Global Art from the bottom up; it seems
that the discussions on Global Art only takes place from the art centers and its institutions (such as the magazines).
6
Jean Hubert Martin’s endeavor with Magiciens de la Terre was to replace the current cosmopolitan rationale of the
international art scene with a planetary paradigm that would no longer allow Western exhibitions to systematically
ignore 80 percent of the surface of the globe. Many articles at the time of the Biennale had intentions of comparing
the two, but they were not, however, that successful. See: Pía Barragán, “III Bienal de la Habana. La Bienal del
Tercer Mundo. Entrevista a Pierre Restany.” Arte en Colombia. No 43, (February, 1990), p.56-57; Guy Brett,
“Venice, Paris, Kassel, São Paulo and Habana” Third Text, No. 20 (autumn, 1992), p. 13-22. Recent articles and
essays obscure Havana’s participation in the debate. See for example: Johanne Lamoureux, “From form to platform:
The politics of representation and the representation of politics” Art Journal, Spring, 2005. p. 65-73.
7
Cunningham finishes the argument stating that “these people are then called to the bar of an abstrusely formulated
critical idealism.” I hope to have a different fate. Stuart Cunningham, Framing Culture: criticisms and policy in
Australia (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1992). p. 9.
8
Toby Miller & George Yudice, Cultural Policy (London, Thousand Oaks,CA: Sage Publications, 2002). p. 32.
9
John Patrick Diggins, The Rise and Fall of the American Left (London & New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1992).
p. 40.
487
10
Stone worked during 2003-4, thanks to a contract with HBO, on two documentaries on Fidel Castro’s life just
before surrendering power to his brother in July-August 2006. The first one, titled Comandante, was banned for
being soft on the Cuban leader; the second, titled Looking for Fidel, was broadcast in April 2004.
11
The many speeches given by Cuban Minister of Culture Armando Hart Dávalos provide evidence of this
intention.
12
This has been studied by Caribbean scholars such as Antonio Benitez Rojo, Fernando Retamar, and Edward
Glissant, and British Scholars such as Stuart Hall (of Jamaican descent) and Paul Gilroy among others.
13
It is necessary to note the participation of the Soviets in economic and political, but also, cultural and academic
affairs during the first decades of the Revolution.
14
Accepting the intromission of the Soviets produced proximity with the North East creating an exceptional space
for contingency and emergency, and a critical understanding of the imperial aspirations of the Soviet-Union on the
part of Cubans studying in the USSR.
15
Many scholars have studied such phenomena, and the survival of the regime demonstrates this, not without being
stigmatized in the process.
16
What has come to be called the era of the Curatorial Class, an issue explored recently to exhaustion in articles,
notes, essays, and books, to cite some: Brian O’Doherty, Museums in Crisis (1972); Douglas Crimp, On the
Museum’s Ruins (1993); Nelson W. Aldrich, Old Money: The Mythology of Wealth in America (1996); Charlie
Finch et al., Most Art Sucks: Five Years of Coagula (1996); Gregory Sholette, “Affirmation of the Curatorial Class”
Afterimage, Vol. 28, (Summer, 2001); Tim Griffin, “Global Tendencies: Globalism and large-scale exhibitions” Art
Forum, 42.3,(November, 2003), Paul Werner, Museum, Inc.: Inside the Global Art World (2005); among others.
17
For that reason it is not mentioned systematically in this work.
18
This research presents, in different moments, the discussions around issues such as primitivism, kitsch, art brute,
otherness, marginalization, colonialism, in-communication, the city, creative networks, among others taking place
inside the Lam Center.
19
The article is fully revised in Chapter 4 in the section on “Third World Art”. Gerardo Mosquera, “El Tercer
Mundo hará la cultura occidental” Revolución y Cultura (July-Sep. 1986). p. 39-47.
20
Hal Foster, “The Artist as Ethnographer,” The Return of the Real (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1996). p.171-203.
21
“There is no real syncretism in the linking of non-contradicting antagonisms; syncretism is a strategy of
participation, a resignification and pluralization against hegemony.” Gerardo Mosquera, “Wifredo Lam” 23rd São
Paulo Biennial Catalog. São Paulo: Fundacão Bienal do São Paulo, 1996.
22
The most blatant example of that curatorial blindness in Magiciens could be found in the much-denounced
asymmetric neighboring of works by Richard Long and by the Yuendumu community. Long’s mud drawing was the
focal point of the Grande Halle. It dominated the entire room, but more dramatically it loomed over the sand
drawings performed by the aboriginal people from the Yuendumu community, which were set at its foot like some
cast shadow or discarded double, thus revealing the ideological bias and formal automatisms of the curatorial
gesture. See revision of the Third and Fourth Havana Biennales, chapter five.
23
Certainly, it is clear how co-optation menaces all cultural action based on syncretism. The challenge is to see who
retains control of the changes and articulations. Ticio Escobar, El mito del arte y el mito del pueblo: cuestiones
sobre arte popular (Asunción, Paraguay: R. Peroni Ediciones, 1987 Asunción: 1986). p. 119-131.
24
The Lam Center team followed the work of Latin American anthropologists and critics, such as Ticio Escobar,
Sërgio Figueiredo Ferreti, and Nestor García Canclini, and international ones such as James Clifford and Michael
Taussig on these issues. Brazilian anthropologist Figueiredo Ferreti will compile his work years later in his
Repensando o Sincretismo (São Paulo: EDUSP. Fialho, Livia Alexandra, 1995).
25
Supporters such as Luis Camnitzer had called UNESCO, or a group of Third World nations, to take on the
adventure during the 1991 biennale. Luis Camnitzer, “Cuarta Bienal de la Habana” Arte en Colombia. No. 43
(February, 1990), 61-67.
26
In comparison with, for example, the 2003 Venice Biennale that counted on a budget of five and a half million
U.S. dollars or Documenta11 that was backed by eleven million and the one hundred-fifty thousand that Havana
Biennale had in his last two editions made it impossible to compete in scope or exhibitions/productions. Numbers
taken from: Tim Griffin, “Global Tendencies: Globalism and Large-scale Exhibition. (Panel discussion)” Artforum
International, No. 42.3 (November, 2003). P. 152-163.
488
27
The theoretical forums have become an important venue for new thinkers from around the world. They attest the
generational shift taking place on art theory and criticism as well as the global scope of the theoretical enterprise
today.
28
The theme has surrounded the last two editions of the Biennale. Discontent with the performance of the event and
the pressing global conditions had made of such coment, if well not published explicitly, a real burden on the
Biennale, which tries to maintain its centrality in the discussions on global art and the participation of the Global
South on it.
29
Vicki Gold Levi & Steven Heller, Cuba Style: Graphics from the golden age of design (New York: Princeton
Architectural Press, 2002). p.11
30
Luis Camnitzer,. narrating his experience of his first visit to Havana in the 1980s expresses how “Kitsch was
omnipresent, partially because I was staying in the Hotel Riviera. The hotel is a Meyer Lansky’s -North American
Mafia monument- built in 1957, continually restored by the Cubans to maintain its original look. As a synthesizing
symbol, the hotel offers a staircase in the lobby that stops halfway toward the ceiling with no apparent function
beyond being itself. It is still used today by just-married couples to pose for their wedding pictures.” Luis
Camnitzer, New Art of Cuba. (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1994). Introduction
31
Joseph L. Scarpaci, Roberto Segre, Mario Coyula, Havana: two faces of the Antillean metropolis (Chapel Hill:
University of North Carolina Press, 2002.) p. 80.
32
The author interviews Nelson Herrera Ysla in April and October 2006. All translations from Spanish are mine
otherwise it will be explicit
33
The reports of the official Cuban statistics for the period 1962 to 1987 on the global social product (GSP),
suggests that overall the Cuban economy performed extremely well, growing at an average rate of 5.9% per year
from 1962 to 1987. However, the limitations of Cuban macroeconomic statistics produced by revolutionary Cuban
cannot be compared with those produced in other countries in the region. Many things have been said about Cuban
economics but as Jorge F. Pérez-Lopez puts it “Two different views of the economy of contemporary Cuba continue
to coexist. One portrays, largely unaffected by inflation, providing full employment for its citizens… a leader in the
region. A competing view depicts the Cuban economy as stagnant, inefficient, burdened by repressed inflation and
severe underemployment… These two views are obviously colored by ideology and politics.” Jorge F. Pérez-Lopez,
“Bringing the Cuban Economy Into Focus: Conceptual and empirical challenges” Latin American Research Review,
Vol. 26, No. 3 (1991), p. 7-53.
34
Roberto Segre, La vivienda en Cuba: República y revolución. (La Habana: Ed. de Ciencias Sociales, 1984).
35
The author and Herrera Ysla, Havana city April 2006
36
However critical or visionary Sartre makes, also, remarks on the literacy programs and the cinema mobiles that
transformed Cuban education and culture during the first years of the revolution. Jean-Paul Sartre, On Cuba (New
York: Ballantine Books, 1961).
37
Yuri Pavlov, Soviet-Cuban Alliance 1959-1991. (Miami: University of Miami -North-South Center, Transaction
Publishers, 1994).
38
The origin of the Non-aligned movement can be traced to a conference hosted in Bandung, Indonesia in 1955. The
prior year in Colombo (Sri Lanka), Indian Prime Minister Nehru had stated in a meting with the Chinese Prime
Minister, what would become the five pillars of the non-aligned countries: Respect to Sovereignty, non aggression,
non interference, equality, and peaceful co-existence. The purpose of the organization as stated in the Havana
Declaration of 1979 is to ensure "the national independence, sovereignty, territorial integrity and security of nonaligned countries." The founding fathers of the NAM are: Nehru of India, Tito of Yugoslavia, Sukarno of Indonesia,
Nasser of Egypt, and Nkrumah of Ghana. The first official Non-Aligned Movement Summit was held in Belgrade,
September of 1961, thanks to Josip Broz Tito. The meting counted with participation of the five founders and with
participation of Fidel Castro of Cuba, in addition to 21 other countries from Africa and Asia and Cypress.
39
Fragment of Fidel Castro’s speech to the UN on his position as chairman of the nonaligned countries movement at
the United Nations, 12 October 1979, after the September meting of the non-aligned, the Sixth Summit, in Havana.
"We are 95 countries from all the continents representing the vast majority of humanity. We are united by
determination to defend cooperation among our countries, free national and social development, sovereignty,
security, equality and self-determination. We are associated in the endeavor to change the current system of
international relations based on injustice, inequality and oppression. We act on international policy as a global
independent factor. Gathered in Havana (for the sixth summit), the movement has just reaffirmed its principles and
confirmed its objectives. The non-aligned countries insist that it is necessary to eliminate the abysmal inequality that
489
separates developed and developing countries. We therefore struggle to eliminate the poverty, hunger, disease and
illiteracy that hundreds of millions of human beings are still experiencing. We want a new world order based on
justice, equality and peace to replace the unfair and unequal system that prevails today under which, according to
the proclamation in the Havana declaration, wealth continues to be concentrated in the hands of a few powers
whose economies, based on waste, are maintained thanks to the exploitation of workers and to the transfer and
plundering of natural and other resources of countries in Africa, Latin American and other regions of the world.
For this reason we agreed in Havana to reaffirm that the quintessence of the non-alignment policy, in accordance
with its original principles and fundamental nature, is the struggle against imperialism, colonialism,
neocolonialism, apartheid, racism, including Zionism… Since their founding, the non-aligned countries have
considered that the principles of peaceful coexistence must be the cornerstone of international relations, that they
constitute the foundation for strengthening international peace and security, reducing tension and extending this
process to all regions of the world and to all aspects of relations. And they must be applied universally in relations
between states." Havana Domestic Service (in Spanish) 1533 GMT 12 Oct 79, “Text of speech by Cuban President
Fidel Castro to the 34th UN General Assembly, in his position as chairman of the non-aligned countries” as in Jan 5,
2007 http://lanic.utexas.edu/la/cb/cuba/castro/1979/19791012
40
The movement lost credibility beginning in the late 1960s when it was seen by critics to have become dominated
by states allied to the Soviet Union, the so-called Soviet imperialism of post WW II. Many questioned how countries
in outright alliance with the Soviet Union such as Cuba could claim to be non-aligned. The movement divided
against itself over the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. However, the 1979 meeting in Havana saw the
movement discussing the merits of a "natural alliance" with the Soviet Union. Under the leadership of Fidel Castro,
the Summit discussed the concept of an anti-imperialist alliance with the Soviets. Castro sustained in the 34th UN
General Assembly, “…as the Sixth Summit meeting has stated. The socialist countries did not contribute to the
plundering of the world nor are they responsible for the phenomenon of underdevelopment. However, they
understand and assume the obligation of helping to overcome it because of the nature of their social system in which
international solidarity is a premise... I have not come here as the prophet of revolution. I have not come to request
or express the desire for violent upheaval in the world. I am here to talk of peace and cooperation among nations. I
am here to warn that either injustice or inequalities are solved peacefully and wisely, or the future is going to be
apocalyptic… Enough of the illusion that the world's problems can be solved with nuclear weapons… Let us say
farewell to arms and concentrate in a civilized manner on the most urgent problems of our time. This is the
responsibility and most sacred duty of every statesman in the world. Furthermore, this is an indispensable
requirement for mankind's survival.” During the Sixth Conference of the NAM, Prime Minister Michael Manley of
Jamaica praised Fidel Castro as "humane" and credited him for strengthening the forces committed to the struggle
against imperialism in the Western Hemisphere. The final declaration also condemned the Camp David peace
accords as an abandonment of the cause of the Arab peoples and an act of complicity with the continued occupation
of Arab territories; the focus then was decolonization and development. Hans Köchler (ed.), The Principles of NonAlignment. The Non-aligned Countries in the Eighties. Results and Perspectives (London: Third World Centre,
1982.)
41
Author conversation with Cuban philosopher Magali Espinoza, Havana, May 2006
42
Author conversation with Cuban curator Margarita Sánchez Prieto, Havana, April 2006
43
Armando Hart Dávalos, Arte, Política Cultural, Comunicación y Nueva Sociedad / Art, Cultural Policy,
Communication, and New Society (Lima: Ed. Causachun, 1989.). p. 27.
44
Thomas McEvilley, “Arrivederci Venice: the Third World Biennials –reviews of Third World international art
survey exhibitions.” ArtForum, No.32.3 (November, 1993). p. 114.
45
“But if works in the indigenous traditions are not apt to be seen, neither are the Western Modernist works that lie
in the background: many of the works seem to be Third World embodiments of classical Modernism, with
admixtures of regional points of view.” Ibid. McEvilley, p. 115.
46
República de Cuba, Ministerio de Cultura, Pincipales Leyes y disposiciones relacionadas con la cultural as artes
y la enseñanza artística, Tomo II. (Havana: Gaceta Oficial de Cuba, 1984). p. 121.
47
Lam’s mixed-ethnicity as Cuban-Chinese (Spanish, Afro-Caribbean and Chinese) and multicultural training have
been broadly studied; see: José Manuel Noceda, et al., Wifredo Lam: La cosecha de un Brujo / Wifredo Lam: The
harvest of a magician (Havana: Instituto Cubano del Libro, 2002).
490
48
Lam did not live in Cuba since 1942, however he returned with some frequency. According to the bibliographical
notes in Jose Manuel Noceda’s monographic work on Lam, in 1966 coming from France Lam paints Tercer Mundo,
in celebration for the debates taking place in Cuba at the time. Ibid. Noceda, p. 340.
49
The 26Th of July Movement is the name selected by Castro and Guevara to commemorate an attack on the
Santiago army barracks on July 26, 1953. The movement began formally in 1955 when Castro went to Mexico to
form a disciplined guerrilla force. The leaders of the movement remaining in Cuba to carry out sabotage and
political activities were Frank País, Armando Hart, and Enrique Oltuski. At this time the movement espoused a
reform program that included distribution of land to peasants, nationalization of public services, industrialization,
and mass education. After Castro's victory, the 26th of July Movement was integrated into the Organizaciones
Revolucionarias Integradas in 1961. "26th of July Movement" Encyclopedia Britannica. 2007. Britannica Concise
Encyclopedia. As in: January 2, 2007 <http://concise.britannica.com/ebc/article-9073949/26th-of-July-Movement>.
50
The literacy campaign is considered the first and most symbolic of the programs of the revolutionary government.
In the fall of 1960, during a record-setting, five-hour speech at the United Nations, Castro announced, ‘‘Cuba will be
the first country of America that, after a few months, will be able to say it does not have one illiterate person.” At
the time, about a quarter of Cuba’s population of roughly 4 million was illiterate. Most of them lived in the
countryside. This reality was something the organizers of the campaign hoped would bridge the gulf between city
and country. In few months thousands of brigades of students bolstered the island’s 35,2000 teachers. Nearly
270,2000 teachers and students fanned out across the country armed with two lesson books and a lantern to teach by
at night. The campaign ended in November 1961, Cuba’s illiteracy rate had been slashed from 20 percent at the start
of the year to just 4 percent. Luisa Campo Gallardo, the museum of Cuban Literacy director, argues that “complete
literacy was unattainable because of 50,2000 Jamaican and Haitian immigrants on the island, plus the fact that some
older Cubans, like her own grandmother, didn’t want to learn to read and write.” Nonetheless, a literacy rate of 96
percent put Cuba at the level of ‘highly developed countries’ as Japan, France, the Soviet Union, and Switzerland.
Armando Hart Dávalos has published a series of books, among others: Del trabajo cultural (1978); Cambiar las
reglas del juego (1983), Cultura en Revolución (1985); Arte, Política Cultural, Comunicación y Nueva Sociedad
(1989); Cubanía, cultura y política (1993); Hacia una dimensión cultural del desarrollo (1996); Cuba: Raíces del
Presente (1999); Cultura para el desarrollo: El desafío del siglo XXI (2001).
51
“The system was designated to militarize the mentality of children. For example, in teaching the alphabet, the
letter ‘F’ was introduced with ‘el Fusil (the gun) de Fidel Fue (was) a la Sierra.’ The letter ‘R’ was treated thus:
‘Raul el faRo’ (Raul Castro, beacon, bearer of light). ‘CH’ was the pretext for constructing the following phrase:
‘Los MuCHaCHos y muCHaCHas quieren muCHo al CHe’ (The boys and girls like Che Guevara very much).” Sam
Dolgoff, The Cuban Revolution: A Critical Perspective (Montreal: Black Rose Books, 1976). p. 106
52
One of the most active groups before the revolution was Orígenes -leaded by José Lezama Lima in the late 1940s
and 50s (famous for their connection to Spanish poet Juán Ramón Jimenez). Orígenes had published a series of
ephemeral journals and twenty three books, all of them remarkable in literary and poetry value. The enterprise was
leaded by Lezama Lima and supported economically by Rodríguez Feo’s sugar Money. Other writers of the group
were, Lorenzo García Vega, Mariano Rodríguez, Guy Pérez, and Fina García Marruz. Other publications before the
revolution were Revista Avance that shocked Havana provincial taste by publishing foreign writers in the 1950s, it
became later on Ciclón. Orígenes and Avance were two major contributions to the avant-garde position of Cuban
literature in the Spanish speaking world during the 1940s and 50s. Antoni Kapcia, Havana: The making of Cuban
Culture (Oxford, New York: Berg, 2005). p. 95-97.
53
The group became almost a cultural phenomenon. It was able to issue the most radical international thinking of
the period, publishing some books by new and radical writers and poets. It, even, had a TV spot (Lunes en TV) in
which promoted world culture. If well Lunes was published with the blessing of the state, it felt in disgrace for
tensions inside and with official institutions. Some of its members went to exile in mid 1960s, among others
Guillermo Cabrera Infante, Lydia Cabrera, Eugenio Florit, and Severo Sarduy. Lisandro Otero, Llover Sobre
Mojado. Memorias de un intelectual Cubano (Mexico: Planeta, 1999). p.76.
54
Jaime Saruski & Gerardo Mosquera, La Política Cultural de Cuba (Paris: Unesco, 1978). p. 29.
55
Haydée Santamaría (1922-1980) was one of the co-founders of the 26 of July Movement. She participated as
guerrilla fighter in Sierra Maestra and before in the “Cuartel Moncada” take over. She was not the only woman, but
one of the most important with Celia Sánchez (1920-1980), and Melba Hernandez among others. In September 4
1958 is created in Sierra Maestra the "Mariana Grajales" female platoon of the rebel army. After the triumph of the
revolution, Haydée opened Casa de la Américas, an institution to bring the most important intellectuals, writers, and
491
artists of the time. After some time, Casa turned its interest on Creole languages and had promoted Caribbean and
Antillean writers and artists. It happened under the direction of Antonio Benítez Rojo in the Caribbean Institute of
Casa.
56
The Revista Casa de las Américas since 1960 had counted with the most prominent of the region’s writers, it was
directed by Santamaría until 1965 and later by Roberto Fernandéz Retamar becoming the Revolution’s leading
cultural forum. Other magazines such as; Boletín de Música, published from 1970 and Conjunto, directed to the
performing arts community from 1964, in addition to catalogs and books of exhibitions and symposia are part of the
wide spectrum of its bibliography.
57
Lisandro Otero & Francisco Martínez H, Cultural Policy in Cuba (Paris: Unesco, 1972). p. 38.
58
Ibid. Othero & Martínez, p. 39.
59
The creation of the Cinemateca de Cuba in 1961, under the direction of Hector García Mesa would become a
forum for debate about film and its revolutionary power. The New Latin American Cinema would be in part being
born out of these discussions, and later with the relationship with film makers and producers from Brazil, Argentina,
Bolivia, and so on. Between 1960 and 1968 ICAIC produced: 44 long films, 204 documentaries, 77 cartons, 94
People’s Encyclopedia (for the literacy campaign), and 435 installments of the Latin American Film News Reel.
With the development of mobile-cinemas it screened 363.163 films to almost 40 million spectators. It worked with
film makers from Viet-Nam (films Hanoi and Martes 13), Laos (La Guerra Olvidada), and several countries in
Africa. In cooperation with Latin American film makers it had produced documentaries on guerrilla struggle,
resistance, and reportage on student movements. During the 1960s and 1970s Cuban films won several prizes in film
festivals around the world. Among others: Cannes, Biarritz, Mexico, and Budapest from. See Michael Chanan, The
Cuban Image: Cinema and cultural politics in Cuba (London: British Film Institute, 1985). p. 44-45 & 102.
60
The CNC was under the ministry of education and counted with a Research Center to publish Cuban authors,
almost always in debate with the most progressive vies of those of Lunes. Its authority was enhanced after 1963 to
organize, direct, coordinate, all cultural activity nationally and locally, and to rescue national culture. Instituto de
Literatura y Lingüística de Cuba, M. García (ed.), Diccionario de la Literatura Cubana (Havana: Letras Cubanas,
1980). p. 231.
61
Ibid. Kapcia, p. 135.
62
“El problema que aquí se ha estado discutiendo y vamos a abordar, es el problema de la libertad de los
escritores y de los artistas para expresarse… La Revolución tiene que comprender esa realidad y, por lo tanto, debe
actuar de manera que todo ese sector de artistas y de intelectuales que no sean genuinamente revolucionarios,
encuentre dentro de la Revolución un campo donde trabajar y crear y que su espíritu creador, aun cuando no sean
escritores o artistas revolucionarios, tenga oportunidad y libertad para expresarse, dentro de la Revolución. Esto
significa que dentro de la Revolución, todo; contra la Revolución nada. Contra la Revolución nada, porque la
Revolución tiene también sus derechos y el primer derecho de la Revolución es el derecho a existir y frente al
derecho de la Revolución de ser y de existir, nadie.” Fidel Castro, Palabras a los intelectuales. June 1961. Complete
text of the discourse can be accessed from: http://www.cubarte.cult.cu/fidel/6.html
63
Poster art became highly appreciated. Exhibitions in 1966 (in the Cuban Pavilion) and 1969 (1er Salón de
Carteles) would show the most advance of the visual vocabulary. A complex mix of pop and op art, photo montage
and deco style was trying to find a Cuban identity. Poster and politics where connected and both part of the everyday
life of Cubans during those initial years of revolution. In conversation with Amparo León in Madrid 2006, she made
her Doctorate dissertation on the issue. See also: Jorge Vega, El Cartel Cubano de Cine. (Havana: Letras Cubanas,
1996). In particular the article written by Adelaida de Juan, “La belleza de todos los días: Notas sobre diseño
gráfico.” p. 26-36.
64
The Escuela de Arte de San Alejandro, located in the Convento de San Augustín was created by French painter
Jean Baptiste Vermay in 1819, under the Real Sociedad. The academy followed European Models. Guillermo
Sánchez Martinez, “Comienzos del Arte Escenográfico en Cuba” in Ana Cairo Ballester, Letras. La Cultura en
Cuba (Havana: Ed. Pueblo y Educación, 1987). p. 405.
65
Painters and visual artists were well aware of the developments in places such as Mexico and Uruguay. Because
of the flux of intellectuals, artists, and exiles from the East were also aware of the Russian Avant-Garde, the
proximity to the United States brought developments taking place in New York as well. Phillip Brenner, et al., The
Cuba Reader: The making of a revolutionary society (New York: Grove Press, 1988). p. 487-98.
66
Ambrosio Fornet and Norberto Codina Boeras, editor of La Gaceta de Cuba have called the five years before
1970 “Cuban culture’s gray years.” See: A. Fornet, “El intellectual en la Revolución” (1980); A. de la Fuente, Una
492
Nación para todo: Raza, desigualdad y política en Cuba (2002); J. Franco, The Decline and fall of the Lettered City.
Latin America in the Cold War (2002); A. Kapcia, Havana: The making of Cuban culture (2005); and J.
Buckwalter-Arias, “Reinscribing the Aesthetic: Cuban Narrative and Post-Soviet Cultural Politics” PMLA Vol. 120,
No. 2 (March 2005). p. 362–374.
67
Third Cinema decries neocolonialism, the capitalist system, and the Hollywood model of cinema as mere
entertainment to make money. The manifesto “Towards a Third Cinema,” was written in the late 1960s by Argentine
filmmakers Fernando Solanas and Octavio Getino, members of the Grupo Cine Liberación. It was Published in 1969
in Tricontinental, “Towards a Third Cinema” started by a quote of anti-colonialist writer Frantz Fanon: “...we must
discuss, we must invent…” The distribution of posters in Tricontinental established a reputation for Cuban design in
the 1970s; it was stopped, along with its publication in early 1990s, due to ink shortages and financial trouble during
the special period. Tricontinental began to be printed again in 1995. In 2000, the decision was made to begin to
reprint posters. The magazine is distributed around the world, and at its height, 87 countries received Tricontinental,
and there were more than 100,2000 subscribers, mostly students. At one time, it was very common for posters from
issues of Tricontinental to be posted on the walls of student community centres around the world.
68
Not only “weirdoes,” gays, and religious practitioners (Catholics and Christians), but also important writers and
artists were censured; the work of Virgilio Piñeira, José Lezama Lima, Antonio Benitéz Rojo, René Ariza (a
playwriter), Eduardo Herrera (of the Caimán Barbudo), and Reynaldo Arenas was prohibited, taken out of
circulation, ban, and some sent to the camps.
69
If Cuba does not have a document like the 1934 “On the Reconstruction of Literary and Art Organizations,” it has
many documents produced by the institution in control of cultural policy. The UNEAC cannot be compared with The
Union of Soviet Writers that by early 1930s established the new cultural policy at the Congress of Socialist Writers
in the Soviet Union. Although, many things have been said on the way artists had to comply with the new rules to
avoid punishment, it cannot be paralleled to the Gulag labor camps in Siberia. Artists who strayed from the official
line were put aside, insolated, and in few cases punished. A famous case, writer Reinaldo Arenas who migrated in
early 1980s to the US in what is known as the Mariel period. In 1980, under international pressure, the Cuban
government opened the port city of Mariel to any Cuban who wanted to leave for the United States. The Cuban
American community mobilized to help, and within days, a massive flotilla of private yachts, merchant ships, and
fishing boats arrived in Mariel to bring Cubans to Florida. In the six months the port remained open; more than
125,2000 Cubans were delivered to the U.S. These immigrants, known as the Marielitos, were much less affluent
than previous generations had been. Many of then had been stigmatized and few thousands incarcerated in Cuba and
then in the US because their “behavior” (gender wise or else). See: Reinaldo Arenas, Antes que anochezca.
(Barcelona: Tusquets, 1992). The film produced by Julian Shnabel, Before Night Falls (2000) elaborates on Arenas
memoirs. Other books assume the phenomenon in its social, economic, and politic complexity. See: Alejandro
Portes & Rubén G. Rumbaut, Legacies: The Story of the Immigrant Second Generation. (Berkeley: University of
California Press, 2001).
70
The Nueva Trova Cubana would become a Latin American phenomenon in the 1970s, in addition to other protest
song genres such as the Andean Music and figures like Victor Jara and Violeta Parra. Big names for Cuba and the
region would emerge in these years: Silvio Rodríguez, Pablo Milanés, Martín Rojas, Roberto Novo, and groups like,
Los Mocada and Manguaré.
71
The creation of the Ministry of Culture was part of a reorganization of the central government in a moment of rethinking its ties with the Soviet Union and to respond to the general radicalization of the policies, in terms of
military participation in liberation struggles in Africa and Latin America. It has been said that the new model,
embedded in the Cuban Constitution of 1976, would be a mix between communalist Russia and French democracy,
where a decentralization would be embrace always within the control of a strong central policy making machine.
72
Antonio Benítez Rojo (1931-2005) had worked before in Casa and lost his post during the “grey years”. He had
worked in the Centro de Investigaciones Literarias from 1970-1974. He returned to work in the Editorial
Department (1976-1980) and the Centro de Estudios del Caribe / Caribbean Studies Center (1979-1980) before
leaving Cuba for the United States.
73
See a diagram in chapter four.
74
The identification and rescue of folklore as the bases of any national style or identity would move the system to
establish a vibrant dialogue between disciplines and the old cultural barrier (hi-lo). For example, the national ballet
(highly Western in style and training) had to recognize and introduce the rich popular culture, during decades it has
being acclaimed by world audiences. The network of Casas de Cultura (cultural centers), reading circles, libraries,
493
museums, art galleries, etc., became an example for any third world country. Armando Hart Dávalos, Arte, Política
Cultural, Comunicación y Nueva Sociedad /Art, Cultural Policy, Communication, and New Society (Lima: Ed.
Causachun, 1989). p.18.
75
Ibid. Jaime Saruski & Gerardo Mosquera, p. 24.
76
The Mariel episode, know also as the Mariel boatlift was a mass deportation and displacement of Cubans who
departed from the city port of Mariel, north of Cuba, for the United States. Between April 15 and October 31, 1980
the Cuban government allowed anyone willing to leave the island to do so as a result of various facts; the take-over
of the Ecuadorian embassy in Havana, around 1.500 people would entered it and ask for political asylum. The
government used it as a means to get rid of the 'undesirables' of the society, such as criminals, homosexuals, misfits,
cultural diverges, and mental patients. Around 125.2000 Cubans leave during the episode.
77
ISA opened on September 1st 1976, using the much debated installations of the National Art Schools located in a
former Country Club in Havana West. For an in-depth discussion about the debates around the art schools until 1976
see. John A. Loomis, Cuba’s forgotten Art Schools. Revolution of Form (New York: Princeton Architectural Press,
1999). Especially chapters 4 and 6.
78
Gerardo Mosquera, “An Indescribable Adventure: The new Cuban art” in Transition, Vol. 10.3 (2001). P. 124133.
79
Among the artists participating in Volumen Uno are performer Leandro Soto, conceptualist Gustavo Pérez
Monzón, and painter José Bedia. Ana Mendieta happened to be in Cuba realizing her “carvings” in Jaruco Park
outside Havana thanks to a Guggenheim fellowship and the release of tensions between the countries in early 1980s
under the Carter administration. She assisted to the exhibition and introduced the young generation to “Marxist”
minimal artist Carl Andre in a trip in 1982. Cuban painter Jose Bedia remembers meeting Andre on this trip. In that
sense Volumen Uno became a landmark debut of the first generation of artists educated under the revolution. Other
American artists traveled to Havana in trips organized by Mendieta. She, as a member of an artist exchange
organized by the Cuban Cultural Circle, brought painters Rudolf Baranik and May Stevens in May 1982. Bedia
regards Mendieta as part of the first rapprochement between Latin and Anglo artists, eager to act as a connector
among the various art communities to which she belonged. See: “Forum: Art in Cuba.” Artforum 21. No. 4
(December 1982) and Laura Roulet, “Ana Mendieta and Carl Andre: Duet of leaf and Stone.” Art Journal (Fall
2004). p. 80-99.
80
Luis Camnitzer explores in detail the role of the generation of Volumen Uno in the first chapter of his book “New
Art of Cuba”. In the introduction he narrates his experience of traveling to Havana for the first time in 1981. “I went
to the ‘First Meeting of Latin American Intellectuals’ in 1981. What I remember most about that trip is kitsch,
recycling, and the new art generation… The new art generation was so impressive primarily because it was just
that, a generation, formed by people educated after the Revolution, with no pre-revolutionary memories. Its
members met regularly to discuss art-making problems in Cuba and their own work. A critic, Gerardo Mosquera,
joined and provided them with a theoretical framework for their art. They were all under thirty, some still students,
and well informed about both socialist and capitalist art and aesthetics. While sharing common concerns, they were
developing distinct individual languages and showed a refreshing openness in their approaches. My ties with this
group were strengthened in subsequent trips and later when three of the artists came to my college for a four-month
artist-in-residence program.” Camnitzer, New Art of Cuba. Intro and chapter 1.
81
It is important to mention that Mosquera was part of the Ministry of Culture. As a civil servant he made part of the
office of Plastic Arts since 1978. He is going to be one of the main subjects in the development of the first period of
the Havana Biennale.
82
Cuba was an active participant of the World Conferences organized by Unesco. It can be said that in part the
success of Cuban cultural policy is associated to its openness with respect to meetings like these. If well Cuba
sometimes acted against its own resolutions, as in the case of the Universal Copyright Convention of 1952 and the
Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of
Cultural Property (1970). In other opportunities being central to the discussions and debates as in the case of the
Declaration of Principles on International Cultural Cooperation of 1966, the Convention for the Protection of World
Cultural and Natural Heritage of 1972, the UNESCO Declaration on Race and Racial Prejudice of 1978, the
Recommendation concerning the Status of the Artist of 1980, and the Recommendation on Safeguarding Traditional
and Popular Culture of 1989. Most importantly, the work of Mosquera and Saruski would be studied and distributed
in the World Conference on Cultural Policies, MONDIACULT that took place in Mexico City, 1982.
494
83
Both tendencies can be seen in the articles written by Mosquera and the new generation of critics; Jaime Saruski,
José Veigas, and Nelson Herrera among them, in magazines such as: El Caimán Barbudo, Pensamiento Crítico, and
Cultura y Revolución. This issue is treated in depth in the second chapter.
84
In conversation with Nelson Herrera Ysla, Havana, December 12, 2006.
85
Ibid.
86
As explore by Sebastian Edwards, in “The Economics of Latin American Art: Creativity Patterns and Rates of
Return”. The author uses two sources to determine the heath of Latin American art market, the Leonard's Price
Index of Latin American Art at Auction and Sotheby's (which pioneered Latin American art auctions in 1979),
Christie's started later on. Sebastian Edwards, “The Economics of Latin American Art: Creativity Patterns and
Rates of Return”. Economía 4.2 (2004), p. 1-35.
87
A good description of the Cuban participation in the Sandinista affair can be found in Jorge Catañeda’s Utopia
Unarmed. In the book he comments on the role of the America Department of the Central Committee of the Cuban
Communist Party, or the Ministry of Revolution, managed by Manuel Piñeiro. Piñeiro’s participation in many of the
revolutionary movements of Latin America during the 1960s and 70s is well known. He fell in disgrace after the
coup in Chile that marked the end of arm Revolution in the region. “But by, 1978 it suddenly seemed that the
Nicaraguan rebels might actually beat Somoza, and the armed struggle in Latin America returned to the fore. So did
Piñeiro, albeit under different circumstances… Cuba served as a conduit between the Sandinistas and other
revolutionary organizations. It supplied the Sandinistas with intelligence, communications, arms, and personal
security for many of the FSLN’s leaders. Towards the end of the war, it even provided the ‘equipment’ to launch a
Sandinista Air Force, which played a minor but symbolic role.” In 1982 Manuel Piñeiro in his discourse “La crisis
actual del imperialismo y los procesos revolucionarios de la América Latina y el Caribe” had said, “Arms are
indispensable for the triumph of any liberating revolution in the continent, and, more important, to preserve its
continuity and full realization.” See. Jorge Castañeda, Utopia Unarmed. The Latin American Left after the Cold War
(New York: Vintage Books, 1994). p. 59-61.
88
Sujatha Fernández, Cuba Represent! Cuban arts, state power, and the making of new revolutionary cultures
(Durham & London: Duke University Press, 2006). p. 9.
89
David Craven, “Cultural Democracy in Cuba and Nicaragua during the 1980s” Latin American Perspectives, Vol.
17, No. 3 (summer, 1990), p. 100-119.
90
“De la misma manera debemos propiciar las condiciones necesarias para que todos esos bienes culturales
lleguen al pueblo. No quiere decir eso que el artista tenga que sacrificar el valor de sus creaciones, y que
necesariamente tenga que sacrificar su calidad. Quiere decir que tenemos que luchar en todos los sentidos para que
el creador produzca para el pueblo y el pueblo a su vez eleve su nivel cultural a fin de acercarse también a los
creadores…Creo que ese principio no contradice las aspiraciones de ningún artista; y mucho menos si se tiene en
cuenta que los hombres deben crear para sus contemporáneos.” “In the same way, we must produce the necessary
conditions so that all those cultural goods arrive to the people. That does not mean that the artist must sacrifice the
value of his creations, or sacrifice its quality. It means that we have to struggle to allow the creator to produce for
the people. In that sense the people can raise its cultural level and can reach a creative state… I believe that this
principle does not contradict the aspirations of any artist. Less if it is certain that men (artists) must create for their
contemporaries.” Fidel Castro, Palabras a los intelectuales
91
“En nuestro caso, la educación directa adquiere una importancia mucho mayor. La explicación es convincente
porque es verdadera; no precisa de subterfugios. Se ejerce a través del aparato educativo del Estado en función de la
cultura general, técnica e ideológica, por medio de organismos tales como el Ministerio de Educación y el aparato de
divulgación del Partido. La educación prende en las masas y la nueva actitud preconizada tiende a convertirse en
hábito; la masa la va haciendo suya y presiona a quienes no se han educado todavía. Esta es la forma indirecta de
educar a las masas, tan poderosa como aquella otra. Pero el proceso es consciente; el individuo recibe continuamente
el impacto del nuevo poder social y percibe que no está completamente adecuado a él. Bajo el influjo de la presión
que supone la educación indirecta, trata de acomodarse a una situación que siente justa y cuya propia falta de
desarrollo le ha impedido hacerlo hasta ahora. Se autoeduca. En este período de construcción del socialismo
podemos ver el hombre nuevo que va naciendo. Su imagen no está todavía acabada; no podría estarlo nunca ya que
el proceso marcha paralelo al desarrollo de formas económicas nuevas. Descontando aquellos cuya falta de
educación los hace tender el camino solitario, a la autosatisfacción de sus ambiciones, los hay que aun dentro de este
nuevo panorama de marcha conjunta, tienen tendencia a caminar aislados de la masa que acompañan. Lo importante
es que los hombres van adquiriendo cada día más conciencia de la necesidad de su incorporación a la sociedad y, al
495
mismo tiempo, de su importancia como motores de la misma.” Texto dirigido a Carlos Quijano, semanario Marcha,
Montevideo, 12 de marzo de 1965. Ernesto Che Guevara, “El socialismo y el hombre en Cuba.” In: Ernesto
Guevara, Escritos y Discursos. Vol 8. (Havana: Ed. Social Sciences - Ministry of Culture, 1977). p. 268.
92
“Let us not attempt, from the pontifical throne of realism-at-any-cost, to condemn all the art forms which have
evolved since the first half of the nineteenth century, for we would then fall into the Proudhonian mistake of
returning to the past, of putting a straight–jacket on the artists expression of the person who is being born and is in
the process of making himself or herself… The probabilities that important artists will appear will e greater to the
degree that the field of culture and the possibilities for expression are broadened.” Ernesto Guevara, Escritos y
Discursos. Vol 8. (Havana: Ed. Social Sciences - Ministry of Culture, 1977). Quote in: Craven. p. 102.
93
Antonio Eligio (Tonel), “A Tree from Many Shores: Cuban art in movement” Art Journal, Winter 1998. p. 62-73.
94
Luis Camnitzer, “La Habana: un imán que nuestro arte necesita” in Granma, Havana, February 15, 1987. p.7.
95
“Nuestra relación con el arte es la de consumidores de lo producido por las metrópolis y (por tanto) la
dependencia cultural nos obliga a vivir una relación de apropiación diferida: nuestro arte es el resultado de lo que
otras culturas hicieron, en vez de una producción es una reproducción.” Néstor García Canclini, Arte Popular y
Sociedad (Mexico: Grijalbo, 1977). p. 135-146.
96
See Robert J.C. Young, Postcolonialism: An Historical Introduction (Oxford and Malden, Mass: Blackwell
Publishers, 2000).
97
About the issue of post-modernity and postcoloniality in Latin America see: Carlos Rincón “Modernidad
Periférica y el desafió de lo postmoderno”; Anibal Quijano, “La Colonialidad del Poder y la Experiencia Cultural
Latinoamericana” (1998); John Beverly, Michael Aronna & José Oviedo, The Postmodernism Debate in Latin
America (1995); Santiago Colas, “Latin American Postcolonial Ideologies” (1995). These texts present a vision
from the region in which geography, history, and theory entangle. Ricón’s work functions in relation to European
currents of thought were Modernity is the byproduct of European colonialism and the industrial revolution and Latin
America raises from its Western roots, Rincón using the novel as center for his discussion explains how Latin
American culture is the result of its geo-political specificity with respect to the hegemonic one. Quijano’s
“Colonialidad del Poder” explores from a historical perspective the development of the concept of race, and how it
has produced series of practices of gobermentality and production of subjectivity which had stagnated the whole
region, nonetheless producing a wide range of cultural production. Beverly and Arona expand the notion and make a
case on the multiple faces and applications that cultural theory has on the cultural production of the region and its
application on multidisciplinary studies. Colas and others such as the Toro brothers also have worked the issue from
a more philosophical and theoretical perspective.
98
Alfonso del Toro, “Más allá de la 'postmodernidad', 'postcolonialidad' y 'globalización': hacia una teoría de la
hibridez” 'Estrategias de la 'postmodernidad' y la 'postcolonialidad' en Latinoamérica. 'Hibridez' y 'Globalización'.
(Frankfurt: DFG-Projekt, Theorie und Kritik der Kultur und Literatur, Bd. Frankfurt am Main: Vervuert. 2006). p. 9.
99
del Toro goes to the bases of Latin American contemporary though underlining how for Nestor García Canclini,
Jose Juaquín Bruner, Jesús Martín Barbero, among others, as well as for more recent academics such as Carlos
Rincón, Fernando del Toro, and Herman Herlinghaus the terms are one way or the other related to the unfinish
project of modernity in the region. Alfonso del Toro, “Más allá de la 'postmodernidad', 'postcolonialidad' y
'globalización': hacia una teoría de la hibridez” 'Estrategias de la 'postmodernidad' y la 'postcolonialidad' en
Latinoamérica. 'Hibridez' y 'Globalización'. (Frankfurt: DFG-Projekt, Theorie und Kritik der Kultur und Literatur,
Bd. Frankfurt am Main: Vervuert. 2006). p. 9-36.
100
The debate in Latin America has been recently fueled by the revision of the so-called Alternative, Peripheral, or
Heterogeneous Modernity of Latin America. Postcolonial has not only been considered as an historical category but
also a discursive dimension. In that regard new exchanges, interactions, complicities emerge giving to the discourse
new tones and relevancy. For an introductory discussion refer to: Alfonso del Toro, “La Postcolonialidad en Latino
América en la Era de la Globalización. Cambio de paradigma en el pensamiento teórico-cultural Latinoamericano?
In Alfonso and Fernando de Toro, El Debate de la Postcolonialidad en Latinoamérica. Una Postmodernidad
periférica o cambio de paradigma en el pensamiento Latinoamericano (Frankfurt: Vervuet, 1999). p. 31-77.
101
For Ortiz “la nacionalidad supone un crisol de razas y una cultura mestiza” (Nationality supposes a crucible of
races and a racially mixed culture). Fernando Ortiz, Contrapunteo Cubano del Tabaco y el Azúcar, Prologo de
Malinoswki /Cuban Counterpoint: Tobacco and Sugar (Havana: Consejo Nacional de Cultura, 1964). p. 102.
102
Bolivian anthropologist Silvia Rivera Cusicanqui has sustained that sugar is the drug of capitalism (making
people obsessive and obese) and alcohol is the drug of colonialism (used as a tool of control – indigenous peoples
496
have low tolerance to alcohol); meanwhile tobacco, marihuana, and coca are (were) ritual drugs of liberation for
indigenous cultures, now part of global rings of traffic connected to regional wars and globalization. Silvia Rivera
Cusicanqui, “Las Fronteras de la Coca. Epistemologías coloniales y circuitos alternativos de la hoja de coca.”
Unpublished text. 2003.
103
The first production of sugar from sugar-cane took place in India. Alexander the Great's companions reported
seeing "honey produced without the intervention of bees" and it remained exotic in Europe until the Arabs started
cultivating it in Sicily and Spain. Only after the Crusades did it begin to rival honey as a sweetener in Europe. The
Spanish began cultivating sugar-cane in the West Indies in 1506 (and in Cuba in 1523). The Portuguese first
cultivated sugar-cane in Brazil in 1532. The process of making sugar by evaporating juice from sugarcane developed
in India around 500 BC. Sugarcane is a tropical grass, probably originated in New Guinea. During prehistoric times
its culture spread throughout the Pacific Islands and into India. By 200 BC producers in China had begun to grow it
too. Westerners learned of sugarcane in the course of military expeditions into India. Nearchos, one of Alexander
the Great's commanders, described it as "a reed that gives honey without bees". The Sanskrit word for "sugar"
(sharkara), also means "gravel". Similarly, the Chinese use the term "gravel sugar." A. C. Hannah & Donald Space,
The International Sugar Trade (New York: J. Wiley, 1997). Introduction
104
Ibid. Ortiz, Cuban Counterpoint: Tobacco and Sugar, p. 87-90.
105
By 1550, approximately 3,2000 small mills were built in the New World creating an unprecedented demand for
cast iron gears, levers, axles and other implements. Specialist trades in mold making and iron casting were
inevitably created in Europe by the expansion of sugar. Sugar mill construction is the missing link of the
technological skills needed for the Industrial Revolution that is recognized as beginning in the first part of the 1600s.
106
Mary Louis Pratt, Imperial Eyes: Travel writing and transculturation (New York: Routledge, 1992). p. 173.
107
Ibid. p. 174.
108
García Canclini’s more important books are: Arte popular y sociedad en América Latina (México: Grijalbo,
1977); La producción simbólica. Teoría y método en sociología del arte (México: Siglo XXI, 1979); Las culturas
populares en el capitalismo (México: Nueva Imagen, 1982); ¿De qué estamos hablando cuando hablamos de lo
popular? (Montevideo: CLAEH, 1986); Cultura transnacional y culturas populares /ed. con R. Roncagliolo (Lima:
Ipal, 1988); Culturas híbridas. Estrategias para entrar y salir de la modernidad (México: Grijalbo, 1990); Cultura y
Comunicación: entre lo global y lo local (La Plata: Ediciones de Periodismo y Comunicación, 1997); Culturas
Híbridas Estratégias para entrar e sair da Modernidade (2ª ed. São Paulo: Martins Fontes, 1998); Las industrias
culturales en la integración latinoaméricana /con Carlos Moneta (Buenos Aires: Eudeba, 1999); La globalización
imaginada (Barcelona: Paidós, 1999); Imaginarios Urbanos (2ª ed., Buenos Aires: Eudeba, 1999); Consumidores e
cidadaos. Conflitos multiculturais da globalizacao (Rio de Janeiro: Ed. UFRJ, 4. ed., 1999); Latinoamericanos
buscando lugar en este siglo (Buenos Aires: Paidós, 2002).
109
Henry Samuel Magdoff (1913 - 2006), was for years the co-editor of the Marxist publication, Monthly Review. A
prominent American socialist commentator and analist, Magdoff held several administrative positions in
government during the presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt. Later in his life he was accused of being a spy for the
Soviets, he was never indicted. The Age of Imperialism would become his first book published in 1969. Pensamiento
Crítico, No. 43 (June, 1970). p. 7.
110
Lee Oscar Lawrie (1877 - 1963) was one of the United States' foremost architectural sculptors and a key figure in
the American art deco scene preceding World War II. His work includes the details on the Nebraska State Capitol
building and many of the architectural sculptures at New York City's Rockefeller Center.
111
This section uses many of Suarez observations comparing them with contemporary sources in order to asses his
arguments and neutralized the “cold war” rhetoric of the book. Orlando Suarez Suarez, La Jaula Invisible.
Neocolonialismo y plástica Latinoamericana /The Invisible Cage. Neocolonialism and Latin American visual arts
(Havana: Ed. Ciencias Sociales, 1986). The quote is from his introduction, p 8.
112
For a contemporary revision of U.S history on the issue, see: Gretchen Murphy, Hemispheric Imaginings: The
Monroe Doctrine and Narratives of U.S. Empire (Duke University Press, 2005). Resides, small economic groups
would become monopolies. Industrialist such as Havemeyer, Carnegie, and Rockefeller controlled sugar, steel, and
oil respectfully. Morgan, Rockefeller, and Mellon would become major financial institutions. And others would
control the nascent industry of automobiles (Ford). All of them would have interest in the arts and their activities in
this front would impact greatly the art world. See. Frances Weitzenhoffer, The Havemeyers: Impressionism Comes
to America (New York: Harry N. Abrahams Publishers, 1986).
113
Ibid. Suarez Suarez, p. 13.
497
114
The Monroe Doctrine dictated in mid 19th century asserted the right of the U.S. to intervene in Latin America as
its natural extension. In 1904, U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt added the Roosevelt Corollary when intervening
in Panama and the West Indies; this was the largest extension that has ever been added to the Monroe Doctrine. The
Corollary would be dismantled in the 1930s. However another would replace it, The Good Neighbor policy. “The
minstrel shows not only accompaniescolonization, it becomes a site of bloodless and landless victory" Gretchen
Murphy, Hemispheric Imaginings: The Monroe Doctrine and Narratives of U.S. Empire. Duke University Press,
2005. p. 80.
115
See a thougtful exploration in: Sergio Guerra & Alberto Prieto, Estados Unidos contra América Latina: dos
siglos de agresiones (Havana: Colección- Nuestros Países. Casa de las Américas, 1978).
116
José A. Benítez, “Martí, Estados Unidos y América Latina” Granma, January 12, 1983.
117
Ricaurte Soler, “José Martí, Bolivarismo y anti-imperialismo” Casa del las Américas (magazine) N.138 (Havana,
May-July 1983) p. 41.
118
Since 1815 in Jamaica, Bolivar had said: “How beautiful would be that the Isthmus of Panama were for us what
Corinto was once for the Greeks... Hopefully we will have the fortune to install a Congress just like it.” What
Bolivar envisioned was the understanding between all new nations, the unit of the Continent, “...to form a new,
single nation with all the new nations.” In June 22, 1826 the Congress of Panama would intend to settle Bolivar’s
old dream. The Congress was attended by New Granada, Venezuela, and Ecuador (as Grancolombian countries),
Guatemala, Mexico and Peru. United provinces of Central America, Chile and Buenos Aires did not attend because
of internal problems. Bolivia did not arrive in time to the summit and Great Britain sent an observer. Unfortunately,
the congress did not arrive to a good conclusion either. After it, Latin American congresses took place in Lima
(1847 and 48) and Chile (1863 and 64) trying to prevent the facts happening in the Caribbean with William Blake
(that had named himself president of Nicaragua) and what was happening in Mexico (with Napoleon III and later
with the U.S). See: Simón Bolívar, Escritos fundamentales Caracas: Monte Ávila, 1998. Gordon Cornel-Smith, El
Sistema Inter-Americano (Mexico: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1971). p. 58-59.
119
The Pan-American Union was the secretariat of the Union of American Republics from 1910 to 1948. The Union
of American Republics succeeded the International Union of American States (1890–1910) and preceded the
Organization of American States (funded in 1948). The International Union of American States was founded
following the first International Conference of American States in Washington, D.C. (2 October 1889–19 April
1890), attended by representatives from Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El
Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay, Venezuela, and of course, the
United States. From 1890 to 1910 the International Union of American States more or less operated as a branch of,
and was based in, the U.S. Department of State. It was recognized as the Union of American Republics in a meting
in Buenos Aires in 1910, with the Pan-American Union as its secretariat. The organization was moved to the new
Pan-American Union Building on Constitution Avenue and 17th Street NW in Washington, D.C. Following the
formative meeting in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the Pan-American Union organized inter-American conferences in
Santiago, Chile, in 1923; Havana, Cuba, in 1928; Montevideo, Uruguay, in 1933; and Lima, Peru, in 1938. The PanAmerican Union also organized the meeting in Bogota, Colombia, in 1948 that led to the founding of the
Organization of American States (OAS). In 1951 the Pan-American Union was officially renamed the Secretariat of
the OAS. See. Mark T Gilderhus, Pan American Visions: Woodrow Wilson in the Western Hemisphere, 1913–1921
(Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1986).
120
During his tenure as president, he founded the International Institute of Education –IIE.
121
Bacon visited Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Chile, Peru, and Panama (as Secretary of State during 1909-12, he
obtained the advice and consent of the Senate for the Canal treaties of 1909 with Colombia and Panama) as the
representative of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. His mission, to broad and raise the interest and
also the cooperation of the leaders of the region in furthering the purposes of the U.S. “Mr. Bacon’s trip marks one
of the steps toward the development of closer cultural and intellectual ties with the countries of South America.”
L.S.R. in The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Vol. 63 (Jan 16, 1916), p. 298. See
also: Robert Bacon, For Better Relations with our Latin American Neighbors (Washington: Carnegie Endowment
for International Peace, 1915).
122
By 1870, Rockefeller helped found the Standard Oil Company. Over a forty-year period, Rockefeller built
Standard Oil into the largest and most profitable company in the world, with important fields in Latin America
(Mexico and Venezuela in particular) and became the world's richest man. The close relationship between prevailing
economic, political, and military priorities and the thrust of the Foundation's work in the field of malaria is explained
498
in several documents. In spite of its relatively small financial investment in malaria research and eradication, the
Rockefeller Foundation was able to reap enormous benefits from its work in this area. Not only was the Foundation
able to increase the profit margins of the Rockefeller empire by ameliorating some of the dire economic
consequences of malaria, but also it was able to use its participation to penetrate the public health field and
consolidate the hegemony of scientific medicine. It has been also discussed the Rockefeller Foundation's attention to
the malaria problem reflected more than mere philanthropic concern. See: Saúl Franco-Agudelo, “The Rockefeller
Foundation's antimalarial program in Latin America: donating or dominating?” Internat. J. Health Services13
(1983), Marcos Cueto Ed., Missionaries of Science: The Rockefeller Foundation and Latin America (Bloomington:
Indiana University Press, 1994).
123
See: The Guggenheim Foundations objectives. As in: http://www.gf.org/guggs.html
124
According to the World Bank, foundations are divided in six categories: Private, Family, Operating, Independent,
Corporate, and Public foundations. Private Foundations are nonprofit organizations whose funds come from one
source, whether it is an individual, a family, or a corporation. Family Foundations receive endowments from
individuals or families. Family foundations show measurable donor or donor-family involvement, especially though
participation on the foundation’s board of directors (e.g. Turner Foundation, Rockefeller Brothers Fund). Operating
Foundations are private foundations that use the bulk of their resources to provide charitable services or run
charitable programs of their own (e.g. J. Paul Getty Trust). Independent Foundation is in the form of an endowment,
and even though wealthy families start many private independent foundations, no family members control the grant
making. Because of their endowments, they are focused primarily on grant making and generally do not actively
raise funds or seek public financial support. Their boards of directors often consist of people who are eminent in the
fields of interest to the foundation. Of the largest private foundations in the United States, most are independent
foundations, although they may have begun as family foundations (e.g. Ford, Rockefeller and MacArthur
Foundations). Corporate Foundations or company-sponsored foundations are entities through which a corporation
organizes and channels its philanthropic giving. The company-sponsored foundation is a separate, legal organization
(501c3) subject to the same rules and regulations as other private foundations. Most corporate foundations maintain
close ties with the donor company and the board of directors includes company executives (e.g. Bank of America
Foundation, American Express Foundation). Public Foundations are legally classified as “public charities,” public
foundations are publicly supported nonprofit organizations and receive assets from multiple sources. They can be
funded by contributions from individuals, corporations, governmental units, private foundations and fees for service.
A public foundation must continue to seek money from diverse sources in order to retain its public status (e.g. Asia
Foundation, UN Foundation, Vancouver Community Foundation). According to the World Bank directory this is a
list of foundations that work with the Bank in projects, by October 2006, of interest in Latin America. Alcoa
Foundation, Association Francois-Xavier Bagnoud, AVINA Foundation, Bernard Van Leer Foundation, Bill and
Melinda Gates Foundation, Blue Moon Fund, Citigroup Foundation, Clinton Foundation, Coca-Cola Foundation,
Diageo Foundation, Earth University Foundation, Exxon-Mobile Foundation, Ford Foundation, Fundação Oriente,
Fundação Assistência Médica Internacional (AMIs), Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Fundação Luso-Americana
para o Desenvolvimento, Fundação Passos Canavarro, Fundación ONCE, Fundación Santillana, Fundación Banco
Bilbao Vizcaya, Fundación MAPFRE, Galapagos Conservation Trust, GE Foundation, Global Fund for Children,
Global Fund for Women, Global Greengrants Fund, Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, Ilidio Pinho Foundation,
International Youth Foundation, Inter-American Foundation, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, Levi
Strauss Foundation, Open Society Institute & Soros Foundations Network, Pan American Health Organization
(PAHO), Pfizer, Inc., Rabobank Foundation, Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Rockefeller Foundation, Schwab
Foundation, Shell Foundation, Tinker Foundation, United Nations Foundation, VolkswagenStiftung, W. K. Kellogg
Foundation, William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, World Childhood Foundation. Source: World Bank Web Page
http://web.worldbank.org/ Others corporations with regional interest and foundations working in the cultural field
are, ESSO, Philip Morris, British American Tobacco, Jonnie Walker. More on this topic see. Greg Grandin,
Empire's Workshop: Latin America, the United States, and the Rise of the New Imperialism (New York:
Metropolitan Books, 2006).
125
Of the 12,261: 4,481 were medical doctors and dentists; 3,114 nurses; 3,201 engineers; 1,158 scientist
(mathematicians, biologists, and chemists); and 307 social scientists and artists. According to José A. Benitez, only
in 1970 some 35,2000 professionals abandoned the region to settle in the US. Most of them needed to replace or to
be drafted in the Vietnam War.Ibid. Suarez Suarez, p. 25.
499
126
IE was established in 1919, in the aftermath of World War I, by Nicholas Murray Butler, President of Columbia
University, Elihu Root, former Secretary of State and president of the Carnegie Foundation, and Stephen Duggan,
Sr., Professor of Political Science at the College of the City of New York and IIE's first President. They believed
that there could be no lasting peace without greater understanding between nations and that international educational
exchange formed the strongest basis for fostering such understanding. The Institute was created to act as a catalyst
for educational exchange. It met a real need for a central point of contact and source of information both for U.S.
higher education and for foreign nations interested in establishing educational relations with the United States. IIE
began organized student exchanges with several European governments as well as faculty and teacher exchanges.
IIE President Stephen Duggan persuaded the government to create nonimmigrant student visas, bypassing post-war
quotas set in the Immigration Act of 1921. During the 1930s the Institute established the Emergency Committee to
Aid Displaced German Scholars, helping to find lectureships for these refugee scholars. IIE also assisted those
fleeing from Spanish and Italian fascism. Expanding its activities outside Europe, IIE opened the first exchanges
with the Soviet Union and Latin America. After the Second World War, the Institute was instrumental in
establishing what it now NAFSA: Association of International Educators, the professional association of those who
work for international education on campus. IIE also arranged for more than 4,2000 U.S. students to study and work
on reconstruction projects at devastated European universities.In 1946, the Institute began its administration of the
graduate student component of the Fulbright Program. In the fifties, IIE became increasingly involved with assisting
the developing world, managing programs concerned with public administration, food research, family planning,
and other development-related fields for the countries of Asia, Africa, and Latin America. The flow of foreign
students to the United States nearly doubled during this decade. IIE began producing on an annual basis statistical
data on the foreign student population in the U.S. The Fulbright Program had expanded greatly.
During the 1960s the Institute established overseas offices in Asia, Africa, and Latin America to meet growing needs
for information about U.S. higher education. Donor-supported Educational Services were likewise expanded to meet
the increasing demand for information on international education. In the seventies IIE undertook administration of
the Venezuelan Government's "Gran Mariscal de Ayacucho" Scholarship Program which assisted nearly 4,2000
promising young Venezuelans, many from disadvantaged backgrounds, to study in the United States in fields related
to national development. IIE also assumed responsibility for a portion of the USIA International Visitor Program.
IIE began administering the ITT International Fellowship Program, which for 17 years was an exemplary model of
corporate involvement in international educational exchange. In 1978–79, IIE joined with the White House and
USIA in planning the innovative Hubert H. Humphrey North-South Fellowships. The end of the decade also saw the
beginnings of the South African Education Program, designed to prepare black South Africans for a post-apartheid
future. The Institute began managing short-term, hands-on professional development projects and internships,
largely through the administration of projects for USAIDs, and further extended its reach into Africa and Southeast
Asia opening offices in Jakarta, Zimbabwe, Sri Lanka and Cairo. Innovative programs in journalism and human
rights were added to the IIE roster. Taking advantage of improving relations with Communist governments, IIE
developed the U.S.-U.S.S.R. Student Exchange Program in cooperation with the Soviet State Committee for Public
Education and extended its educational advising services in the People's Republic of China. The International
Education Information Center was opened at New York headquarters. Enrichment programs designed to introduce
foreign students to American society and culture were developed. IIE also expanded its services for scientific and
technical development, establishing the Department of Science and Technology, which currently manages USAID's
worldwide Energy Training Project. Marking a significant commitment on the Institute's part to strengthening
services in support of international cultural exchange, IIE merged with Arts International, Inc.(AI), bringing together
IIE's worldwide outreach and program management experience with AI's information resources and assistance
provided to arts professionals. The Institute celebrates 85 years of excellence in educating future leaders from the
United States and around the world. IIE is initiating programs for leaders, managers, professors, and students in
formerly Communist countries to learn about market economics and democratic institutions. Worldwide, IIE is
working with policy makers and scientists to address the immensely complex task of solving environmental
problems. As in:<www.iie.org/Content/NavigationMenu/About_IIE1/Mission_and_Profile/History/History.htm>
127
It was until 1926 called Commission not Institute. After the end of World War II it would become UNESCO.
128
The U.S Information Agency (USIA), has various precedents: Between 1939 and 1945, after the start of World
War II in Europe, President Franklin Roosevelt established several agencies to counter the effects of Axis
propaganda. One of the first is the Office of the Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs (CIAA), formed in 1940 to
counteract German and Italian propaganda in Latin America. Nelson Rockefeller is CIAA's coordinator of
500
commercial and cultural affairs between the U.S. and American Republics (exchange of persons, libraries, and
binational centers). In 1941 several low-powered, commercially owned and operated transmitters are leased to the
Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs to broadcast to Latin America. In August 3, 1953 President Eisenhower
creates the United States Information Agency (USIA) under Reorganization Plan No. 8, as authorized by the SmithMundt Act of 1948. The new agency encompasses all the information programs, including Voice of America (its
largest element), previously in the Department of State, except for the educational exchange programs, which
remain there (under Fulbright and the Rockefeller’s control). Theodore Streibert is appointed the first USIA Director
(1953-1956); he reported to the President through the National Security Council and receives complete, day-to-day
guidance on U.S. foreign policy from the Secretary of State. In September 1961, The Mutual Educational and
Cultural Exchange Act (Fulbright-Hays Act; Public Law 87-256) consolidated various U.S. international educational
and cultural exchanges, including the translation of books and periodicals and U.S. representation in international
fairs and expositions, and established government operation of cultural and education centers abroad. By the end of
the year, a Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs is established in the Department of State under an Assistant
Secretary. See: Holly Cowan Shulman, The Voice of America: Propaganda and Democracy, 1941-1945. Madison,
(WI: Wisconsin University Press, 1990), and Dizard Jr. Wilson P., Inventing Public Diplomacy: The Story of the US
Information Agency. (Boulder, Colorado: Lynne Renner, 2004).
129
The article states that “The governments represented in the Seventh International Conference of American States,
considering: That it is necessary to complement the political and juridical organization of peace with the moral
disarmament of peoples, by means of the revision of text books in use in the several countries…” In a final note the
delegation of the United States present apologies for not introducing the changes in their curriculum because of
“United States differs form that in other counties of the America in that it lies entirely outside the sphere of activity
of the Federal Government and is supported and administrated by the State and municipal authorities and by private
institutions and individuals.” Convention on the Teaching of History The American Journal of International Law,
Vol. 28, No. 2, Supplement: Official Documents (April, 1934), p. 71-74.
130
We find important counter examples in the introduction of local subjects in the work Mexican mural painters
after the revolution, the indigenous rhetoric and visual promotion in the texts of Jose Carlos Mariategui in Peru, and
the use of native icons during the arm struggle in Central and South America. In the Cuban case the example was the
suppression of the real role that the U.S played during the Cuban independence of 1898 and the pos-independence
control over the country that according to Fidel Castro in his early speeches was not historically accurate in school
texts. They would change after the upcoming of the Revolution. Ibid. Suarez Suarez, p. 23.
131
The murder was never resolved. Some theories point out in direction of international interests, the candidate was
leftist, and had been the attorney who represented union workers (and police involved) against the United Fruit Co.
that was under investigation for the killing of an undetermined number of banana workers in 1928. Arturo Alape,
writer and researcher, is who worked for more than three decades in the issue. See: Arturo Alape, El Bogotazo:
Memorias del olvido (Havana: Casa de las Américas, 1983); and his last work, El Cadáver Insepulto (Bogotá:
Editorial Planeta Colombiana, 2005).
132
Since World War II they have been coordinated efforts to create a central intelligence organism. Even before
Pearl Harbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt was concerned about American intelligence deficiencies. He asked
New York lawyer William J. Donovan to draft a plan for an intelligence service. The Office of Strategic Services
was established in June 1942 with a mandate to collect and analyze strategic information required to conduct special
operations not assigned to other agencies. During the War, the OSS supplied policy makers with essential facts and
intelligence estimates playing an important role in directly aiding military campaigns. Since the early 1930s the FBI
had been responsible for intelligence work in Latin America, and the military services protected their areas of
responsibility. The 1947 National Security Act created the CIA charging it with coordinating the nation's
intelligence activities and correlating, evaluating and disseminating intelligence which affects national security. It
followed Donovan’s directions and plan; it envisaged a powerful, centralized civilian agency would have
coordinated all the intelligence services. He also proposed that this agency have authority to conduct "subversive
operations abroad," but "no police or law enforcement functions, either at home or abroad." See “Factbook on
Intelligence” Central Intelligence Agency (December 1992), p 4-5.
133
See: Maurice Rheims, 35 Centuries of Art Collecting and Collectors from Midas to Paul Getty New York:
Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1st edition, 1961. And Laura de Coppet, Alan Jones, The Art Dealers: the powers behind
the scene tell how the art world really works (New York: C.N. Potter, 1984); Nancy Einreihofer, The American Art
501
Museum. Elitism and Democracy (London, New York: Leicester University Press, 1997) (in particular) chapter 7,
“Capitalism and the American art museum: an analysis of the corporate influence” p.124-149.
134
Serge Guilbaut, How New York Stole the Idea of Modern Art: Abstract Expressionism, Freedom, and the Cold
War (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1983).
135
The other two were the Socio-Economic Council and the Juridical Council. After some time other councils have
been created.
136
Fragment form the text “La OEA y la Cultura” (OAS and Culture) published in a booklet produced by the
Department of Cultural Affairs, OAS Washington, 1962.
137
Conferencias Internacionales Americanas. Segundo suplemento 1945-1954, p. 289-294.
138
Alfred Barr, former director of MOMA wrote a piece entitled "Is Modern Art Communist?" for the New York
Times Magazine, noted the tragic irony of myopic censorship in what was supposed to be a free society, and in
particular how the Soviet Union itself had labeled abstract art as decadent formalism in the early 1920s. This is the
moment in which the new ideology would take place, en the U.S the collective pressure on abstraction, combined
with the intimidating investigative activities of HUAC and manipulative politicking of McCarthy, made almost
impossible for the federal government to fund exhibitions of Abstract Expressionist artworks. In 1947, Secretary of
State George C. Marshall announced that tax money would no longer go to support modern art through the Office of
International Information and Cultural Affairs (OIC). In October 1953, A. H. Berding similarly announced that,
since the United States Information Agency (USIA) was responsible for representing American culture abroad,
nonrepresentational works would no longer receive federal support.
139
Gomez Sicre was born in Cuba and educated at the University of Havana. He advised Alfred H. Barr, Jr., in the
preparation of the 1944 Museum of Modern Art exhibition Modern Cuban Painters. He studied art history at both
New York University and Columbia University. Alejandro Anreus, “Jose Gomez Sicre and the ‘idea’ of Latin
American Art” Art Journal, Vol. 64 (winter, 2005). p. 86.
140
As a matter of fact, Gomez Sicre was able to increase the interest of the OAS in Art, through the development of
a Visual Arts Archive that by 1960 had more than 3,2000 entries. The exhibition program increased also from an
insignificant number of shows during the 1950s, always attached to “good will” by part of ambassadors or high
officials, to a 20 exhibitions planned in advance in 1960.
141
In 1960 the collection had pieces by 46 artist form 15 countries. Among others: Argentina- Miguel Diomede,
Sara Grilo, Emilio Pettoruti, Lajos Szalay, and Mario Pucciarelli; Bolivia- Maria Luisa Pacheco; Brazil- Roberto
Burle-Marxs, Marcelo Grassmann, and Aldemar Martins; Chile- Pablo Buchard, and Roberto Matta; ColombiaEnrique Grau, Alejandro Obregon, and Eduardo Ramirez Villamizar; Cub- Wifredo Lam, Rene Portocarrero, Rau
Milian, Amelia Pelaez, Hugo Consuegra, and Jorge Camacho; Ecuador- Oswaldo Guayasamin; Guatemala- Rodolfo
Abularach, Carlos Merida, and Roberto Ossaye; Haiti- George Liataud; Honduras- Jose Antonio Velasquez;
Mexico- Jose Luis Cuevas, Manuel Felgueres, Alberto Gironella, and Diego Rivera; Panama- Alberto Dutary, Ciro
Oduber, and Roger Muntanola; Peru- Joaquin Roca-Rey, Fernando de Szyszlo, and Armando Villegas; UruguayPedro Figari, Carlos Paez Vilaro, and Rafael Barradas; Venezuela- Elsa Gramcko, Angel Hurtado, Alejandro Otero,
and Osvaldo Vigas. Jose Gomez Sicre, La Union Panamericana al Servicio de las Artes Visuales en America
Washington, 1960. (Booklet of the Museo de las Américas).
142
Marta Traba, Dos décadas vulnerables de las artes plásticas Latinoamericanas, 1950-1970 /Two Vulnerable
Decades of Latin American Art, 1950-1970 (Mexico: Siglo XXI, 1973). p. 70.
143
59 artists were awarded in the national exhibitions. They became automatically in the vanguard of Latin
American art for two decades. They are: Argentina – Felipe Aldama, Ary Brizzi, Victor Chab, and Rogelio
Polesello; Brazil- Mauricio Salguero, Alberto Teixeira, Yukata Toyota, and Nicolas Vlavianos; Colombia- Fernando
Botero, Feliza Burztyn, Francisco Cardona, Alvaro Herran, and Nirma Zarate; Costa Rica- Lola Fernandez and
Carlos Moya-Barahona; Chile- Gracia Barrios, Sergio Castillo, Juan Egenau-Moore, and Guillermo Nunez;
Salvador- Carlos Canas and Victor Manuel Rodríguez; Guatemala- Rodolfo Abularach, Robeto Gonzalez, and
Efrain Recinos; Haiti- Lionel Derenoncourt, Maria Jose Cardere, and Montes Mericier; Honduras- Gelasio Jiménez
and Arturo Luna; Mexico- Lilia Carrillo, Guillermo Castano, Fenando Garcia Ponce, and Oliver Seguin; NicaraguaSilvio Miranda and Ricardo Sobalvarro; Panama- Antonio Alvarado and Guillermo Trujillo; Paraguay- Carlos
Colombino, Hemann Guggiari, and Lothe Schulz; Peru- Roberto Guzman, Manuel Pereira, Fernado de Szyslo, and
Daniel Yaya; Puerto Rico- Olga Albiazu, Tomas Batista, Rafael Ferrer, and Luis Hernandez Cruz; Dominican
Republic- Candido Bido, Gilberto Fernandez, and Domingo Liz; Uruguay- Ernesto Cristiani, Hermenegildo Sabat,
and Ruisdael Suarez; Venezuela- Edgardo Guinard, Francisco Hung, Humberto Jaime-Sánchez, and Victor Varela.
502
The winners in the Inter-American exhibition were: Painting, Rogelio Polesello from Argentina; in sculpture,
Hermann Guggiari from Panama. Salón ESSO de Artistas Jóvenes (catalog) (Washington: Pan-American Union,
1965).
144
A second an a third meetings were held in Chichén Itzá, Mexico (1964) and Puerto Azul, Venezuela (1967).
IAFA director Robert Wool, was a former correspondent for Look who had traveled extensively in Latin America.
145
The Inter-American Foundation for the Arts (IAFA) later became the Center for Inter-American Relations
(CIAR) and, more recently, the Americas Society. “The Rockefeller Foundation and family alike were actively
involved in this process: family members founded and directed the IAFA and CIAR, while the Foundation also
provided translation subsidies and other grants. The Ford Foundation likewise was instrumental in promoting
Spanish American literature in the U.S. (as well as abroad: it was one of the later sponsors of Mundo Nuevo, a Parisbased journal edited by Rodríguez Monegal that was critical in disseminating Boom works and criticism from 1966
to 1968). It patronized journals, launched an Intercultural Publications Program, and funded professorships at
prestigious universities. Literary competitions of the early 1960s such as the Premio Life en español and the William
Faulkner Foundation's Ibero-American Novel Award were similarly designed to encourage the production,
translation, and visibility of Spanish American fiction in the U.S.” Deborah N. Cohn, “A Tale of Two Translation
Programs Politics, the Market, and Rockefeller Funding for Latin American Literature in the United States during
the 1960s and 1970s.” Latin American Research Review 41.2 (2006), p. 139-164.
146
Twenty-two out of the 28 artists had moved to New York during the Cold War years, the rest of them the same
year of the exhibit. Robert M. Wool, in the introduction to the catalog for Magnet: New York (September 21 October 10), Bonino Gallery, New York.
147
In a recent interview Catlin discusses his affiliation with the army during WWII, spying on German and Japanese
activity in Chile while he taught North American art at the University of Chile, and his efforts to preserve art works
from damage during the war. He mentions his work for the Museum of Modern Art, particularly his contribution to
their exhibit of "mixed American art" in Mexico and the "odd" reaction of Mexican critics to the exhibition. He
discusses the evolution of modern art in Latin America and speaks on the rebirth of Latin American art and culture
in the 19th and 20th centuries, its presence in North America, and its surrealist and picaresque qualities. Series of
Oral History Interviews, Smithsonian Archives of American Art. http://www.aaa.si.edu/collections/oralhistories
148
For more information about it see: Contemporary Latin American Artists: Exhibitions at the Organization of
American States, 1941-1964, compiled and edited by Annick Sanjurjo (Lanham, Md:: Scarecrow Press, 1997), the
former archivist for the Museum of Contemporary Latin American Art at the Organization of American States in
Washington, D.C., is the second volume of a two-volume reference work documenting all the OAS exhibitions of
Latin American artists from 1941 to 1985; my text “Our Space is Our Time” (2006) that explores the effects of Area
Studies in the construction of an accurate Art History for Latin America; “The Bizarre: Constructions of a parallel
world” (2004) that describes the history of the Sao Paulo Biennale and the Museums of Modern Art in Rio and Sao
Paulo; and my series of charts (in progress 2002) on 20th century Latin American Art (2002-2008).
149
In October 1976 the Latin American Museum for Contemporary Art was open. In 1979 two meting were held,
one in Oaxaca and another in Villa de Leyva (Mexico and Colombia) with directors of the art museums of the
region. The meetings were organized by Jose Gomez Sicre (OAS); Waldo Ramussen (MOMA); and Roger D. Stone
(CIR) the objective was to establish a pact to circulate exhibition across a system that would group the museums.
The name of the network was called UMLAC (Union de Museos de Latinoamerica y el Caribe).
150
From an Associated Press release describing the success of the first Latin American auction at New York
Sotheby’s. AP, October 18, 1979. New York. “Along with many other businesses at the time, Sotheby's chose this
period of rapid growth to "go public." The share issue in 1977 was oversubscribed 26 times, and within 18 months
the vale of a share had more than doubled. The early 1980s, a period of market and corporate uncertainty, was
followed in 1983 by the acquisition of Sotheby's by businessman A. Alfred Taubman and a small group of investors.
Led by Michael Ainslie, Sotheby's once again became a private company. At the same time, the art market was
revitalized by several important sales that set the stage for the series of auctions at Sotheby's which have entered the
history books for their drama, their prices and for the way they captured the public's imagination.” Fragment from a
“History of Sotheby’s” by Sotheby's Marketing Information brochure.
151
See the foreword for Latin American Art at Action. Susan Theran, Leonard’s Price Index of Latin American Art
at Auction (Newton, MA: Auction, Index Inc., 1999).
152
Ibid. Theran, introduction.
503
153
Néstor García Canclini, “Para una teoría de la socialización del Arte Latinoamericano” (For a Theory of
Socialization of Latin American Art) Casa de las Américas, no. 89 (March-April, 1975), p. 99-119.
154
Néstor García Canclini, Arte Popular y Sociedad (Mexico: Grijalbo, 1977). p. 135-146.
155
“Si consideramos el objeto de estudio de la estética, es el proceso que abarca a los artistas, las obras, los
intermediarios y el público. La historia del arte será la historia de las relaciones entre esos componentes, sus
transformaciones de una cultura a otra: en suma, la historia de una cierta relación entre la practica estética, sus
condiciones de producción y los proyectos sociales en los que se busca superar dichas condiciones.” Ibid. García
Canclini, Arte Popular, p. 144.
156
Ibid. Suarez Suarez, p. 65.
157
Ibid, 65-66 and 98.
158
Marta Traba, Dos décadas vulnerables da las artes plásticas Latinoamericanas, 1950-1970 /Two Vulnerable
Decades of Latin American Art, 1950-1970 (Mexico” Siglo XXI, 1973). p. 120.
159
A discussion took place around the ESSO Exhibition in Venezuela in 1965. Marta Traba, “Tres días de
controversia” (Three Days of Controversy) Revista Nacional de Cultura, Caracas, no. 71 (Sep-Oct. 1965)
160
Ibid. Traba, Dos decadas, p. 121.
161
“Cuando en diciembre 1976 asumí la responsabilidad de crear el Ministerio de Cultura y junto a un grupo de
funcionarios emprendimos la tarea de organizar una basta red de instituciones culturales y, especialmente, artísticas,
dentro del sistema de la economía del país, adquirí plena conciencia de la importancia y enorme complejidad que
tenía el echo de que la producción espiritual (cultural) era fuente de riquezas económicas.” Armando Hart Dávalos,
“Cultura y Desarrollo: El desafío de nuestros tiempos” Oppening speech for the Cultura y Desarrollo Summit, ISA
Havana, June 14th 2000. Cultural para el Desarrollo. Deafio para el siglo XXI (Havana: Ed. Social Sciences,
2001). p. 134 -148.
162
Ibid. Kapcia, p. 172.
163
Other publications in which a new thought is found are the Tricontinental Magazine, the newspaper Granma and
cultural supplement for the UNEAC among others.
164
In addition to the already mentioned other publications were; Albur, Bastión, 5 de Septiembre, Conceptos, Cuba
Internacional, El Militante Comunista, Granma, Huellas, La Nueva Gaceta, Naranja Dulce, Opina, Quehacer,
Sierra Maestra, Signos, Temas, Trabajadores, Tribuna de la Habana, Unión, Universidad de la Habana, and 26, all
functioning and publishin, some with problems, during the 1980s.
165
The book presents 43 articles written by 28 authors (among them three non-Cuban, Lucy Lippard, Luis
Camnitzer, and John Brantley Mays). It uses 26 bibliographical sources in Cuba and during the research reviewed
publications from 16 countries -that had published on Cuban art during the 1980s. Margarita González, Tania
Parson, and José Veigas, Dejame que te Cuente. Antología de la crítica en los 80s /Let Me Tell You.Critical
antology of the 1980s (Havana: Arte Cubano Ed., 2002).
166
The exhibition took place in the newly open Centro de Arte Internacional, in San Rafael Street. With
participation of, Tomas Sánchez, Flavio Garciandía, Rogelio López Marín, José Bedia, Ricardo Rodríguez Brey,
Juan Francisco Elso, Gustavo Pérez Monzón, Israel León, Lisandro Soto, Rubén Torres Llorca, and José M. Fors. It
opened in January 14, 1981.
167
Gerardo Mosquera, “Volumen Uno” Introduction to the Catalog Volumen Uno. Ibid. González, Partson &
Veigas, p. 18-20.
168
“Esta actitud estética puede entrañar el peligro de tomar como orientación los derroteros trazados por la
‘vanguardias’ promovidas y manipuladas en las metrópolis.” Angel Tomás, “Desafió en San Rafael. ¿Inicio de una
ruta o retorno al pasado?” (San Rafael’s Challenge: A new route or the return to the past? El Caimán Barbudo, no.
159 (Havana, March 1981). Ibid. González, Partson & Veigas, p. 22.
169
(Los 80 son) “el renacimiento Cubano para Luís Camnitzer, todo un movimiento de renovación para Mosquera, a
mi juicio el quinto movimiento miliar en la historia de la plástica Cubana del siglo XX, luego de las tres
generaciones de vanguardia antes del 59 y de la fértil reverberación de los 60.” Rufo Caballero, “La década
prodigiosa” El Caimán Barbudo, No. 263 (July, 1990). Quoted in: González, Partson & Veigas, p. 12-15.
170
The article appeared in Art in America, which have shown some interest on the Cuban scene. Luis Camnitzer
would publish the first report covering the Havana Biennale in 1984 also in Art in America. Lucy Lippard, “Made in
U.S.A: Art from Cuba” Art in America (April, 1986), p. 27 - 35. See also. Lucy Lippard’s Overlay: Contemporary
Art and the Art of Prehistory (1983), Get the Message?: A Decade Of Art For Social Change (1984)
504
171
Among others, Adelaida de Juan, Las artes plásticas (1968), Pintura y grabado coloniales cubanos: contribución
a su estudio (1974), En la galería latinoamericana (1979), Historia de Cuba. Las artes plásticas en Cuba, (1980);
Caricatura de la República (1981), Conferencia-texto para la asignatura: Pintura y diseño gráfico de la Revolución
1959-1979 (1983), Pintura cubana; toma y variaciones, (1980); Orlando Suarez Suarez, La Jaula Invisible (1984);
Manuel López Oliva, El arte y los artistas (1986). It was until 1987 when Luis Camnitzer (a non-Cuban) started to
write a synthetic history of the new art that a real interest to tell what was happening took shape. It is thanks to
Camnitze’s New Art of Cuba (1994) when the Cuban art of the 1980s and its Revolutionary history came into being
for English readers. I have to acknowledge his work since it has given light to many of the initial thought in this
research. See: Luis Camnitzer, New Art of Cuba (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1994).
172
Gerardo Mosquera, Exploraciones en la Plástica Cubana (Havana: Ed. Letras Cubanas, 1983).
173
In one of the most interesting pieces of the book “Martí y Arte Abstracto” (Martí and Abstract Art), Mosquera
makes a theoretical and historical approach to abstractionism, using as corner stone Martí’s “ensayos sobre arte y
literature” (republished in Havana in 1976). The essay is a vehement defense of abstract art that had been until
late1970s under attack, during the ‘grey years’ and by the introduction of Soviet photorealism, and event American
pop-art. It bring an array of non Cuban authors and artists such as Arnold Hauser, Boris Suchkov, Sidney
Filkelstein, Levi Strauss, S.L. Rubenstein, and U.S. abstract artists such as Noland, Pollock, Motherwell, Kline,
Rothko, Still, Newman, Kelly, and Louis. This section, in certain way, is the core of the book dividing it in two
halves. Ibid. Mosquera, Exploraciones, p. 315-355.
174
See “La gruta de las pinturas silenciosas” and “El arte abstracto de los aborígenes preagroalfareros cubanos.”
Ibid. Mosquera, Exploraciones, p.17-32.
175
Such as in “Servando Cabrera Moreno: toda la pintura” (p. 87) and “Manuel Mendive y la evolución de su
pintura” (p. 232). Ibid. Mosquera, Exploraciones.
176
In photography see his “35 con la 35 (p. 214); in landscape and portraiture see “Acerca del paisaje y el retrato”,
Tomás Sánchez miró al paisaje Cubano” (p. 379). Ibid. Mosquera, Exploraciones.
177
This section also has conversations and free essays on artists active in the 1970s. “Mi pintura es un acto de
descolonizacion” (My Painting is and Act of Decolonization” (p.179). Ibid. Mosquera, Exploraciones.
178
His text “Diez Nuevos Pintores” (p. 416) was and introductory text for a catalog of and exhibition that did not
happen in 1980, one year later Volumen Uno took place (with eleven artists). The texts on Flavio Garciandía y José
Bedia are the evidence of his support to the new generation. See “La Pintura ‘trascendentalita’ de Flavio
Garciandía” (p. 450) and “Crónicas Americanas de José Bedia” (p. 460). Ibid. Mosquera, Exploraciones.
179
Both, Ravenet (1905-1969) and Pérez Cisneros (1915-1953) were very active during the 1940s. Ravenet was a
modern painter trained in Havana and later in Europe; Pérez Cisneros was an art critic and scholar (he wrote an
scholarly volume on the history of Cuban art from XVI to late IXX century as part of his doctoral degree in 1942)
then became a diplomat, better remember by his role in the “universal declaration of the right of men” during the
1948 UN meting in Paris. They curated some of the most important art exhibitions of the Republican period. Among
those exhibitions; La Mujer a través del Arte (1937), El Arte en Cuba, 300 Años de Arte en Cuba, Arte Cubano
Contemporáneo (1940), and the Exposición de Cartografía, Urbanismo, Fotografía, y Grabados antiguos de Cuba.
All reached a wide audience and put the visual arts on the cultural map of Cuba. The ones on Colonial art were the
first surveys on the subject, concretely acknowledging that Cuba had a tradition of colonial art worthy of scholarly
and public attention. Most of them were accompanied by informative catalogues, which, as pointed by the same Guy
Pérez Cisneros, “constituted for a long time the only library on Cuban art.” Guy Pérez Cisneros, “La obra del pintor
Ravenet,” Arquitectura No. 132 (Havana Jun., 1944), p. 255.
180
In the meeting also participated, Guy Pérez Cisneros, David Alfaro Siqueiros, Mario Carreño among others. See
Guy Pérez Cisneros, “Pintura y escultura en 1943” Anuario Cultural de Cuba, 1944; Mario Carreño, “La plástica
Cubana de hoy” Universidad de la Habana, (Sep-Oct 1952); David Alfaro Sequeiros, “Carta abierta a los pintores y
escultores de Cuba” in Raquel Tibol, David Alfaro Sequeiros y su obra (Mexico: Ed. Empresa, 1969). A note on the
meeting appears in Museum of Modern Art Bulletin, No. 5, (New York, April 5, 1944).
181
Ibid. Gonzalez, Parsons, & Veigas, p. 285.
182
Later on the work of Luís Camnitzer in exhibitions and as visiting professor in ISA would establish a real interest
in conceptual art.
183
This is going to be the first of a series of trips and work with Cuban artists during the 1980s. Camnitzer is
considered the father of conceptual art in Latin America, but especially in Cuba. He worked for a short period as a
visitor professor in ISA and was an active consultant for three Havana Biennales.
505
184
See a complete list of exhibitions that took place in Cuba, or related to the new Cuban art of the 1980s in:
Gonzalez, Parsons, & Veigas, p. 283-305.
185
“Por la proyección de su obra y por las Fuentes que la nutrieron la figura de Wifredo Lam –a través del Centro
que lleva su nombre ha convocado a los artistas que forjan la imagen auténtica y contemporánea de un mundo que
ha emprendido la reconquista de su propia identidad. En esta primera oportunidad, el llamado se ha circunscrito a
los artistas plásticos de Nuestra América. En el futuro, estarán también con nosotros los de Asia y África.” From the
preface for the First Havana Biennale catalog. Centro Wifredo Lam, Dirección de Artes Plásticas y Diseño, 1ra
Bienal de la Habana (Havana: Ministerio de Cultura, 1984).
186
Ibid. 1ra Bienal.
187
Ibid. 1ra Bienal.
188
Ibid. 1ra Bienal.
189
Eliseo Diego, “Presentación” Catalog, First Havana Biennale (Havana: Ministry of Culture, 1984). p. 10.
190
Ibid. Diego, p. 11.
191
In conversation with Nelson Herrera Ysla, Havana, April 12, 2006.
192
Ibid.
193
Osvaldo Sánchez, Kuba o.k, Arte Actual de Cuba Dusselford: Kunsthalle, 1990. P. 21. Osvaldo Sánchez has
written about the 80s generation with a critical stand on the phenomenon. He considers a paradox the art produced
which “was due undoubtedly to a loss of faith, the spiritual ruin of revolutionary thinking” and the official discourse
of the time. Osvaldo Sánchez, La isla posible (Barcelona: Ed. Destino, 1995). p.105.
194
Gerardo Mosquera, “The World of Differences. Notes on Art, Globalization and Periphery” Neue Bildende Kunst
4/5 (1995)
195
Marcia Leiseca, wife of Osmani Cienfuegos, brother of Camilo Cienfuegos -a hero of the revolution- and
secretary of the Council of Ministers at the moment of the creation of the Lam Center, became for the 1970s and 80s
generation, in her position as vice-minister of culture, supporter of musicians (case of Silvio Rodriguez), artists,
critics, and curators. For example, she was able to support the ''conflictive exhibits,'' in particular the ones that took
place in the Castillo de la Real Fuerza. Actually, she was removed from the vice-ministry for and scandal with some
of the exhibitions in question that depicted “not friendly” according to some of the more reactionary members of the
cultural world. Short after, Leiseca returned to the cultural life as vice-president of Casa de las Américas, institution
that used to be directed by her friend and college Aideé Santamaría (who died in 1980). Both shared a bourgeois
background and enjoyed, because of their involvement during and after the Revolution, the consent of the regime.
More in Jay Murphy, “Report from Havana: Testing the limits” Art in America Vol. 80, No. 10 (October, 1992), p.
65.
196
These words present Llanes in a symposium organized by the Australian non-profit cultural organization “The
South Project” in 2002. As in: www.thesouthproject.org. Llanes is currently writing her memoires of the six Havana
Biennales she participated. It will be published by the seal Arte Cubano in 2010.
197
Ibid. South Project.
198
The Russian philologist and literary philosopher Mihail Bakhtin used the term chronotope to designate the spatiotemporal matrix which governs the base condition of all narratives and other linguistic acts. The term itself can be
literally translated as “time-space.” Other scholars such as Caryl Emerson and Michael Holquist state that the
chronotope is a unit of analysis for studying language according to the ratio and characteristics of the temporal and
spatial categories represented in that language. To this extent, a chronotope is both a cognitive concept and a
narrative feature of language Specific chronotopes could correspond to genres or could represent particular
worldviews or ideologies. See Mihail M. Bakhtin, The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays by M.M. Bakhtin,
translated by Caryl Emerson & Michael Holquist (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1981).
199
Llanes, Llilian, “La Bienal de la Habana” Third Text No.20 (Autumn 1992). p. 5-12.
200
“This is not principally an academic or art-historical issue. By the mid 1990s, the international or global art show
has become the prodigious exhibitionary mode of Western ‘national’ museums. Exhibiting art from the colonized or
postcolonial world, displaying the work of the marginalized of the minority, dis-interring forgotten, forlorn ‘pasts’such curatorial projects end up supporting the centrality of the Western museum. Parallelisms suggest that there is
an equidistant moment between cultures, and where better to stage it – who could better stage it? - That in the great
metropolitan centers of the West. The promise of coevality with regard to space and representation may well be
kept; the choice of worlds of art from ‘other’ cultures may well be catholic and non-canonical. All this may make
‘global art’ more readily available to the embrace of multicultural aesthetics of a meticulous archival study…. Sites
506
of cultural difference too easily become part of the globalizing West’s thirsts for its own ethnicity, for citation and
simulacral echoes from Elsewhere.” James D. Helbert, “Visual Culture Visual Studies” in Robert S. Nelson &
Richard Shiff, eds., Critical Terms for Art History (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003). p. 449.
201
Jose Manuel Noceda, born in September 24, 1959 in a little town called San Martin in the Matanzas province,
Cuba.
202
Currently Leticia Cordero works for the UNEAC and the Nicolás Guillén Foundation. The UNEAC is a social,
cultural, and professional non-governmental organization with status II (two) in the Social Council of the United
Nations. It is an autonomous and juridical entity that groups voluntarily following the notion of artistic excellence
Cuban writers and artists in general. The UNEAC organizes the Cuban National Salon that has been taking place
since 1969. This event, with a series of other of local interest, became central for the contemporary production of
visual arts until the opening of the Biennale. .
203
Luisa Campuzano, university professor in the area of Classic Literatures. Founder and director of the Women’s
Studies program at Casa de las Américas in Havana, as well as Professor of Literature at the Universidad de la
Habana. Her distinguished list of publications on Latin American culture and history includes, most recently, a book
on magical realist Alejo Carpentier, Carpentier entonces y ahora (1997) and the two-volume edited collection,
Mujeres latinoamericanos: siglos XVI al XIX, published jointly in Havana and Mexico City. She is currently
researching a book on Cuban women travelers to the U.S.
204
This experience is going to take her to be the director of the Lam Center for the 8th Havana Biennale in 2003.
205
Hilda M. Rodriguez was born in Havana, 1960.
206
As a matter of fact, José Manuel Noceda is one of the most prolific authors on Wifredo Lam. He has published
extensible on his work, life, and related topics.
207
Ibis Hernandez used to be uncharged of the library and the documentation center, we tried to find the pieces of
paper in the archives of the Lam Center; later on I went to the national archives to see if they where part of the
administrative documents there, unfortunately I was not able to find them.
208
The congress was inaugurated in April 23, 1971 and lasted a week (April 30). In it 1,700 delegates participated
and raised their opinions on how to improve the Cuban education at the time. The documents produced there, in
addition to what the political elite had brought to the table, became educational policies for the years to come, until
the creation of the Ministry of Education (Law 1306, 1976) out of the new Cuban constitution in 1976. See.
“Congreso Nacional de Educación y Cultura.” Bohemia No. 18 (April, 1971) p. 56-57, and “Se clausura el Congreso
Nacional de Educación y Cultura.” Granma, La Habana, 1 de mayo de 1971.
209
Rachel Weiss, “Visions, Valves, and Vestiges: The Curdled Victories of the Bienal de la Habana” Art Journal
Vol 66, No. 1 (Spring 2007). p. 11-26.
210
Clare Carolin, “Report from Havana” Artnet reviews, 1999. As in:
<www.artnet.com/magazine_pre2000/reviews/carolin/carolin11-16-99.asp)>
211
Starting with two important tour exhibitions: Los Hijos de Guillermo Tell (1990-91) and AnteAmérica (1992),
which was co-curated by Carolina Ponce de León and Rachel Weiss.
212
Many articles and papers have been written about the issue. For more information see: Elisa Facio, “Jineterismo
during the Special Period” Global Development Studies, No. 3-4 (Winter 1998-Spring 1999). p. 57-78; David
Forrest, “Prostitution and the New Cuban Internationalism”' In: Frances Cleaver, ed., Making Men Matter: Men,
Masculinities and Gender Relations in Development (London: Zed Books, 2001); and Julia O'Connell Davidson,
Prostitution, Power, and Freedom (Ann Harbor: University of Michigan Press, 1999).
213
Alejandro de la Fuente, Una nación para todos: Raza, desigualdad y política en Cuba. 1900-2000 (Madrid:
Colibrí ed., 2000).
214
Ibid. de la Fuente, p. 434.
215
More about Cuba’s challenges during the period can be found in: Damián J. Fernández, Cuban Studies Since the
Revolution (Gainesville: Florida International University, 1992); Graciela Chailloux, Rosa López Oceguera, Silvio
Baró Herrera, Globalization and Cuba-U.S. Conflict (Havana: Editorial José Martí,1999); and Andrea Colantonio,
Robert B. Potter, “Urban Tourism And Development in the Socialist State: Havana During the 'special Period'”
(Hampshire: Ashgate Publishing, 2006).
216
I refer to some of these exhibitons in chapter two.
217
Gerardo Mosquera, “Dos Heterodoxos.” text for the exhibition booklet of Ezequiel Suárez y Angel Delgado in
Galería Khalo. 1994.
507
218
Osvaldo Sánchez, “Soñar con la espiral de Tatlin/Dreaming of Tatlin’s Spiral,” Poliester: Pintura y No Pintura
No. 4 (1993), p. 15.
219
Gerardo Mosquera, “Los Hijos de Guillermo Tell / The Children of William Tell,” Poliester: Pintura y No
Pintura No. 4 (1993), p. 21.
220
Ibid. Report from Havana.
221
At the moment of the interview Mosquera was organizing a series of events: a survey of work by the Brazilian
artist Cildo Meireles co-curated with Dan Cameron at the New Museum (Nov. 19, 1999-Mar. 5, 2000); a group
show, "No es Solo lo que Ves" ("It's Not Just What You See") of work by artists such as Felix Gonzalez-Torres and
Mona Hatoum, "all of whom in some sense perverted the course of Minimalism" at Madrid's Museo Centro de Arte
Reina Sofia in December; and a number of publications, including contributions to the second volume of Cream, the
"contemporary art exhibition in a book" scheduled for publication by Phaidon in October 2000. Ibid. Report from
Havana.
222
Recently he had curated: States of Exchange, London, 2008; Border Jam, Montevideo, 2007; Transpacific,
Santiago, 2007; Liverpool Biennial International, 2006 (with Manray Hsu); Cordially Invited (with Maria
Hlavajova), Utrecht, 2004; Panorama of Brazilian Art, São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Recife, Vigo, 2003; MultipleCity
(with Adrienne Samos), Panama, 2003; “Perverted Minimalism, Madrid's Museo Centro de Arte Reina Sofia in
December in 2000; in addition to editit and write for a number of international publications.
223
“…critical reviewers of The Other Story who are of ‘non-western’ origin, notably Homi Bhabha and Sutapa
Biswas, both in some ways echo the views of Sewell and Fuller. For example, Bhabha makes the point that the art of
The Other Story is ‘not very good.’ Sewell makes the claim that the art is ‘not good enough’ and Fuller also attacks
the work by saying that it has ‘little if any aesthetic or artistic value.’ This seems rather strong evidence then that the
work shown in The Other Story was of limited quality. On the other hand, by what standards were the works of art
judged? They were judged on rules and principles governed by a European or western art tradition. Therefore, the
works of The Other Story will inevitably fall short of Sewell and Fuller’s criteria.” To see the entire discussion
about issues of quality versus pertinency rose in the paper of Philip Lawrence-Hoyte and in response to the marginal
work on this exhibition by writers such as, Babha, Sewll, Araeen, fuller, among others, see: Philip Lawrence-Hoyte,
“The Oter Strory (1989)”Q-Art London. The London student-artist and writers’website. Accessed from
http://www.q-artlondon.com/
224
Margarita Sánchez refers to Shirin Neshat that had participated in 1989 and African artists such as the Nigerian
Twins Seven Seven always treated as a craftsman who participated in 1989 and Beninese artist Romuald Azoume in
1997.
225
Azucena Placencia, “El Centro Wilfredo Lam: Arte Contemporáneo” Bohemia, November 11, 1993, p.16-18.
226
“Valoraciones, V Bienal de la Habana. Espacio Africano” in Bohemia, Cultural Magazine of the news paper
Granma (March 9, 1993). p. 62.
227
My parentesis, Ibid. Valoraciones, p. 62.
228
Ibid. Valoraciones, p. 66.
229
Ibis Hernández Abascal, “On Resouces and Methods” Heterogenésis (Sweden) No. 55-56 (October, 2006), p. 32.
230
Margarita Sánchez Prieto, “Concerning the Ninth Havana Biennale” Heterogenésis (Sweden) No. 55-56
(October, 2006). p. 12.
231
Text presented in the second edition of Generazione delle Immagini, a series of conferences held at the Milan
Triennale, Llanes contribution participated in the event titled "Sguardi Planetari" (Planetary Outlooks). It is a
reflection on the fragmented and complex international art panorama. Llilian Llanes, “Polarization or
Universalization of Art” (manuscript) Havana, 1992. Published by Undo.Net Network for Contemporary Art, Milan.
As in: <www.undo.net/cgi-bin/openframe.pl?x=/facts/Eng/elianes.htm>
232
Geeta Kapur presented her paper title: “Tradition and Modernity in Third World Fine Art” during the Third
Havana Biennale in 1989.
233
As a matter of fact, the CNAP asked not to include any Cuban artists not living in Cuba to be official participant
of the Fifth Havana Biennale. After many discussions the Lam Center had to comply with the order and decided that
no Cuban artists that had participated before in the Biennale would be able to participate in the 1994 staging of the
event. It brought criticisms by part of the international press and the artists that had immigrated during the ‘especial
period’. Many of them famous by the time, in part because of the Biennale, became highly critical of the event itself
and had brought an ill image among certain circles in the United States. See: Pedro de la Hoz, “Nuestro desafió no
puede ser imitar el pasado sino adelantarnos al futuro” Arco Noticias 10 (Especial Arco’98. January, 1998). p. 2-6.
508
234
Nelson Herrera Ysla, “La Historia de la Bienal de la Habana” (The History of the Havana Biennale). As in:
<www.cubanet.com>
235
Peter Ludwig, a chocolate industrialist and philanthropist, collected roughly 50,2000 artworks and valuable
pieces of craftsmanship, ranging from pre-Columbian sculpture to medieval manuscripts to paintings by Picasso.
Also collected Pop Art, Russian avant-garde paintings and artworks that had been made under repressive
governments in Cuba and elsewhere, including the more than 100 Cuban artworks that he bought in the early 1990's.
“His other philanthropies in the art world included establishing a foundation to nurture the arts in Cuba, where he
helped to subsidize the Fifth Havana Biennial art exhibition in 1994.” Eric Pace, “Peter Ludwig, 71, German Art
Collector, Dies” The New York Times, Arts. July 23, 1996. Antonio Zaya worked in creating a network of artists
and curators that went from the Canaries, to the Mediterranean, to the Caribean, to the Americas to Africa. He was
editor of the magazine Atlantica for more than twenty years, curated and edited many shows, catalog and books on
Canary, Caribbean, African, and Latin American art. He was also a poet, an art critic, a painter and a performer.
Antonio died on September 2007; his twin brother of Octavio Zaya (also curator) survives him.
236
Press release seventh Havana Biennale. Havana: Wifredo Lam Center, 1997.
237
This point will be treated more deaply in chapter five.
238
My interview with Hilda María Rodríguez, Havana, April, 2006.
239
Rubén de Valle started his career as cultural agent being president of the Hemanos Saíz during the 1980s, later
worked as assistant for the director of the Literature office at the Ministry of Culture. He helped to create and
organize the Havana Book Fair, one of the most important cultural events in Cuba today. As member of the official
elite he was appointed director of the Lam Center in 2005 to manage the ninth Biennale.
240
During the four weeks of my visit to Havana during the ninth Biennale I was surprised for the few visitors,
national and international to the event if comparing it with previous editions I had attended to.
241
Brazilian photographer Sebastián Salgado commenting in his traveling exhibition in the Czech Republic, titled
“Workers.” Transcription of a note by Radio Prague. Dita Asiedu, Sebastiao Salgado's "Workers" tour Czech
Republic by train (Radio Prague). 02-05-2005. Available from: <www.radio.cz/en/article/66050>
242
My interview with Magali Espinoza, Havana, April 2006.
243
Llanes, Llilian, 'La Bienal de la Habana', Third Text No.20 (Autumn 1992). p. 9.
244
Nelson Herrera Ysla, “Comunicación en tiempos difíciles: Uno más cerca del otro” (Communication in Difficult
Times: Closer to each other). In Nelson Herrera Ysla, eds., Coordenadas de arte contemporáneo /Cordinates in
Contemporary Art (Havana: Arte Cubano Editions, 2003). p. 22.
245
Ibid. Herrera Ysla, p. 23.
246
My interview with Ibis Hernandez Abascal, Havana, April 2006.
247
My interview with Margarita Sanchez Prieto, Havana, April, 2006.
248
My interview with Dannys Montes de Oca, Havana, April 2006 and Merida, June 2007.
249
The conference was organized by Gerhard Haupt, in collaboration with Bernd M. Scherer for the Haus der
Kulturen der Welt, Berlin. The presenters were: Nelson Aguilar, Hans Belting, Carlos Capelán, Catherine David,
Lorna Ferguson, Sebastián López, Jean-Hubert Martin, Gerardo Mosquera, Valerie Smith, among others. Gerardo
Mosquera, “The World of Differences. Notes about art, globalization, and periphery” Neue Bildende Kunst No. 4/5,
Berlin (1995). The text can be found in: <http://universes-in-universe.de/magazin/marco-polo/e-mosquera.htm>
250
Ibid. The World of Differences.
251
Ibid. The World of Differences.
252
Manuel López Oliva, “Una bienal de otros mundos” Arco Noticias 10 (Especial Arco’98. January, 1998), p. 4952.
253
“In order to act in the word, we cannot sing in Kikongo, although we are still using, writing, reading, and singing
in it. It is not productive to sing in French either; we have to ‘make’ French, to reinvent French, or at least to
participate creatively in its inner cords in order to help the evolution of it.” Gerardo Mosquera, “El Tercer Mundo
hará la cultura occidental” Revolución y Cultura (July-Sep. 1986), p. 39-47.
254
Ibid. López Oliva, p.51.
255
Ibid. López Oliva, p.52.
256
Ibid. López Oliva.
257
The Prince Claus Fund for Culture and Development and HIVOS (Humanist Institute for Co-operation with
Developing Countries), both from the Netherlands, as well as the AFAA (Association Française d'Action Artistique)
dropped their financial support for the 2003 Havana Biennale. It happen after 75 members of the opposition were
509
sentenced to long prison terms (up to 28 years) and 3 ferry hijackers were sentenced to immediate execution in April
(2003), “the European Union sent a memorandum to the Cuban government on 5 June, in which it expressed itself as
being ‘deeply worried’ about the violations of human rights and demanded the release of the political prisoners…
Fidel Castro was so angered over this that he repeatedly and fiercely attacked the European Union in the period
following, for instance in his speech on 26 July 2003 on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the storming of the
Moncada barracks he brought the issue. The Prince Claus Fund contributed 90,2000 US Dollars to the previous
biennial, which was also supported by HIVOS. According to a statement by the organizers, the two foundations
together were responsible for 70% of external support for the 7th Havana Biennial. Pat Binder and Gerhard Haupt,
8th Havana Biennale. Universe in Universe: Worlds of Art On line service for contemporary Art from the Third
World. As in: < http://universes-in-universe.de/car/habana/bien8/english.htm>
258
Among other participants were, Viktor Misiano (Russia), Paulo Venancio (Brazil), Andrés Serrano (Spain),
Rasheed Araeen (Pakistan-UK), Fumio Nanjo (Japan), Yongwoo Lee (Korea), and Michael Sorkin (U.S.)
259
Llilian Llanes, “Polarization or Universalization of Art” manuscript for a conference in Milan titled “Generazioni
de la imagine: La scuadra planetaria,” written in Havana in 1992. Published in Undo.Net Network for Contemporary
Art, Milan. As in: <http://www.undo.net/cgi-bin/openframe.pl?x=/facts/Eng/elianes.htm>
260
Global South is another term in debate. In academic circles, the countries of the former Third World are known
as the Global South, the developing countries, and the under-developed countries, as well as the disadvantage
nations among other apelatives. Economists refer to these nations as the "Two-thirds World" and "The South"
referring to the two-third not economically developed under capitalism. International agencies call them developing
countries, but the term is disapproved by activists that argue that the term implies that industrialization is
progressive. More on the topic is scattered presented in the edited text of the conference titled “Cultures of
Globalization.” Frederic Jameson & Masao Miyoshi, eds., The Cultures of Globalization (Durham, London:
University of Duke Press, 1998). An interesting discussion can be found also in: Pramod K. Mishra, “The Fall of the
Empire or the Rise of the Global South?” Rethinking Marxism, Vol.13, No. 3 & 4 (September 2001), p. 95 – 99.
261
Hannah Arendt, On Violence (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1970). p. 21.
262
Szeemann invented the modern-day Großausstellung ("great exhibition"), in which the artworks are tied to a
central concept and are assembled into new and often surprising interrelationships. His over 200 exhibitions were
distinguished by a great abundance of material and a broad range of themes. Subversivness, alternative lifestyles and
the Gesamtkunstwerk ("total artwork") coming from Wagner's concept of a work which spans all the arts which his
own exhibitions, in a certain sense, were also indebted. See: L'Ecole du Magasin International Curatorial Training
Program, L'Ecole session 16 (2006-2007). Topic: Harald Szeemann, archive, and curatorial practice. A book would
be edited as part of the 9th Lyon Biennale (Sep. 2007). As in: <http://www.ecolemagasin.com/session16>
263
Harald Szeemann, Ecrire les expositions (Brussels: La lettre volée, 1996). p. 40.
264
Robert Fleck, “If it's Tuesday, Interview with Hans-Ulrich Obrist” Artforum (May, 1995), p. 112.
265
José Ignacio Roca was member curatorial team for the 2006 São Paulo Bienal and jury member in the 2007
Venice Biennale. José Ignacio Roca, “Curaduría Crítica” Columna de Arena, No. 10 (Sep. 1999). As in: <
http://universes-in-universe.de/columna>
266
John Tagg, “A Socialist Perspective on Photographic Practice” Three perspectives on photography, Hayward
Gallery, Londres, 1979. Cited in Ferguson, Greenberg, Nairne, “Mapping international Exhibitions” in Curating
(London: The contemporary art museum and beyond, Academy Editions, 1997). p. 30.
267
Julian Stallabrass, “Artist-curators and the new British art” Art and Design Vol. 12, No. 1-2 (January-February
1997), p. 78-81.
268
My interviews with Nelson Herrera Ysla, Havana, April 2006.
269
My Interview with Ibis Hernandez Abascal, Havana, April 2006.
270
My Interview with Margarita Sánchez Prieto, Havana, April 2006.
271
The Marco Polo Syndrome: an international symposium, 11 and 12 April 1995. Organized by: Haus der Kulturen
der Welt, Berlin; Idea, concept, and direction Gerhard Haupt in collaboration with Bernd M. Scherer, HKW.
Participants: Nelson Aguilar, Hans Belting, Carlos Capelán, Catherine David, Lorna Ferguson, Sebastián López,
Jean-Hubert Martin, Gerardo Mosquera, Valerie Smith. Statement and works of artists: Pat Binder, Zvi Goldstein,
Marina Abramovic, Sharif Waked, Rasheed Araeen. A photographical essay on Mexico by Ulrich Wüst illustrates
the first section of the issue magazine. In collaboration with: Lateinamerika-Forum Berlin, German section of the
International Association of Art Critics (AICA), art magazine neue bildende kunst. More information and
reproduction of the text by participants can be found in: Neue Bildende Kunst 4-5 (1995).
510
272
Ibid, The World of Differences.
Ibid.
274
Ibid.
275
My interview with Dannys Montes de Oca, Havana, April 2006.
276
Sánchez departed Cuba in 1989 and nationalized Mexican in 1998, now lives in San Diego. Commenting on his
experience as curator and Artistic Director of InSITE, "I'm open to complications. I'm attracted to doing things that
offer a new experience," says Sánchez. "I see these interventions have a chance to do something where I can learn a
lot, where I can be inspired even as I get crazy and tired." Robert L. Pincus, “Transborder exhibition aims to
redefine relationship between art and public” The San Diego Union Tribune. August 21, 2005.
277
My interview with Silvia Medina de Miranda, Barcelona, November 2006.
278
In several articles Mosquera made the comment on how instead of being a temporal phenomenon, the New
Cuban art has produced subsequent generations of artists that can be clearly identify. The 1990s generation has been
described by the name “weed.”
279
Evald Ilyenkov was born in Smolensk in 1924. He started his studies at the Institute of History, Philosophy and
Literature in the University of Moscow. After the World War he continued his studies and defended in 1953 his
candidate thesis on the questions of dialectical logic in Marx's economic works. From 1953 to his untimely death in
1979 he worked at the Institute of Philosophy in the Academy of Science of the Soviet Union. His work was highly
critical of the state of things in the Soviet Union in the 1960s and 70s. His views on the development of human
personality continued the great tradition of cognitive psychology in the Soviet Union. One can understand that his
independent views gave emphasis and a voice to ideas that were not very fashionable in the Soviet philosophy in the
1970s but make him a most interesting object of study among contemporary philosophers and psychologists in the
West. See, Vesa Oittinen, ed., Evald Ilyenkov's Philosophy Revisited (Helsinki: Kikimora Publications, 2000).
280
The project was modeled after a group of South Asian scholars, “the Subaltern Studies Group,” led by Ranajit
Guha, founded in 1980. It based its interest on discussions on the political discourse and the theories of colonialism
and postcolonislism. The “Latin American Subaltern Studies Group” was founded in 1993 by five scholars, John
Beverley, Robert Carr, Jose Rabasa, Ileana Rodriguez, and Javier Sanjines. Citing the trend of democratization in
Latin America, the collective saw a need to re-examine the “concepts of pluralistic societies and the conditions of
subalternity within these societies” (Latin American Subaltern Studies Group 110), they founded an academic
collective that was simultaneously an academic and political project, seeking both a paradigm of post-coloniality
rooted in subatlernity. See: John Beverley, Subalternity and Representation: Arguments in Cultural Theory (PostContemporary Interventions) (Durham: Duke Press, 1999); Rodriguez "Is there a Need for Subaltern Studies?" p.
58; Rodriguez "Is There a Need for Subaltern Studies?" p. 44. Among the Asian group were: Gayatri Chakravorty
Spivak (who helped the Latin Americans when working in Pittsburgh); Gayan Prakash and Ranajit Guha among
others. See: Ranajit Guha (Editor), A Subaltern Studies Reader, 1986-1995 (Minnesota: University of Minnesota
Press, 1997).
281
Espinoza argues that it is shown in exhibitions like the ones taking place at the end of the 1980s, some of them
censured. The exhibition series at the Castillo de la Fuerza and the Baseball game organized by some artists and
critics, among other performances and happenings are indicators of such transition.
282
Los Hijos de Guillemo Tell took place in Caracas (Alejandro Otero Museum) and Bogotá (Luis Angel Arango
Galleries), in 1991. Ante América became the passport for Mosquera as international curator, organized by Carolina
Ponce de León, Rachel Weiss, and Mosquera the exhibitions started in Bogotá, traveling to Venezuela, and finally
the United States during 1992-4. See, Thomas McEvilley, “Ante-America" ArtForum (Jan, 1994), p. 91.
283
Some of these figures fell into disgrace, García Buchaca faced a political trial and died in 1979 after 15 years of
house arrest; Olga Andreu and Aideé Santamaría committed suicide; María Maya Surduts left for France and
became a leader in the women’s movement; Wanda Garatti returned to Italy after being expulsed in 1974. Marta
Arjona, Selma Díaz, and Marcia Leyseca, after some problems remain highly regarded as cultural figures in Cuba.
284
Russian and Soviet posters from the twentieth century cover a wide range of social, political, historical and
artistic topics. Soviet government supported poster campaigns that showed Rusian women hard manual work. On
the topic see: Cathy Porter, Women in Revolutionary Russia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987)
especially chapter 4; Gregory James Massell, The surrogate proletariat: Moslem women and revolutionary
strategies in Soviet Central Asia 1919-1929 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1974); Victoria E. Bonnell,
Iconography of Power: Soviet Political Posters under Lenin and Stalin (Berkeley: University of California Press,
1998).
273
511
285
My interview with Hilda María Rodríguez, Havana, April 2006.
Desiderio Navarro, "Lam y Guillén: mundos comunicantes", in Sobre Wifredo Lam (Habana, 1986), p. 138-163;
and "Leer a Lam" in his Ejercicios del Criterio (Habana, 1988), p. 151-168.
287
Gerardo Mosquera, “Wifredo Lam” 23rd Sao Paulo Biennial - Catalog (São Paulo: Fundacão Bienal do São
Paulo, 1996). On-line version of the text in: < http://www1.uol.com.br/bienal/23bienal/especial/iela.htm>
288
Ortiz called it transcultural, Guillén used mestizaje, García Canclini hybridization, and even Camnitzer called it
Spanglish.
289
Ticio Escobar, El mito del arte y el mito del pueblo (Asunción: R. Peroni Ed. & El Museo del Barrio, 1986). p.
119-131.
290
Mosquera quotes a work by a Brazilian anthropologist working in developing new ethnographies in the fashion
of Eunice Durham’s work. He mentions: Sërgio Figueiredo Ferreti, Repensando o Sincretismo (São Paulo: EDUSP,
1995).
291
Ibid, 23rd São Paulo Biennale.
292
Actually, syncretism is more associated with certain Afro-American religions, that according to a narrative of a
harmonious synthesis, veils the character of these religions as African or Indigenous to adapt them to the new
context.
293
Edward Glissant, Caribbean Discourse: Selected Essays. Charlottesville: Virginia University Press, 1999, 1-37.
Antonio Benítez-Rojo's Repeating Island (1992) /see Heller, Ben A. "Landscape, Femininity, and Caribbean
Discourse" MLN – Vol.111, No. 2 (March 1996), p. 391-416.
294
Gilroy argues for a modernity broad enough in scope not simply to include the marginal positions of slaves, but
to put the "ungentle" aspects of slavery and terror as crucial and systematic enough to understand them at the heart
of modernity, itself: "A preoccupation with the striking doubleness that results from this unique position-- in an
expanded West but not completely of it-- is a definitive characteristic of the intellectual history of the black
Atlantic." Paul Gilroy, Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double-Consciousness (Boston: Harvard University Press,
1994). p. 58.
295
Clement Greenberg’s article “Avant-Garde and Kitsch” claimed that avant-garde and modernist art was a means
to resist the “dumbing down” of culture caused by consumerism embodied in Kitsch. Greenberg termed this 'kitsch',
a word that his essay popularized in the 1950s. “Kitsch is mechanical and operates by formulas. Kitsch is vicarious
experience and faked sensations. Kitsch changes according to style, but remains always the same. Kitsch is the
epitome of all that is spurious in the life of our times.”Clement Greenberg, “Avant-Garde and Kitsch,” Art and
Culture, 1968. p. 11. It was first published in the Partisan Review Vol. 6.5, fall 1939. p. 34-39.
296
“Recycling was present in everything from food to buildings... This policy, while making economical sense,
sacrifices the development of an official architectural language. New government buildings are variations of the
international style nicely spiced with tropical vegetation and, mostly, respectful of the human scale. Fascist
wedding-cake style buildings constructed in honor of Batista's glory are now used for socially useful functions such
as hospitals…The problem does not exist because of a lack of awareness but because of a scarcity of funds. It
creates a critical situation that has been discussed by several Cuban architects. Between food and buildings I should
mention the contributions of the ANIR (Asociación Nacional de Innovadores y Racionalizadores, or the National
Association of Innovators and Rationalizers), a group designed to find alternative solutions for those technological
products no longer available because of the U.S. blockade. When an institution needed hinges to build silkscreen
drying racks, this group designed them by bending pieces of scrap aluminum that turn around nails. The whole
printing industry was saved by ANIR, which was able to keep the presses functional by recreating missing and
broken pieces. The paper industry was also reconstructed following this drive for a degree of self-sufficiency, and a
process for paper-making was developed using 80 percent bagasse (cane remnants from the sugar production)
content.” Luis Camnitzer, New Art of Cuba (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1994).
297
My interview with Nelson Herrera Ysla, Havana April and online conversation on December 2006.
298
My interview with Hilda María Rodríguez, Havana, April 2006.
299
I apologize for ommisions on this chart. There are many people and institutions that are part of this research that
do not appear in the credit pages of the catalogs published by the Biennale.
300
My interview with Abel Prieto, Cuban Minister of Culture. April 2006.
301
Ibid. Prieto.
302
Ibid.
286
512
303
Abel Prieto recognizes that in the last decade Cuban art has been a source of income for the Country and that a
cultural economic policy has to be in place to re-assign any kind of income that the arts bring to the Cuban cultural
world.
304
Kurt Hollander, “Art, Emigration and Tourism: works by Cuban artists in last spring's fifth Havana Biennial
foreshadowed the country's current massive exodus of boat people. (Report from Cuba)” Art in America Vol. 82 No.
10 (October, 1994). p. 41-47.
305
Ibid. Hollander, p. 42.
306
Orlando Gutiérrez Castillo & N. Gancedo Gaspar, “Tourist Development for the Cuban Economy” ReVista
Harvard Review of Latin America, (winter, 2002), p. 203.
307
Ibid. Gutierrez & Gancedo, p. 207.
308
More on tourism in Cuba can be found in: Rosalie Schwartz, Pleasure Island: tourism and temptation in Cuba
(Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1997) and Peter C. Ripley, Conversations with Cuba (Athens: University of
Georgia Press, 1999).
309
Ibid. Hollander, p. 41.
310
During my years working in the Ministry of Culture of Colombia (1995-2001), we invited Cuban scholars and
curators to inform our debates on art theory and to serve as jurors for competitive events in the country. At the time
we were told that from their honoraries, 60% was taken as tax by part of the Cuban government.
311
Ibid. Hollander, p. 42.
312
Sujatha Fernándes’ interview with Manuel Gonzalez in: Sujatha Fernándes, Cuba Represent! Cuban arts, state
power, and the making of new Revolutionary cultures (Durham-London: Duke University Press, 2005). p. 144.
313
Hans Haacke, October, Vol. 30. (autumn, 1984), p. 9-16. p. 12.
314
Peter Ludwig collected also Pop Art, Russian avant-garde paintings and Cuban contemporary art. His collection,
estimated in 50,2000 pieces included more than 100 Cuban artworks that he bought in the early 1990's. Later his
foundation would acquire many hundreds more. “The Ludwigs donated or made long-term loans of artworks from
their collection to many cities in Germany and elsewhere. Over the years, more than a score of museums in various
countries have come to display works that the Ludwigs had acquired. The city of Cologne built and, in 1986, opened
a museum bearing their name near the Cologne cathedral after Mr. Ludwig had given the city more than 300
American and European artworks from the 1960's. The Ludwigs later gave Cologne scores of works by Picasso,
which led to the construction of another museum. Mr. Ludwig, who held a doctorate in art history, also played an
important role in the founding of art museums in Budapest and in Coblenz, Germany, where he was born. His other
philanthropies in the art world included establishing a foundation to nurture the arts in Cuba, where he helped to
subsidize the Fifth Havana Biennial art exhibition in 1994.” Eric Pace, “Peter Ludwig, 71, “German Art Collector,
Dies” The New York Times, July 23, 1996.
315
Interview with the producer, Natasha del Toro on her documentary: Rough Cut: Cuba: The Art Revolution.
Frontline World, PBS on view, September 14, 2006.
316
Ibid.
317
History, architecture, music, film, and art are just a few of the areas that can provide added value for the
development of a more integrated, sustainable, and sophisticated assortment of tourist offerings. Gutierréz &
Gancedo, p. 208.
318
From the 1976 ICOMOS Charter on Cultural Tourism. ICOMOS International Scientific Committee on Cultural
Tourism is one of 16 international scientific committees of the International Council on Monuments and Sites part of
UNESCO. In the 2005 meting a panel discussion on the cultural tourism of art fairs and biennials took place
including among other participants, Larry Rinder and Saul Ostrow.
319
To see a research that evaluates the impact of cultural tourism in small cities in Europe. See: Bellini, Elena,
Gasparino, Ugo, Del Corpo, Barbara and Malizia, William, "Impact of Cultural Tourism Upon Urban Economies:
An Econometric Exercise" (September 2007). Social Science Research Network, FEEM Working Paper No. 85.2007
Available at: <http://ssrn.com/abstract=1011975>
320
“Recent literature is full of reports indicating that cultural tourism is growing and that cultural tourists spend
more, stay longer, and tend to stay at hotels rather than campgrounds or with friends/family more than do ‘general’
tourists. Consequently, these tourists would be deemed ‘desirable’ in terms of the economic contribution to the state
or a region.” Gail A. Vander Stoep, “Changes of Estimating and Using Economic Impact for Cultural Tourism”
Manuscript for the Proceedings of the 2004 Northeastern Recreation Research Symposium GTR-NE-326. Michigan
State University. p. 109-116.
513
321
See: John Byrne, “Contemporary Art and Globalisation: Biennials and the Emergence of the De-Centred Artist”
International Journal of the Humanities, Volume 3, Issue 1, pp.169-172.
322
That is the case of Shanghai, Gwangju, Singapore, Taipei, Cairo, Athens, Auckland, Seville, Dakar, Cuenca,
Istanbul, Prague, Sharjah, etc. See my chart with a list of Biennials in the world.
323
Hans Belting, “Contradiction and Criticism” In: Annette W. Balkema & Herk Slager, eds., The Archive of
Development (Amserda, Atlanta: Rodopi Editions, 1998). p. 25-26.
324
Other biennial that falls into this model is the Liverpool Biennial in its efforts to regenerate the city. See a
thoughtful discussion on the issue in: Hammad Nasar, “Sharjah Biennial: Less Oil More Courage” for Art world
Salon, a blog in contemporary art. As in Tuesday April 17, 2007, <<
http://www.artworldsalon.com/blog/2007/04/17/sharjah-biennial-less-oil-more-courage/>>
325
Nasar asks the question of “Infrastructure for whom?” he comments how the majority of its population in the
Arab Emirates is expatriate - an astounding 78 percent. “And a large percentage of this is composed of male
immigrant labor from the Asian subcontinent, living with limited rights and virtually no voice. In fact, most of the
technical teams in the Museum, and the laborers in the Sharjah Expo Centre, where larger-scale installations are
housed, came from the North West Frontier Province in Pakistan.” Continuing with his discussion on the artists
participating in the Biennial who addressed the issue were, “Dan Perjovschi’s finely weighted cartoons, and a
collaborative project between e-Xplo (Erin McGonigle, Heimo Lattner, and Rene Gabri) and Ayreen Anastas in the
form of public sound installations (also produced as a CD) of migrant workers singing or reciting poetry in their
mother tongues. Of the more than 80 artists present, just one (Ranjani Shettar) came from the subcontinent, and
precisely zero from China. And while I would hate to argue for a UN model for international art events, I was
disappointed to see that Sharjah’s version of “international” seemed to look mostly westwards.” Ibid. Art world
Salon.
326
Dermis P. León, Havana, Biennial, Tourism: The Spectacle of Utopia. Art Journal Vol. 60, No. 4 (winter, 2001),
p. 71.
327
Ibid. Leon, p. 72.
328
My interview with Rubén del Valle Lantarón, Director of Visual Arts. Ministry of Culture, Cuba, Havana, April
2006.
329
The Prince Claus Fund contributed 90,2000 US Dollars to the Seventh biennial, which was also supported by
HIVOS. According to a statement by the organizers, the two foundations together were responsible for 70% of
external support for the 7th Havana Biennial. The support was dropped after 75 members of the opposition were
sentenced to long prison terms (up to 28 years) and 3 ferry hijackers were sentenced to immediate execution in April
2003. The European Union sent a memorandum to the Cuban government on 5 June, in which it expressed itself as
being "deeply worried" about the violations of human rights and demanded the release of the political prisoners and
publish a document limiting the participation of EU institutions in Cultural Events. Pat Binder and Gerhard Haupt,
“8th Havana Biennale” Universe in Universe: Worlds of Art On line service contemporary Art from the Third World
< http://universes-in-universe.de/car/habana/bien8/english.htm>
330
My interview with Rubén del Valle Lantarón, Havana, April 2006.
331
Ibid. Gutiérrez & Gancedo, p. 208.
332
During the writing stage of this work Kevin Power and Magali Espinoza published their book Nuevo Arte
Cubano. Rachel Weiss in an article on the Havana Biennale published by the Art Journal (Spring 2007) has
expressed the forthcoming of her book on Cuban Art of the 1990s, she is working for a volume on the Third Havana
Biennale in 1989. Llilian Llanes is also working in her memoires of the six editons she work as Director.
333
To name two of them; Nelson Herrera Ysla, Ojo con el Arte (Havana-Bogotá: Letras Cubanas, 2004) and Nelson
Herrera Ed. Coordenadas de Arte Contemporáneo (Havana: Arte Cubano Ediciones and Wifredo Lam Center,
2003).
334
Gerardo Mosquera, “The World of Differences. Notes on Art, Globalization and Periphery” Neue Bildende Kunst
4/5 (1995).
335
Terry Smith, "The Provincialism Problem", Artforum (Sept. 1974), p.54-59; Thomas McEvilley, "Doctor,
Lawyer, Indian Chief: 'Primitivism' in 20th-Century Art at the Museum of Modern Art in 1984," Artforum No. 23.3
(1984), p. 54-61; McEvilley, “Arrivederci, Venice: The Third World Biennials Artforum No. 32.3 (Nov 1993), p.
114-118; Thomas Mc Evilley, "History, Quality, Globalism, II," Skopje, Macedonia: Museum of Contemporary Art,
January, 1995. For more on the work of McEvelley see. Thomas McEvilley, G. Roger Denson, Capacity: History,
the World, and the Self in Contemporary Art and Criticism (New York: Routledge, 1996).
514
336
Ibid. The World of Differences.
My Interview with Hilda María Rodríguez, Havana, April 2006.
338
My interview with Dannys Montes de Oca, Havana, April 2006 and Merida, June 2007.
339
My interview with Magali Espinoza, Havana, May 2006.
340
Sugatha Fernándes, Cuba Represent! Cuban arts, state power, and the making of new Revolutionary cultures
(Durham-London: Duke University Press). p. 143.
341
According to Fernándes, “New state-managed galleries sold Cuban artwork to foreign buyers for dollars; the
artists receive up to 70% of the sale price and the remainder was retained by the state. Ibid. Fernándes, p. 143.
342
Osvaldo Sánchez, “The Children of Utopia” Third Text Vol. 7 (summer, 1989), p. 40.
343
Enzo Di Martino, The history of the Venice Biennale: 1895- 2005 visual arts, architecture, cinema, dance, music,
theatre (Venezia: Papiro Arte, 2005). p. 143.
344
“A partir da XVII Bienal las obras pasaron a ser agrupadas pelo sistema da analogía de linguagem e nâo por
paìses, seguindo metodologia proposta por Walter Zanini. In 1981 the XVI. En 1983 - A XVII Bienal manteve a
mesma estrutura da anterior. Sua grande conquista foi ter 50% do orçamento pago pela iniciativa privada. Alëm de
exposiçiónes de artistas nacionais e estrangeiros houve, ainda, duas grandes mostras de arte plumžria brasileira.”
From the 16th Bienal art-woks would start be gouping by analogy and country of origin. Following a method
proposed by Walter Zanini. In 1983 the 17th Biennial kept the same structure. Its major achievement is to get 50
percent of its funding from private institutions. Besides the exhibitions by Brazilian and foreing artists, the event
presented two big exhibitions of Brazilian Painting. Fundação Bienal de São Paulo, As in:
<www1.uol.com.br/bienal/23bienal/pbienal.htm>.
345
Leon Paroissien the Artistic Director of the 1984 Biennale of Sydney stated that, “The theme of the Fifth
Biennale of Sydney was my response to a succession of international exhibitions I had seen in Europe: The 'Aperto'
section of the 1980 Venice Biennale (shown in the Magazzini del Sale), Westkunst in Köln in 1981, and in 1982, the
Venice Biennale, Documenta, and Zeitgeist, a major international survey shown in the recently restored Martin
Gropius Baud in Berlin, in the same year. Common to these exhibitions was a focus on the resurgence of figuration,
with an emphasis especially on so-called Neo-expressionist painting. Bill Wright's 1982 Biennale of Sydney
surveyed for Australian audiences many of the newly prominent artists spanning expressionist and other figurative
tendencies, and I found myself questioning the category labels being applied to work that was quite dissimilar in its
intent.” It counted with the presence of Latin American artists such as: Antonio Dias, Gonzalo Díaz, Cildo Meireles,
and Eugenio Dittborn and super stars such as Joseph Beuys, Tony Crag, Juan Davila, Marlene Dumas, Hans Hacker,
Jenny Holier, Anselm Kiefer, Mike Kelley, Art & Language, Cindy Sherman, among others. Access from:
http://www.biennaleofsydney.com.au/history
346
In his text for the exhibition “While Cuba Waits”, Kevin Power analyzes the production of Cuban artists during
the 1990s and argues that they are the real representatives of the postmodern condition of the 1980s. His inputs have
an interesting perspective since he build on the work of Gerardo Mosquera and Osvaldo Sánchez who are clearly
major figures in the dissemination of the Cuban scene from the 1980s on. Kevin Power, While Cuba Waits, Art from
the nineties (Santa Monica, CA: Smart Art Press, 1999).
347
The prizes were named alter Latin American artist that had established an international awareness of the art
produced in the region. In doing that the organizers wanted to rein scribe Latin American art into the main narrative
of art history.
348
Centro Wifredo Lam, Sobre Wifredo Lam. Ponencias de la Conferencia Internacional Ira Bienal de la Habana
(Havana: Letras Cubanas Ed., 1986).
349
Luis Camnitzer, “Report from Havana: The First Biennial of Latin American” Art, Art in America, Vol. 72. No.
11 (December, 1984), p. 41-50.
350
See chapter two for more information on the issue.
351
Ibid. Report from, p. 41. The Exhibition was opened in May 17, and curated by W. Rubin successor of Alfred H.
Barr. “It would have been quite correct, I think, to suggest that blockbuster exhibitions of this sort have converted
the museums that embrace them into agencies of mass culture, for something less easily categorized—a cultural
development that has not yet been defined or described—resulted from this planned introduction of huge new
crowds into museums hitherto largely devoid of them. But if the blockbuster exhibition did not transform the
museum into a branch of mass culture, it nonetheless brought us a fairly radical change in the museum-going public.
It created, in effect, a new public which, while lacking both the knowledge and the sensibility to be found in the elite
art public, must all the same be differentiated from the mass public that seeks its principal cultural gratifications in
337
515
television and other commercial entertainments, professional sports events, and similar mass-market enterprises, and
takes no interest whatever in the experience of high art.” For more information about the re-opening of the MoMa in
1984 see. Hilton Kramer, “MOMA Reopen” New Criterium -special summer issue on the occasion of The Museum
of Modern Art's reopening in 1984. (Summer, 1984).
352
Camnitzer brings the fact that an institution such as MoMa has been defined with the help of metropolitan
millionaires on his board of directors, colonial millionaires on its international council, access to embassies and
international circulation through the State Department. All these aspects helped in the definition of a closed version
of internationalism and world-art, and their implantation as universal value versus marginal ones. Ibid. Report from,
p. 42.
353
My online interview with Luis Camnitzer, January 2008
354
Ibid. Report from, p. 43.
355
Ibid. Report from, p. 43.
356
Press releases reporting on the number of artists, exhibitions, and pieces appeared constantly in Granma and
other publications during the first weeks of the Biennale, some photos with general views also. However, very few,
if any, critical approaches to the Biennale were published. What is remarkable is the impact the event had on art
students, scholars, and practitioner artists. The discussions were lively and productive in studios, class rooms, and
the public artistic sphere.
357
Ibid. Report from, p. 49.
358
Antonio Benitez Rojo, “Introduction,” The Repeating Island: The Caribbean and the Postmodern Perspective,
trans. James Maraniss (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2nd ed., 2001). p. 4.
359
At the time other scholars such Paul Gilroy were working from the same perspective and even beyond the
territory in question. Paul Gilroy, The Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double Consciousness (Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press, 1993).
360
See list of artists in the exhibition in a document attached at the end of the text.
361
Evidence of the amount of events can be found in the opening pages of the catalog of this edition of the Biennale.
362
Many variables, such as excessive military spending, nationalism, rigid centralization, and so on, were in play
during those years. The United States were growing at speed rate and was introducing changes into the economy that
was becoming less contingent to state regulation, which produce –at least initially great wealth. It appears that
Soviet Russia was not able to create a culture adequately permeable to the dynamics of an ongoing science-fed
technological flow and the corruption of the central planning was out of control.
363
Armando Hart Dávalos, “Presentación. Segunda Bienal de la Habana” Segunda Bienal de la Habana. Catalog
(Havana: Centro Poligráfico Alfredo López, Ministerio de Cultura, 1986). p. 13-15.
364
Ibid. p.15.
365
Again the publication was posterior to the event. Centro Wifredo Lam, Plástica del Caribe: Ponencias de la
conferencia internacional II Bienal de la Habana (Havana: Letras Cubanas Ed., 1989).
366
Juan Acha, “Reafirmación Caribeña y sus requerimientos estéticos y artísticos” in Plástica del Caribe: Ponencias
de la conferencia internacional II Bienal de la Habana (Havana: Letras Cubanas Ed., 1989). p.13.
367
Ibid. p. 19.
368
Robert Farris Thompson, “El Signo de los Cuatro Momentos del Sol: el arte y la religion Kongo en América” in
Plástica del Caribe: Ponencias de la conferencia internacional II Bienal de la Habana (Havana: Letras Cubanas
Ed., 1989). p. 83-114.
369
Gerardo Mosquera, Africa Dentro de la Plástica Caribeña (Africa in the Visual Arts of the Caribbean) in Plástica
del Caribe: Ponencias de la conferencia internacional II Bienal de la Habana (Havana: Letras Cubanas Ed., 1989).
p.137-164.
370
John Povey, “Segunda Bienal de la Habana” African Arts, Vol. 20, No. 3 (May, 1987), p. 82-84.
371
Ibid. p. 83.
372
Kwame Nkrumah, 1909-1972 became the first prime minister and later president of Ghana. He was born in
Nkroful in what was then the British-ruled Gold Coast, the son of a goldsmith. A firm believer in African liberation,
Nkrumah pursued a radical pan-African policy, playing a key role in the formation of the Organization of African
Unity in 1963. As head of government, he was less successful however, and as time passed he was accused of
forming a dictatorship. Nkrumah was the motivating force behind the movement for independence of Ghana, then
British West Africa, and its first president when it became independent in 1957. His numerous writings address
Africa's political destiny. In 1964 he formed a one-party state, with himself as president for life, and was accused of
516
actively promoting a cult of his own personality. Overthrown by the military in 1966, with the help of western
backing, he spent his last years in exile, dying in Bucharest, Romania, on April 27, 1972. His legacy and dream of a
"United States of African" still remains a goal among many.
373
Ibid. Povey, p. 84.
374
For an interesting discussion about contemporary exhibitions see: Jena Marc Poinsot, “Large Exhibitions” in
Reesa Greemberg, Bruce W. Ferguson, Sandy Nairne, Thinking About Exhibitions (London & New York:
Routledge, 1996). p. 50-52.
375
Llilian Llanes, “Presentación” Tercera Bienal de la Habana’89. Catalogo (Havana: Letras Cubanas Ed., 1989).
p.15.
376
Ibid. p. 16.
377
Ibid. p. 17.
378
See Michael Hardt & Antonio Negri, Empire (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2000).
379
Juan Acha, “Introduction. Tradición y Contemporaneidad en el ambiente del tercer mundo: Su descripción y sus
tres problemas principales” in Debate Abierto Tradición y Contemporaneidad en el Ambiente del Tercer Mundo
(Havana: Centro Wifredo Lam, 1989).
380
Ibid. p. 7.
381
Acha sets historical periods for each manifestation: Feudal craftsmanship from the 1st to the 13th centuries;
renaissance aesthetics from 13th to the 17th centuries; and the modern design starting in the 18th century to today.
Ibid. p. 5.
382
Sergio Magalhaes, “Tradición y contemporaneidad en el ambiente del tercer mundo.” Debate Abierto Tradición y
Contemporaneidad en el Ambiente del Tercer Mundo (Havana: Centro Wifredo Lam, 1989). P. 27.
383
Roberto Segre, “Angustia y Esperanza en le Fin del Milenio: Pasado, presente y futuro del ‘Tercer Ambiente’”
Debate Abierto Tradición y Contemporaneidad en el Ambiente del Tercer Mundo (Havana: Centro Wifredo Lam,
1989). p. 72.
384
Luis Camnitzer, “The Third Biennial of Havana” Third Text No. 10 (Spring 1990), p. 79 – 93.
385
Ibid. p. 89.
386
Ibid. p. 83.
387
Luis Camnitzer, “Un laboratorio vivo: La Habana, Cuba”. Arte En Colombia No. 43 (Feb 1990), p. 64.
388
The exhibition was by artists Eduardo Ponjuán and Rene Francisco Rodríguez in the Castillo de la Real Fuerza in
September of 1989. They had produced a series of paintings using the image of Castro with an ambivalent meaning.
After the incident, Leiseca was appointed Vice-President of Casa de las Américas. Ibid. Camnitzer, Third Biennial,
p. 86.
389
Ibid. p.83-85.
390
Ibid. p. 84.
391
Dorea’s Earth Project was developed initially in 1980 and went on for ten months in the Bahia region at the
North East of Brazil, a cattle region. His initial intention was to establish a space of dialog and communication for
the peoples of that region that at the time was suffering of lack of identity; issue that for the artist was central in
coming into terms with their social and cultural reality. Dorea’s work is connected to the trend in contemporary art
in which art becomes a social healer – a trend with special presence in Brazil- allowing participants to establish
spaces of discussion and connection were creativity and physical experience produces a social catharsis. Kátia Maria
Bastos, “Percepção Estética: um diálogo no Sertão.” Revista Digital Art&. Vol. II. No.01 (April, 2004). Accesed
from: <<http://www.revista.art.br/site-numero-01/trabalhos/pagina/06.htm>>
392
Pía Barragán, “III Bienal de la Habana. La Bienal del Tercer Mundo. Entrevista a Pierre Restany.” Arte en
Colombia. No. 43 (February, 1990), p. 56.
393
Ibid. p. 57.
394
Restany’s participation in the academic event was central for the changes the Biennial would experience by its
fifth installment. The multi-focal exhibition in 1994 would be called by Restany as the apex of the Havana Biennale.
395
Interview with Gerardo Mosquera. Arte en Colombia. No. 43 (February, 1990), p. 59.
396
James Clifford, The Predicament of Culture: Twentieth-Century Ethnography, Literature, and Art (Cambridge:
Harvard University Press, 1988).
397
Leslie Judd Ahlander, “La Bienal amplía su panorama” Arte en Colombia, No. 43 (February, 1990), p. 71.
398
The end of history was a theme explored during those years. In particular by neoconservatives such as Francis
Fukuyama, in his book The End of History and the Last Man. Fukuyama argued that the progression of human
517
history as a struggle between ideologies is finished, with the world settling on liberal democracy after the end of the
Cold War and the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. Fukuyama predicted the eventual global triumph of political and
economic liberalism. "What we may be witnessing is not just the end of the Cold War, or the passing of a particular
period of post-war history, but the end of history as such... That is, the end point of mankind's ideological evolution
and the universalization of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government." Francis Fukuyama,
The End of History and the Last Man (New York: Free Press, 1992).
399
It is necessary to refer also to the exhibition World Cultures and Modern art, presented in Munich on the
occasion of the 1972 Olympics.
400
Ben Hossain mentions Gros and Girodete on Egypt and Delacroix depictions of Morocco, or the founding of the
art academy of Cairo in 1908 as signs of participation in the modern narrative. Brahim Ben Hossain Alaoui,
“Introducción al Arte Contemporáneo Arabe” Cuarta Bienal de la Habana. Catálogo (Havana: Letras Cubanas,
1991). p. 32-38.
401
The author of the text makes a complete exercise of writing history in Western term, even establishing a series of
aesthetic valuations attached to Western tradition, but also rescuing others such as the ones developed by the Iraqi
collective leaded by Ahakir Hassan Al Said and called “the only dimension of art inspired by letters” which fuses
Muslim aesthetics and formal aesthetics. This fact would be illustrated in exhibitions brought to Havana by the Lam
Center. Something remarkable about his text is the fact that even from the 1950s it seems exist an ‘interarab’
identity where in development, artists from the region were in constant flux and exchange. Brahim Ben Hossain
Alaoui, “Introducción al Arte Contemporáneo Arabe” Cuarta Bienal de la Habana. Catálog. (Havana: Letras
Cubanas, 1991). p. 35.
402
According to the editorial note, “the initial idea was to publish a selection of papers and reviews of the various
exhibitions that took place during the Biennale, due we lacked the resources to realize this ambition. However, once
the idea of this issue became known, we began to receive material which went beyond our original intention, and the
issue developed its own momentum.” The Editor, Third Text, No. 20 (autumn, 1992), Foreword.
403
Llilian Llanes, “La Bienal de la Habana” Third Text, No. 20 (Autumn, 1992). p. 5-7.
404
Ibid. p. 7.
405
Guy Brett, “Venice, Paris, Kassel, São Paulo and Habana” Third Text, No. 20 (autumn, 1992), p. 13-22.
406
For more about the 24th São Paulo biennial see my text. The Bizarre: constructions in parallel worlds (2004).
407
The 27th São Paulo Biennial was curated by Lisette Lagnado and her curatorial team, consisting of Adriano
Pedrosa, Cristina Freire, José Roca and Rosa Martínez, as well as Jochen Volz as guest curator. It presented 118
international participants under the concept "Como viver junto" (How to Live Together). Topic inspired by Roland
Barthes’ lecture series "Comment vivre ensemble", which he presented at the Collège de France in 1967-77. For the
first time the Biennial abandoned its model of national representations. Compiled from a press realese of the
biennial, 27th São Paulo Biennial, October – December, 2006.
408
Since then Documenta had integrated a more global perspective, the 1997 Documenta directed by Catherine
David was not only historical, was global. The 2002 Documenta under Okwui Enwezor artistic direction addressed
the post-colonial constellation. The 2007 installment made a revision on the role of feminist theory and practice in
contemporary art going back to the 1960s and 1970s.
409
Ibid. 17
410
Some of Nandis’s work during the time address the reductive way Western studies look at popular culture. See:
The Tao of Cricket: On Games of Destiny and the Destiny of Games. New Delhi; New York: Viking, 1989. New
Delhi; New York: Penguin, 1989. Science, Hegemony and Violence: A Requiem for Modernity. Ed. Ashis Nandy.
Tokyo, Japan: United Nations University, 1988. Delhi: Oxford UP, 1990. Traditions, Tyranny, and Utopias: Essays
in the Politics of Awareness. Delhi; New York: Oxford UP, 1987. New York: Oxford UP, 1992. The Intimate
Enemy: Loss and Recovery of Self Under Colonialism. Delhi: Oxford UP, 1983. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1988.
411
Brett, Brett, p. 22.
412
Luis Camnitzer, “Art, Politics, and the Evil Eye” Third Text No. 20 (autumn, 1992), p. 72-73.
413
Ibid. p. 73.
414
Jay Murphy, “Testing the Limits" Art in America Vol. 80, Issue 10 (October 1992), p.65-69.
415
The ABTV group stands by the initials of his members, Tanya Angulo, Juan Ballester, José Toirac, Elena
Villazón. The group was supposed to follow Pon Juan and Francisco exhibition at the Castillo de la Fuerza. It did
not happen. After it the group started to organized exhibitions in Cuba and Mexico. Finally many of its members
518
emigrated themselves. Some of the activities of the group are describe by Camnitzer in his New Art of Cuba. p. 18890.
416
Murphy quotes Mosquera on the ISA exhibition, “You can smell the power, the passion, the ideas… There is a
lot of energy among young artists. They keep appearing… It will continue even if the government puts fences here
and there.” Ibid. Murphy, p. 122.
417
Camnitzer tells how a Cuban officer said “Well, first we got rid of Spain, later we liberated ourselves from
United Sates; now we were able to get rid of the USRR.” Also comments on how a “yunk” culture has developed in
the middle of the special period. Later in his book, New Art of Cuba (1994), Camnitzer would open his narrative
telling stories about his trips to Cuban in early 1980s and the ANIR (Asociación Nacional de Innovadores y
Racionalizadores) a group designed to find solutions to those technological products no longer available because the
conditions of the island; something that has been also present, and is still, in the artistic practices of Cuba. Luis
Camnitzer, “IV Bienal de la Habana” Art Nexus, No. 4 (May, 1992), p. 106.
418
Ibid. p. 107.
419
Irazarry in a trip from Puerto Rico to the U.S. had written a piece demanding President Carter to release Lolita
Lebrón (a Puerto Rican patriot condemn to life in prison for treason and terrorism), the note he gave it to the pilot of
the plane. The artist was taken by the police; he argued that it was a conceptual game, since he already had done a
press conference announcing that if President Ford visited the island he will call his private army. Irazarry was
sentenced to six years of prison (for terrorists attempt), he spend four of them locked up.
420
Ibid. Camnitzer, Art Nexus, p.109.
421
“This latest Biennial was of special interest due to the fear (or hope, in certain quarters) that, with the seemingly
imminent falls of Fidel Castro, this will be the last Biennial of Revolutionary Cuba.” Ibid. p. 41.
422
Sassen’s work focus on the upcoming of the global city, the leading sociologist was one of the first scholars
interested in such issue. Today “global city” or world city is a concept addressed from geography and urban studies
and rests on the idea of cultural and economic entities created in globalization. One of the most complexes of these
entities is the "global city," whereby the linkages binding a city have a direct and tangible effect on global affairs
through more than socio-economic means, with influence in terms of culture, or politics. "Global city", as opposed
to megacity, is thought to have been first coined by Saskia Sassen in reference to London, New York and Tokyo in
her 1991 work The Global City. The phenomenon is now studied in depth by Globalization and World Cities Study
Group and Network based at the geography department of Loughborough University (UK), which aims to provide a
categorization and ranking of world cities. Saskia Sassen, The global city: New York, London, Tokyo (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1991).
423
Many concur in saying that Cuban artists are among the best trained artists, because of their education and
support by the state, in addition to their participation in global circuits of contemporary art. Scholars such as
Gerardo Mosquera and Magali Espinoza had worked on such isses. See chapter 4.
424
In fact, rumors about the Biennale lost of independence spread because the German industrialist and collector
Peter Ludwig had given 25,2000 Marks (17,2000 U.S. dollars) to the event that year.
425
Llilian Llanes, Introducción, V Bienal de la Habana. Catalog. (Gran Canaria: Centro de Arte Contemporáneo,
1994).
426
My interview with Hilda María Rodríguez, Havana, April 2006.
427
Luis Camnitzer, “The Fifth Biennial of Havana” Third Text, No. 28-29 (autumn/winter, 1994), p.149.
428
Weiss continues, “The writers for Art in America and the New York Times ‘chose’ to discuss the Cuban artists
whose work appears to challenge ‘the state (Cuba).’ This contextualizing of the Biennial clearly conforms (and helps
sensationalize) the dominant prevailing political discourse in the U.S. The article titles clearly establish the limited
‘interest’ and intent of the writers.” She cites two articles in particular: "Report from Havana: Testing the Limits;
Tweaking the Beard of the Maximum Leader; and Report from Cuba: Art Emigration and Tourism.” In addition, she
invites readers to compare the next articles. Ashton, Dore. "Havana, 1986" Arts Magazine, February, 1987, pp. 3839. Ashton, Dore. "Fifth Havana Biennial." Artforum, October 1994, p. 110. Baranik, Rudolf, et al. "Report from
Havana: Cuba Conversation." (Participants: Rudolf Baranik, Luis Camnitzer, Eva Cockcroft, Douglas Crimp, Lucy
Lippard), Art in America, March 1987, p. 21-29. Camnitzer, Luis. "Report from Havana: First Biennial of Latin
America." Art in America, December 1984, p. 41-49. Hollander, Kurt. "Report from Cuba: Art Emigration and
Tourism." Art in America. October, 1994, p. 41-47. Murphy, Jay. "Report from Havana: Testing the Limits." Art in
America. October, 1992, p. 65-68. Weiss, Rachael. "Magicians of the Real World." High Performance Magazine.
Summer 1990, p. 16-17. Wise, Michael Z. "Tweaking the Beard of the Maximum Leader." New York Times. June
519
12, 1994, Section H, pp. 35-36. In <leftmatrix.com>. All articles have been revised, however, since the objective of
this work is not on Cuban Art and its representation on the international press the discussion is only relevant when
they report on the Biennale in specific terms.
429
Ibid. Luis Camnitzer, “The Fifth Biennial of Havana,” p. 147.
430
Ibid. p. 149.
431
Ibid. p. 150.
432
Ibid. p. 150.
433
Betty Klausner, “U.S. contingent in Havana - U.S. artists represented in the Havana Biennial V - Report fom
Cuba” Art in America, Vol. 82, No. 10 (Oct, 1994), p. 42-46.
434
Ibid. p. 43.
435
“For example, in the Second Biennial, over sixty U.S. artists, including such well-known names as Vito Acconci,
Barbara Kruger, Adrian Piper and Leon Golub, were shown in Havana in an adjunct exhibition called ‘Over the
Blockade.’” Ibid. p. 44.
436
Ibid. p. 43.
437
Ibid. p. 44.
438
For more information on this topic see, Arjun Appadurai, Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of
Globalization (1996); James Clifford, Routes: Travel and Translation in the Late Twentieth Century (1997); and
Homi Bhabha’s Nation and Narration (editor), 1990 and The Location of Culture (1994).
439
“Materials for installations were scarce, gallery walls left unpainted and lighting was dim. Cuba did not assume
shipping, insurance or artists' travel costs. Some invited artists, such as the Colombian-born, San Francisco-based
sculptor Maria Fernanda Cardoso, could not participate because of lack of governmental or private funding. Other
artists, due to logistics and expense, were unable to show the kind of work that best represents them.” Ibid.
Klausner, p. 45.
440
Ibid, p. 45.
441
Michael Z. Wise, "Tweaking the Beard of the Maximum Leader." New York Times. June 12, 1994, Section H, p.
35-36.
442
My parenthesis, in: James Clifford, Routes: Travel and Translation in the Late Twentieth Century (Cambridge:
Harvard University Press, 1997). p. 33.
443
Mary Louis Pratt, Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation (London and New York: Routledge,
1992). p. 4.
444
Ibid. Clifford, Routes, p. 343.
445
For example, Kang showed an installation of hundreds of little square paintings, drawings and woodblocks that
he made as he rode the New York subways to work. Ibid. Krausner, p.46.
446
Kurt Hollander, originally from New York City, lived in Mexico City for the more than a decade. He was the
editor of Poliester, a contemporary art magazine of the Americas (which closed in 2006). He is a frequent
contributor to Art in America, as well as other magazines throughout the continent. He co-curated the show entitled
“Así Esta La Cosa” for the Centro Cultural/Arte Contemporáneo in 1997, a mega-exhibition of installation and
object art in Latin America. Kurt Hollander, “Art, emigration and tourism: works by Cuban artists in last spring's
fifth Havana Biennial foreshadowed the country's current massive exodus of boat people” Art in America; Vol. 82,
No. 10 (October 1994), p. 41-47.
447
“The flip side of the issue of tourism is emigration from the island. It is a troubling phenomenon for the Cuban
government and well known abroad. At present, about one million Cubans live outside the island, the majority in the
U.S. In 1962, the U.S. stopped issuing visas to Cubans, forcing all who wanted to emigrate to the U.S. to leave the
island illegally and petition for political-refugee status upon arrival. In 1984 the U.S. signed an agreement with Cuba
to provide 20,2000 resident visas and 3,2000 tourist visas for Cubans each year. However, the U.S. has given out
barely a thousand visas a year since then, so Cubans must still seek extralegal means to emigrate. According to the
U.S. government, the risk the Cubans undertake m emigrating illegally proves that the emigration is of a political
nature, and each refugee is seen as a vote against socialism (although this concept is not applied to Haiti and the
Dominican Republic, or to the thousands of Mexicans who cross the U.S. border illegally each day, who are judged
to be economic émigrés).” Ibid. p. 42.
448
“More than 100 Cuban artists have lived abroad (either temporarily or permanently) in the last four years. From
the late '80s to the early '90s, Mexico was home to the largest group, functioning as a middle ground between Cuba
and the United States geographically, economically and politically. Cuban artists living in Mexico didn't have to
520
renounce their citizenship and could continue to show their work in Cuba while being free agents in the international
art world. In May 1993, worried about a new, large-scale Cuban emigration and pressured by the U.S. during trade
talks, the Mexican government refused to renew visas to Cubans living in Mexico and made it nearly impossible for
others to obtain new visas. As a result, of the several dozen Cuban artists living in Mexico, a few returned to Cuba
while the great majority sought asylum in the States, where they were assured of receiving a hero's welcome in
Miami, which almost always includes exhibitions in art galleries there. This emigration represented the exodus of an
entire generation of artists, those who came of age in the '80s” Ibid. p. 43.
449
“In April of this year, one month before the Biennial, Fidel held a conference titled "Nation and Emigration,"
with more than 200 expatriate Cubans in attendance. This conference represented the first official visit since 1978 of
Cubans living in the United States, although thousands of Cubans not involved in "counterrevolutionary activities"
come each year to visit their families or as tourists. The conference aimed to establish closer relations with moderate
groups in Miami and to make it easier for those in Miami to visit their families, as well as to open up investment
possibilities for Cubans living elsewhere.” Ibid. p. 42.
450
“At the ‘Nation and Emigration’ conference, Roberto Robaina, former president of the Communist Youth and
now number-three man in the political scene, called the balseros ‘deserters.’ That created an outcry among Miami
Cubans, who see them as Heros. Some balsas that survived the crossing have been preserved with the intention of
establishing a foundation and erecting a museum for them; they've already been the focus of an exhibition at the
Fredric Snitzer Gallery.” Ibid. Hollander, p. 41.
451
Kcho's previous works, such as oars made out of machetes and palm trees (the national tree), followed the
anthropological fine of the '80s vanguard artist Elso, with popular materials and Santeria overtones, while his new
work seems more streamlined, more literal in its references to balsas. Ibid. p. 44.
452
Ibid. p. 44.
453
Ibid. p. 45.
454
“Admission to all the exhibitions of the Biennial cost $100 for foreigners (this steep fee was inconsistently
applied) and 100 pesos for Cubans. (Although the official rate of exchange is one to one, $1 can get you 100 pesos
on the street, while $3 represents a month's salary for many Cubans.)” Ibid. p. 43.
455
Jay Murphy, “The Young and Relentless in Havana Revisited” Third Text, No. 28-29 (Autumn/Winter, 1994), p.
161.
456
“In the piece from the series that was exhibited in the Crafts Palace, Buying Crafts, Fidel and the Virgin, after
getting married, go to the Crafts Palace to buy tourist souvenirs. In other works, they visit the Morro and eat in the
Bodeguita del Medio. The curatorial decision to place these works in the sites represented sharpened the ironic
interplay. In fact, the piece representing the Bodeguita del Medio was removed by the restaurant managers.
Reportedly they didn't object to the depiction of Fidel (usually a somewhat delicate matter) but to the fact that he
and the Virgin appeared to be eating the corpse of Francisco de la Cal.” Ibid. Hollander, p. 45.
457
“Los Carpinteros “exhibited in the Museo de Arte Colonial, which is located in the Cathedral Plaza, the works
consist of oil paintings framed by large wooden constructions of different shapes (for example, a mirror with a
vanity table attached, or a fireplace). The works comment ironically on tourism and privilege, especially the piece
titled (in English) Havana Country Club, which shows the artists golfing in tall grass with wooden sticks, with the
country club in the background. Another piece, Marquilla Cigarrera Cubana (Cuban Brand Cigars), which shows
two primitive-looking, semi-naked, cigar-smoking men inside a luxurious museum with huge paintings on the walls,
wryly comments on museums and their intended public. The high-quality wood used for these pieces was obtained
semi-legally from a nearby forest (The Carpenters had permission to cut down one of the two trees they used), and
the material undoubtedly increases the value (and the irony) of the work” Ibid. p. 45.
458
It consisted of “photo-portraits of and interviews with Cubans living in Mexico. The Cubans were not named; the
portraits, often distorted beyond recognition, were presented alongside excerpts from the interviews… Some
subjects were identified as artists, and their comments on Cuba and the Cuban art world, at times quite critical, led
Llanes, the director of the Biennial, to have the work taken down during the opening of the exhibition in the Morro.
Afterwards, in a meeting organized at the Lam Center at the request of the artist, Llanes claimed that the Morro was
under military command and that the work might upset authorities there. She showed it at the Center, where she is in
charge.” Ibid. p. 45.
459
The magazine where the images were taken was Playboy, which is forbidden in Cuba. The work was allocated in
the Museum of Education, were children are the most important audience. After a couple of days and complains by
the Museum personnel, the curators (with authorization of Llilian Llanes) removed it. Nonetheless, sex images were
521
used by many artist in the Biennale, as Camnitzer pointed out in his Third Text piece (1994) “Although the
arguments given were about content, it is clear that the curators’ concept of quality was more important given the
amount of sex displayed in the rest of the Biennial.” It seems that the debate could be based on the foggy area of
freedom of expression (by an artist) versus the right of the organizers to maintain a concept.
460
Ibid. Hollander, p. 44.
461
Cruzvillegas piece consisted of images and texts on Cuban-Mexican relations hung upon the walls and a dozen or
so rolls of toilet paper placed around the floor; Quinones made a wall-high installation of small crosses and other
objects. Tunga took several boxes of Cuban cigars (compliments of a Cuban tobacco store in the mall) and twisted a
couple of them into what looked like crossed fingers. Some viewer took a few crosses from Quinones's installation,
and the guards in the Crafts Palace became so worried about other potential thefts (especially the cigars and toilet
paper, luxury items for Cubans) that they closed off the exhibition to all except those with Biennial credentials.
Arias’ work title “0-Positivo” was a major installation involving a larger-than-life photograph of the artist covered
with a transparent layer of thousands of anonymous blood cells - some healthy, others infected (with the AIDS
virus), and illuminated in UV light. The resulting sanctuary-like atmosphere created a space for considered
reflection on our ethical responsibilities; it was presented in one of the niches in the Morro fortress. Alys brought a
pair of shoes he had covered with magnets, and wore them on several long walks throughout Old Havana. They
accumulated garbage, which he preserved in labeled bags. He also wore a sandwich board to which he attached
documentation - a city map marked with routes, Polaroid photos of the shoes at various sites, magazine clippings
and photos of other oddities. The performance piece afforded Alys a different perspective on the city, as most
foreigners tend to stick close to the protected paths (reinforced by reports that several Biennial visitors were
mugged) and to the taxis and chartered buses that are offered to them alone. Hernandez-Diez brought with him to
Cuba a broken skateboard, which he took to the streets. He videotaped several kids from Old Havana standing on the
useless item. It could be seen as representing the broken dreams and the frustration of the youth in the city (although
some kids have hand-made wooden scooters). This piece also parallels the broken-down state of transportation. Ibid.
p. 46.
462
In 1991, the United States Treasury Department exempted Cuban paintings and drawings from the 30-year-old
trade embargo after American artists, dealers and art critics complained that it hindered the free flow of ideas. The
exemption has helped promote interest in Cuban art in the United States, creating a climate the Havana Government
hopes to exploit to encourage unofficial contacts.” Michael Z. Wise, "Tweaking the Beard of the Maximum Leader."
New York Times. June 12, 1994, Section H, p. 35-36.
463
More than one observer, in fact, remarked on the growing lack of autonomy between the Biennial and the Cuban
tourist industry. Noted in John Wineland “The Havana Biennale as Tourist Discourse” manuscript for a conference
titled TOURIST PRODUCTIONS CONFERENCE. New York University, April, 1998.
464
He also makes the comment in his article published in Art Nexus (Spanish-English version) No. 22 (November
1994). Luis Camnitzer, “The Fifht Havana Biennial” Third Text No. 28-29 (autumn/winter, 1994), p. 154.
465
Atlántica revista de arte y pensamiento contemporáneo, directed by Antonio Zaya and published by the Centro of
Modern Art of the Grand Canary Island in Spain edited and sponsored the Catalog. Several articles were featured in
Atlántica, No. 6-8 (Spring and Fall, 1994), among them; Llilian Llanes, “Desde la Habana, ordenando mis ideas.”
Nelson Herrera Ysla, “Arte, sociedad y bienal de la Habana.” Eugenio Valdés Figueroa, “La crisis de la crisis.
Ideología y marginalidad.” Hilda María Rodríguez Enríquez, “La otra orilla.” And Reynaldo González, “La cultura
cubana con sabor a fresa y chocolate.” Heterogenesis, Tdiskrift for visuell konst (Visual arts magazine - Sweden),
No. 8-9 (Oct. 1994) was dedicated to the fifth Havana Biennale. Edited by Ximena Narea in Spanish and Swedish,
the volumen presented texts by Llilian Llanes, “Aproximación a la quinta Bienal de la Habana;” Ximena Narea,
“Introducción a la Bienal de la Habana;” and by Swedish art historian and critic Oscar Hemmer, “Una ponderosa
manifestación de la fuerza Latinoamericana” published also in the Swedish newspaper Sudsvenska Dagbladet.
466
Rachel Weiss, “Sixth Havana Biennial” Art Nexus No. 26 (October, 1997).
467
Universes in Universe: Worlds of art is a non-commercial information system on the visual arts of Africa, Latin
America, and Asia (including Middle East) within the context of international art processes. It has been on the
Internet since February 1997 and is financed by the efforts of the editors, subsidies, and recently by sponsor
advertisements (recently the German Government is supporting the endeavor). The site contains an ongoing
(commented) survey of the art of these regions, open forum, email listing, informational services, collaborations,
links, etc. The site is directed by curator and critic Gerhard Haupt (Germany) and artist Pat Binder (Argentina). It is
522
possible to see excellent coverage of the sixth and seventh Biennales. The site includes a short history of the event
and many features.Accesed from: <http://www.universes-in-universe.de>
468
Pat Binder and Gerhard Haupt, “6th Havana Biennale. The Cuban Art Scene” Universe in Universe: Worlds of
Art On line service contemporary Art from the Third World < http://universes-inuniverse.de/car/habana/bien8/english.htm>
469
Rachel Weiss, “Sixth Havana Biennial,” Art Nexus No. 26 (October-December, 1997), p. 70-76.
470
Luis Fernando Valencia, “La Bienal de la Habana.” universe in universes on the Sixth Havana Biennale. As in:
<http://universes-in-universe.de>
471
From a text published in English by the Wifredo Lam Center.
472
Ibid. Weiss, p. 72.
473
Belting argues that contemporary art has burst out of the frame that art history had built for it, he calls for an
entirely new approach to thinking and writing about art. When taking about the rise of global and minority art and its
consequences for Western art history, installation and video art, and the troubled institution of the art museum he
comments on the emerging new “geographies for the history of art.” See chapter 8. Global Art and Minorities: A
New Geography of Art History. Hans Belting, Art History After Modernism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
2003).
474
Ibid.Valencia.
475
In “El peso de la culpa” / The Weight of Guilt, Bruguera awaited at the entrance to her house opposite to a Cuban
flag which she had made with human hair (in the fashion of Chinese artist Gu Wenda); she was barefoot and
dressing a body of a lamb around her chest (a traditional sacrifice, offering in Santería practices). There was a pot of
Cuban earth in front of her, along with a deep plate of water and salt. In an almost mechanical act of submission and
resignation, she mixed in her hands a small amount of earth with the tearful water, raised it to her mouth, chewed
and then swallowed it. Gerhard Haupt, “Interview with Gerardo Mosquera on the Sixth Havana Biennale,” Universe
in Universes. Accessed from: <http://universes-in-universe.de/car/havanna/opinion/e_mosqu.htm>
476
Alejandra Pozo, “Bodies of artists in full action Performances at and around the Sixth Havana Biennial” Art
Nexus No. 26 (October-December, 1997), p. 77- 81.
477
“In the back of the house I create a memorial to my grandmother, who, after spending most of her life trying to
leave her birthplace in search of a better life, decided that she didn't want to die in the US and fled to Spain, since
she was unable to return to Cuba. For this performance I am the corpse, on view in the style of a traditional Catholic
wake, draped in a white shroud, and lit only by rows of tiny candles and a single black light. As I lay there, one little
boy from the neighborhood genuflects before asking someone if I might actually be dead. The next day, people in
the street congratulate us, and the bartenders from across the way wave and thank us for bringing them extra
business. Receiving such a warm response from neighbors is one of the small pleasures that offset the difficulties of
working with scant resources. Once again, I'm reminded that it’s the infectious energy and enthusiasm of the Cuban
artists and audiences that makes Havana's art scene so extraordinary.” Coco Fusco. Critic, curator, artist from Cuba;
lives in New York. See a manuscript of a piece done for Radio Latino USA in Universes in Universe.
478
Other performances during the Biennale: Manuel Mendive, Cuba (ending in Cathedral Plaza), César Martínez,
Mexico (Hotel Sevilla), Flavio Pons, Brazil (Centro Lam), Carlos Garaicoa, Cuba (Old-Havana), Casas & Lemebel,
Chile (Centro Lam), Chandrasekaran, Singapore (Casa de Asia), Arahmaiani, Indonesia (Casa de Asia), and Mike
Parr, Australia (Castillo del Morro). Pons work ended when the children crushed paper hearths they were waiving
and holding in front of the audience.
479
Ibid. Pozo, p. 77.
480
Against a white circle and background music, Arahmaiani performed a dance with plastic toys, mostly war
figures Ibid. “The work of this original artist is based on atman, one of the fundamental concepts of Hindu
philosophy which for Chandra represents ‘the innermost nucleus of a constant flow of life and creative energy’. At
the same time, Chandra appeared dressed like a beggar and covered (including his face) with rags. After settling
down inside one of the boxes, he adopted the posture of a beggar with his hand extended, waiting for alms. Someone
in the public offered him a coin which he raised to his mouth through the only available orifice in his rags. From this
point on other generous members of the public also offered him scraps of food, until the moment when Chandra
dragged himself to the other side of the space and began to vomit up all that he had ingurgitated. Back in the box
and in the same position, the story was repeated until Chandra ended his action and waved to the public.” Ibid. Pozo,
p. 78.
523
481
Tokeshi presented a series of jackets manufactured by commission and transformed by the artist. Van Wong,
commissioned to elder women in Colombia to embroider images of massacres in Colombia, they were accompanied
by tubes of tread as military (and/or paramilitary) honors.
482
During the exposure of the photos, the artists placed mirrors in different positions and reflected the light into the
camera. Taken with extremely long exposure time (1 - 2 hours) the image do not allow any live being to be fixed
creating phantom images where the artists plays at the two sides of the camera. The title of the pieces is, PhotoRespiración, 1997 transparent large-format photos, 1996. Sato traveled previously to Havana and shot a series of
photos which he printed in large formats and installed in a house close to the Old Plaza.
483
Eduardo Costa, “Report from Havana: The Installation Biennial.” Art in America No. 86, issue 3 (March, 1998),
p. 51-57.
484
John Wineland in a paper discussing the Biennale as a tourist discourse argues that in those alternative spaces
“the ‘really risky’ work is on display and there is always a ‘threat’ of the Cuban officials shutting down the
gathering. And as Los Angeles gallery director, Ana Iturralde explained, art world ‘insiders’ show up in droves.”
John Wineland, “The Havana Biennale as Tourist Discourse” manuscript for a conference titled TOURIST
PRODUCTIONS CONFERENCE. New York University, April, 1998. Wineland quotes and article by Mark
Shapiro, "A Hot Art Scene Brings the World to Havana's Door" published in the online review, salon.com
<http://www.salon.com/june97/wanderlust/cuba970603.html> and Edward Gomez, "An Art World Emerges into the
Cuban Sun," New York Times, May 25, 1997.
485
Gerhard Haupt, “Interview with Gerardo Mosquera on the Sixth Havana Biennale” Universe in Universes.
Accessed from: <http://universes-in-universe.de/car/havanna/opinion/e_mosqu.htm>
486
Ibid.
487
Coco Fusco “Manuscript for a piece done for Radio Latino USA” Universe in Universes. Accessed from:
<http://universes-in-universe.de/car/havanna/opinion/>
488
“I run into Saavedra at another exhibition of Cuban art at the El Pabellon Cubano and ask him if he chose that
place in la Cabaña because it was where political prisoners faced firing squads until the late 1970's.” Ibid. Fusco.
489
“But a lot of serious artists, like Tania Bruguera, Lázaro Saavedra or Fernando Rodríguez, have always had
criticism as part of their work and their personal position. That was evident in the work of Lázaro in La Cabaña.
Maybe it's the relationship to the specific place, and the very emotional reflection on a theme which is taboo in
Cuba, which is so interesting. His installation was in a vault in which, until not too long ago, firing squad executions
took place.” Ibid. G Haupt. Interview with Gerardo Mosquera.
490
Satorou Nagoya, “A Journal on the 6th Biennial of Havana” Network Museum & Magazine Project, Japan.
Access from: <http://www.dnp.co.jp/museum/nmp/nmp_b/watch/Jun17-s_e.html#1>
491
Ibid.
492
Ibid.
493
In other related publications articles and notes were present depicting one of various aspects of the event. See:
Rachel Weiss, “Bodies of Artists in full action: Performances at and around the Sixth Havana Biennial, Centro de
Arte Contemporáneo Wilfredo Lam, La Habana, Cuba” Art Nexus No. 36 (May, 2000). Gerardo Mosquera, “Sobre
religión y nuevo arte cubano” Atlántica, N. 13, (spring, 1996). Margarita Sánchez Prieto, “Cultura y realidad
histórica en la plástica chilena contemporánea.” Atlántica, N. 13, (spring, 1996). Ibis Hernández Abascal, “Visión
del arte mexicano actual.” Atlántica, N. 13, (spring, 1996). Eugenio Valdés Figueroa, “Reciclando la Modernidad.”
Atlántica, N. 13, (spring, 1996). Nelson Herrera Ysla, “Desafío y provocaciones de los artistas jóvenes en Cuba.”
Atlantica, N. 13, (spring, 1996). In addition the report made for the editorial team of Universe in Universe, “6th
Biennial of Havana: Opinions, reviews, interviews” universe in universe, accessed from: Unverses-inuniverse.de/car/havanna/e_opin.htm that count with participation by: Coco Fusco. Jorge S. Helft Collector, curator,
President of the San Telmo Foundation; lives in Buenos Aires. Gerardo Mosquera Art historian, critic, curator; lives
in Havana. Luis Fernando Valencia Art critic, theorist; lives in Medellín. Zuleiva Vivas Curator, Director for Visual
Arts at CELARG; lives in Caracas. Lee Wen, “Bananas in Havana” in Happening!. Edward M. Gomez, “An Art
World Emerging into the Cuban Sun.” New York Times, online-version of LatinoLink. Allan Parachini and Barbara
Pepe, “Images of Memory.” A 27-minute Real Audio-Video documenting the Sixth Havana Biennial and related
Cuban cultural politics. Beate Cegielska, “Sexta Bienal de la Habana.” TAPETA, Poland. Among others.
494
Rachel Weiss, “The Orbit of the 7th Havana Biennial Planet Buenavista” Art Nexus, No. 39. (February, 2001), p.
51-58.
524
495
This exhibition worked as a tribute to architectural restoration of the past 40 years. It functioned as chronology
that emphasizes the historical moments in the restoration of Havana's cultural legacy. In addition, restoration work
in the historic and urban centers of the country's important cities was presented, for example in Santiago de Cuba,
Trinidad, Cienfuegos and Santa Clara. The exhibition was located at the Oficina del Historiador de la Ciudad.
496
Additionally, a series of academic events were organized by several institutions to be part of the larger spectrum
of the Biennale. Among others: UNAICC (Unión Nacional de Arquitectos e Ingenieros de la Construcción de Cuba)
- Biennial of the Visual Arts. November - December 2000. Fourth Ibero-American Conference of Woman Architects
and Engineers, October 18 - 20, 2000. International Symposium for Architecture and the Building and Construction
Industry at the Service of the Environment, November 15 - 17, 2000 (in Camagüey). UNEAC (Unión de Escritores y
Artistas de Cuba) - Havana 2000. Design, Culture and City. November 15 - 17, 2000. Facultad de Arquitectura de
La Habana - International Seminar for the Education of Architecture, September 2000. Dirección Provincial de
Planificación Física - Ibero-American Seminar for Urban Planning and Execution, November 6 - 9, 2000. All the
information taken from the press release and the Catalog produced by the Centro de Arte Contemporáneo Wifredo
Lam in August 2000.
497
Llanes has explained that personal and contextual issues made her leave the Lam Center and the Biennale. The
death of her husband during the previous year plus the impossibility of retaking control of the event in the midst of
new policies of cultural tourism, among others, seem the most plausible. It is important to mention how by the end
of the fifth Biennale she had sustained that if the Havana Biennale would become a market niche for Cuban and
contemporary Third World Art she would just cancelled it. As any event such as this, one person not constitutes the
event nor can one person (with exception of Castro in this case) decide on the faith of it. Nonetheless, her departure
had produced a would that is still open in the Biennale.
498
Nelson Herrera Ysla, Comunicación en tiempos difíciles: Uno más cerca del otro /Communication in Difficult
Times: One closer to each other Seventh Havana Biennale. Catalog. (Madrid: Art of the World Press, 2000)
499
Ibid. p.25.
500
Ibid. p. 26.
501
“the expenses for making and transporting the works that will be exhibited will be paid by the invited artists or
their sponsoring institutions after coordinating it with the Biennial production team, as a way to contribute to the
success of this event that has been able to keep up because of its importance and transcendence in addressing
significant problems of humankind and its contemporary culture.” From a press release published by the Wifredo
Lam Center in May, 2000.
502
Weiss continues, “Other problems, however, seemed simply the product of disorganization, incorrect site
mapping, missing or uninformative labels, less than rudimentary museology, works by the same artist scattered
across multiple sites, with no apparent logic and an uneven curatorial vision.” She underlines how these facts affect
badly the reputation of the event in a world of increasing professionalization among art agents, museographer,
curators, and the like. Ibid. Weiss, The Orbit, p. 51.
503
I was present at the moment of the interview which was conducted by Patt Binder for Universes in Universe:
Worlds of Art.
504
The magazines Atlantica International, Art Nexus, Polyester, and Third Text, among others became venues for
their writing pieces.
505
Herrera Ysla had always been interested in including not only contemporary art, but also visual production from
many realms (design, popular cultures, and architecture).
506
I was present at the Wifredo Lam Center when the MoMa visitors arrived. A contradictory behavior took the
people present at that moment. Joy for being recognized by that institution and at the same time suspicion because
the predicament of previous years was fulfilling, have the Biennale become a shopping mall for Third World Art?
Or, was just the platform for a newly global art market? What is true is the fact that during that edition major
transactions with Cuban art took place. MoMa bought its first group of works to add to its drawing collection,
managed at the time by Venezuelan curator Luis Perez Oramas.
507
Nico Israel, “VII Habana Bienal” Art Forum. Vol. 39, Issue 6 (February, 2001), p. 147.
508
Grady T. Turner, “Sweet Dreams. (seventh Havana Biennial exhibition, Cuba) Art in America Vol. 89, No. 10
(October, 2001), p. 72-76.
509
Ibid. 74.
510
Ibid. 74.
525
511
Tuner’s article makes short descriptions on several artists; from Cuba, Tania Bruguera, Esterio Segura, Carlos
Estevez, Abel Barroso, Galería DUPP, Los Carpinteros, and Raúl Cordero. Among the internationals, Mexicans
Gustavo Artigas, Julieta Lopez Aranda, and Rubén Gutierrez; from the Philippines, Alfredo Alquizan and María
Gaudinez working in group and Isidro Gomez Hildawa; Argentinean Leandro Erlich and Judi Werthein; and
members of the architectural firm 3-RW from Norway. Turner also comments on the work of Mexican-Canadian
Rafael Lozano-Hemmer and the video program curated by Euridice Arratia showing the work of American artist
Guy Richards Smit.
512
Ibid. Robinson.
513
Ibid. Robinson.
514
Other artists mention in Robinson report are: Esterio Segura schedule to show his sculptures at P.P.O.W, Carlos
Estevez, Galería DUPP, and Gabinete Ordo Amoris. The Israeli Eliezer Sonennschien is mention for his laud work,
giving away certificates for “being the best artists in the contest.” Bolivian Valia Carvalho is mention for
interrupting Havana city scapes with her own images dressing fancy cotles or using techo-gadgets. Africans Jane
Alexander and William Kentridge as well as Frech Annette Messager and British Susan Hiller are also mention.
515
“A large painting by José Bedia went for $19,2000, a Tomas Sánchez drawing sold for $10,2000, an early print
by Carlos Alfonzo was nabbed for $4,2000 – and the Museum of Modern Art apparently bought a suite of small
drawings by the young artist José Toirac (showing martyrs of the Revolution, done in red wine) for $9,500.” Ibid.
516
Walter Robinson, “Havana: Art capital” Artnet an on-line magazine on contemporary art. Accessed from:
<http://www.artnet.com/Magazine/reviews/robinson/robinson11-22-00.asp>
517
Dermis P. Leon, “Havana, Biennial, tourism: The spectacle of utopia” Art Journal, No.69 (December, 2001), p.
68-73.
518
“In addition, I was interested in seeing the first Biennial in many years not overseen by the Havana-based curator
Lillian Llanes Godoy, who had served as the event's artistic director since 1984.” Ibid. p. 69.
519
Ibid. p. 70.
520
“The novelty it has offered thus far is a ‘critical’ Cuban art that calls the concept of socialist utopia into question.
And of course Havana itself is an attraction, softly radiating the exoticism of an old city emerging from ruins.” Ibid.
p. 72.
521
The house was managed by Vicenta, an old Cuban lady that have lived there for more than 50 years. Cuban
curator Patricia Ruíz convinced the old lady to grant some rooms for Cuban artists to exhibit there. Angel Delgado
(artist who had been in prison for some of his works), Alberto Casado, and Ezequiel Suarez among others
participated. Penelope Richardson, “Varieties of Havana: The 7th Habana Bienal” Third Text, No. 55 (summer,
2001), p. 99-102.
522
Galería DUPP was comprised by René Francisco Rodríguez, Bebely Mojena, Yoan Capote, Iván Capote, Inti
Hernandez, Juan Reiveron, David Sariñas, Omar & Duvier, Ruslán Torres, Alexander Guerra, Mayimbe, Wifredo
Prieto, James Bonachea, and Glenda Leon.
523
Ibid. 100.
524
Richardson adds, “The voices individual in the Revolutionary City who receives no reprieve, even when he
sleeps and dreams.” Ibid. p. 100.
525
Ibid. 101.
526
Ibid. 102.
527
Gregory Sholette, “Affirmation of the Curatorial Class – Seventh Havana Biennial Art Exhibition” Afterimage,
Volume 28, No. 5 (March / April 2001), p. 7-10.
528
Ibid. 7.
529
Ibid. 7.
530
Ibid. 7.
531
Ibid. 8.
532
Valerie Cassel, “The Havana Biennale” NKA Journal or Contemporary African Art, No. 15 (Winter, 2001)
533
Ibid. 16.
534
Actually, Cassel calls the collective “Graphical” and not “Grafito” as they are named. Ibid. p. 17.
535
“According to Herrera Ysla, there were about 2,2000 foreign visitors this time, and according to rumor 1,500 of
them were from the US, mostly in groups organized by powerhouse museums like MoMA, LA MoCA and SF
MoMA.” Ibid. Weiss, The Orbit, p. 53.
536
Ibid. Weiss, The Orbit, p. 54.
526
537
In this case Santiago Sierra hired three people to lie hidden in coffin-like boxes on the roof terrace (of Sandra
Ramos gallery). “These were used as benches by the guests, who were not told that the boxes contained people...”
Weiss make reference to what Cubans do now in order to get some extra-money. What was impossible to think 15
years ago. Ibid. Weiss, The Orbit, p. 57.
538
Ibid. Weiss, The Orbit, p. 57.
539
She comments on Bruguera’s work and goes on attack the same symptoms of a regime that is tired of its own
discourse.
540
In particular a video by Ezequiel Rodriguez (Espacio Aglutinador co-founder and co-manager) at Vicenta’s
house and Sandra Ramos exhibition at Espacio Aglutinador that Weiss recognizes as one of the most important art
spaces in the Contemporary Cuban scene.
541
Weiss has always had an interest in the work of female artists, and in her report comments on the works of
Graciela Sacco (Argentina), Nelbia Romero (Uruguay), María Helena González (Cuba-USA), Teresa Margolles
(Mexico, participating out-side the Biennale), and the unavoidable Cuban performance artist Tania Bruguera. She
makes reference, also, to the work of Francis Alys (Mexico-Belgium), Willem Boshoff (South Africa), José A.
Restrepo (Colombia), and Nadin Ospina (Colombia).
542
In a parallel note, Art Nexus did not publish a report on the Biennale; it printed a note sent by the Lam Center that
works in official terms as a press release. Centro de Arte Contemporáneo Wilfredo Lam, “7th Havana Bienal”
ArtNexus No.36 (May, 2000). Another group of texts were published parallel to the Biennale by members of the
Wifredo Lam Center. Most of them did not talk about the Biennale, but about their own research on the areas of
exploration of the center. It is interesting to see how a construction of ‘other histories’ is trying to take place from
these texts. Since the scope of this work does not explore such issues in-depth it just mentions some of the articles
published. Among others: Hilda Mª Rodríguez Enríquez, “Los tigres, entre la modernidad, el slogan y la ficción”
Atlántica, N. 22, winer 1999; Hilda Mª Rodríguez Enríquez, “Del arte contemporáneo Indonesio”. Atlántica, N. 22,
winter 1999; Hilda Mª Rodríguez Enríquez, “La naturaleza, lo mítico-religioso y lo político en las orientaciones del
arte de las Filipinas.” Atlántica, N. 22, winter 1999; José Manuel Noceda, “El dilema de la contemporaneidad en el
arte del Caribe.” Atlántica, N. 22, winter 1999; José Manuel Noceda, “El arte del Caribe y la alegoría del Elegguá.”
Atlántica, N. 22, winter 1999; Wendy Navarro, “La mirada femenina en el arte cubano contemporáneo.” Atlántica,
N. 22, winter 1999; Gerardo Mosquera, “Aimée García.” Atlántica, N. 16, winter 1999; Clara Muñoz, Entrevista con
Nelson Herrera Ysla. Atlantica, N. 28. Invierno, 2001.
543
Adding to the original countries mentioned by George W. Bush during his “State of the Union Address” in early
2002, “The United States has added Cuba, Libya and Syria to the nations it claims are deliberately seeking to obtain
chemical or biological weapons. In a speech entitled ‘Beyond the Axis of Evil’, US Under Secretary of State, John
Bolton said that the three nations could be grouped with other so-called ‘rogue states’ - Iraq, Iran and North Korea in actively attempting to develop weapons of mass destruction.” Monday, March 6th, 2002. BBC News
544
Bonami conceived the international show of the 50th Venice Biennial as a complex of 10 exhibitions by different
curators. “Fault Lines: Contemporary African Art and Shifting Landscapes” curated by Gilane Tawardos, produced
by the Forum for African Arts; “Z.O.U. - Zone of Urgency” curated by Hou Hanru; “The Structure of Survival”
curated by Carlos Basualdo; “Contemporary Arab Representations” curated by Catherine David; “The Everyday
Altered” curated by Gabriel Orozco; “Utopia Station” curated by Molly Nesbit, Hans Ulrich Obrist and Rirkrit
Tiravanija; “Individual Systems” curated by Igor Zabel; “The Zone” (Young Italian artists) curated by Massimiliano
Gioni; “Italian Pavilion” curated by Francesco Bonami and Daniel Birnbaum; “Dreams and Conflicts” (Sogni e
Conflitti - La dittatura dello spettatore); “Clandestines;” and the “International exhibition,” 50th Venice Biennial
curated by the artistic director Francesco Bonami.
545
During late 2002 and early 2003, 75 members of the opposition were sentenced to long prison terms (up to 28
years) and 3 ferry hijackers were sentenced to execution in April that year. The European Union sent a
memorandum to the Cuban government in early June in which expressed itself as being “deeply worried” about the
violations of human rights and demanded the release of the political prisoners. As a response, Castro pronounced a
bitter speech in which condemed European historical colonialism, neo-colonialism, and exploitation and decided to
renounce to any humanitarian help that conditioned Cuba.
546
For more about the discussion see. Pat Binder and Gerhard Haumpt, “8th Habana Bienal. 2003.” Universe in
Universe. Accessed from: <http://www.universes-in-universe.de/car/habana/bien8/english.htm>
547
Christian Rattemeyer, “VIII Bienal de Habana: various venues” Art Forum Vol.42, Issue 6 (Feb, 2004), p. 146.
527
548
Dalila López, Rosa Juampere, Marylin Sampera, Angel Carlos Fernández, Lucie Chjampagnac were assistant
curators for this installment of the Biennale.
549
Ibid. Rattemeyer, p. 146.
550
Terry Smith & Miguel Rojas, “Iberoamericana: The 8th Bienal de la Habana, ‘El Arte con la Vida,’ Havana, Cuba
November 2003.” NKA, Issue 19 (2004), p. 64-69.
551
Ibid. 65.
552
Piccinini with a series of digital altered photographs were normalizes the presence of alien-like pets with
Australian middle class life. Nkanga’s installation connects real space and individual subjectivity, the hair of the
artists (present in a photo) is nail-through walls and halls and into buildings. Dago’s images of nude young Africans
covered in mud, comments on tradition, nature, and culture.
553
Ibid. 66.
554
Ibid. Rattemeyer, p. 47.
555
That is interesting that the Utopia Station’s major support has been granted by AFAA (Association Françoise
Action Artistique). Others supports: Asia-Europe Foundation (ASEF), IASPIS, British Council, Ministry of Culture
of Slovakia. The Utopia Station had begun in the Utopia Seminar at part of the graduate program in visual arts
(IUAV, University of Venice) and in Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York, It continued at the Theater am
Turm, Frankfurt, for the program Public Life.
556
Others such as “Mauricio Dias and Walter Riedweg's video Devotionalia, 1995-2003, documented a project for
which the artists worked with inner-city youths in Rio de Janeiro, producing plaster casts of hands and feet to learn
about creativity and regain a sense of self; and Mexican-born artist Pablo Helguera presented Instituto de la
Telenovela: Fase Habana (El Derecho de Nacer) (Soap Opera Institute: Havana Phase [The Right to Be Born]),
2003, a long-term research project about the impact of the telenovela on Latin American culture.” Ibid. Rattemeyer,
p. 47.
557
The Department of Public Interventions: Fidel E. Alvarez Causil, Analia Amaya Garcia, Douglas Arguelles Cruz,
Abel Barreto Olivera. Humberto Diaz Perez, Heidi Garcia Gonzalez, Tatiana Mesa Pajan, Maria Victoria Portelles
de la Nuez, Ruslan Torres Leyva, Jorge Wellesley-Bourke Marin; all Students of ISA at the time. Janis Demkiw and
Jenifer Papararo, “The 8th Havana Biennial: two perspectives on two collaborations.” C: International
Contemporary Art Magazine, No. 79-80 (winter, 2004). More about the project, participants and what happened
during the Biennale see: Ramón Cabrera Salort, “Un proyecto que creció al compartir” ArteAmerica (on line
magazine) accessed from: <http://www.arteamerica.cu/8/dossier/salort.htm>
558
Ibid. Rattemeyer, p. 47.
559
Ibid. Rattemeyer, p. 48.
560
Ibid. Rattemeyer, p. 48.
561
Prieto's second work titled, Avalanche, 2003, also functions as a minimalist formal exercise, though it's colorful
in its details. It consists of a single line of spheres that increase in diameter from the size of a pea to that of a yellow
Coco taxi (a three-wheel motor scooter commonly found on the streets of Havana).. “Professional and perfectly
versed in the vocabularies of global contemporary art, these young Cuban artists seem eager to participate in the
international art market. Castillo lives in the Netherlands, Leon is a critic in addition to being an artist, and Prieto's
flags have already sold to the Daros Latin America Collection in Switzerland.” Ibid. p. 49.
562
Julia Herzberg, “Bienal de la Habana.” Art Nexus, No. 52 (April, 2004), p. 88-92. Online version, accessed from:
<www.artnexus.com/servlet/NewsDetail?documentid=13523>
563
Ibid.
564
Ibid. Other texts also explore aspects of the Biennale, but were not published for it particularly. Among them,
Llilian Llanes, ‘Parque de Argentina.” Atlántica, N. 27, Fall 2000; Nelson Herrera Ysla, “Una cierta movida en
Latinoamérica” Atlántica, N. 27, Fall 2000 (which is going to become part of his book Coordenadas de Arte
Contemporáneo later in 2003); Magda González-Mora, Vivencias de incomunicación. Atlantica N.36, 2003. Isabel
Maria Perez communications assistant for the Lam Center also publish a note on the event titled, “Havana’s
Biennial: The persistence of the multitle” and published in Cubanow, April 11, 2006, a web-site that document
Cuba’s more important cultural events.
565
See Dannys Montes de Oca, Dayamick Cisneros, ed. Evento Teórico Forum Arte y Vida Havana: Centro Wifredo
Lam, 2003.
566
David Moss & Magda González-Mora, “Of Architectural Metaphors and Time Traps: Contemporary Cuban
Culture” Artpaper (September-October, 2006), p. 38-44.
528
567
My interview with Ibis Hernandez Abascal, Havana April, 2006.
Rachel Weiss, “Havana Biennial” Art Nexus No. 61 (Jun 2006). Online version, accesed from: <
http://www.artnexus.com/servlet/NewsDetail?documentid=16670>
569
Rachell Weiss, on the same issue, argues. “The Havana Biennial is a fully governmental operation. So it is only
appropriate that the best installation in the city that week was one authored by two governments, those of Cuba and
the U.S. Back in January, the staff of the U.S. Interests Section—which is the functional equivalent of an embassy in
the absence of diplomatic relations between the two nations—set up a gigantic LED display on the façade of its
headquarters and began transmitting propaganda in favor of U.S. “democracy” and against the Cuban “dictatorship.”
By the time the biennial opened in March, the Cuban government had installed a forest of black flags atop giant
flagpoles—it was said these were memorials to the Cuban heroes who have fallen “at the hands of American
terrorism against Cuba”— that almost totally obscured the streaming, red LED messages. Some artists claimed,
perhaps jokingly, that the idea came from artists, from Jenny Holzer for the Americans and from Wilfredo Prieto—
whose work in the last biennial was a baldly cynical stand of black, white, and grey flags titled Apolítico—for the
Cubans” Rachel Weiss, “Havana Biennial” Art Nexus No. 61 (Jun 2006). Some other people commented in the “war
on/with artists” making comments on how it looked a battle between Jenny Holzer Vs. Wilfredo Prieto.
570
I asked personally but he declined to comment about it.
571
Recently the debates have been centered in the return of modernism, the end of postmodernity, and the
impossibility of postcolonialism as new stage. The discussions around globalization, global art, and a universal art
history are in course. See: James Elkins, Is Art History Global? (Chicago-New York: Art Institute of Chicago Routledge, 2006).
572
Among the participants, Miguel Calderón, Arcángel Constantini, Minerva Cuevas, Iván Edeza, Helen Escobedo,
Thomas Glassford, Christian Jankowski, Anette Kuhn, César Martínez, Valeska Peschke, Betsabé Romero, Peter
Strauss, Frank Thiel, Diego Toledo, and coordinated by Edgardo Ganado Kim.
573
Since 1986, the work of Consuelo Castañeda and Humberto Castro (dressing as penises and spraying milk to the
passebyers) marked the beginning of a series of collectives acting in diverse spaces of the city. Grupo Art Calle,
Grupo Puré (with Lazaro Saavedra), Grupo Imán, Grupo Provisional (with Carlos Rodríguez and Glexis Novoa),
ABTV during the late 1980s and early 90s. And later other groups such as DUPP, Arte y Conducta, and Grupo de
Intervensiones Publicas. Some artists have been part of those for long time, among others René Francisco
Rodríguez, Tania Bruguera, and Lazaro Saavedra.
574
This gesture of generosity to an old woman with so few possibilities in life became somewhat paradoxical when
presented as an artwork, commented Weiss. On the other hand, Lázaro Saavedra had sent email announcements for
the project “Techo pa’ lo guajiro,” (roofs for the blacks) a proposal from a collective named Robin Hood, of recent
creation. It intented to help “campesino families in the Peralta batey and other zones of Jagüey who still remain
without roofs since Hurricane Wilma;” following, in a sense Francisco’s model the collective composed of young
artists and economists started an investigation to understand how resources are distributed, additionally, revealed the
artistic qualities of nylon (plastic) in the optic of the popular imagination peasants. No further information surfaced
during the biennial about the project. Ibid. Weiss, Havana Biennial, 2006.
575
The subtitle of the piece is “La vida es una pasarela” (Life is a Catwalk), making reference to the fashion industry
and the ephemeral of life in the streets of poor urban centers.
576
Ibid. Weiss, Havana Biennial, 2006.
577
Ibid. Weiss, Havana Biennial, 2006.
578
Ibid. Weiss, Havana Biennial, 2006.
579
David Moss & Magda González-Mora, “Of Architectural Metaphors and Time Traps: Contemporary Cuban
Culture” Artpaper (September-October, 2006), p. 40.
580
My parenthesis, Ibid. p.41.
581
In the article González tells the story of how they were able to visit Kcho’s house-studio (a consular house) in a
fancy area of Havana were he has assistance, service, friends, and a large space to display and work in his pieces.
Apparently Moss was captivated by the charm and straightforwardness of Kcho (who clearly plays with the system),
and most surprising by his recent work. Ibid. p. 42.
582
The project generated considerable discussion among artists, some of whom denounced it on various grounds in a
vituperative piece in the Miami El Nuevo Herald. But museum officials were well satisfied. Perhaps they were not
concerned with the work’s inspiring such a conflict between the fundamental refusal of the gesture and the unity and
enthusiasm of the seeming reunion. Ibid. Weiss, Havana Biennial, 2006.
568
529
583
Some of the participants along the years are, José Bedia, Gustavo Acosta, Carlos Garaicoa, Ibrahim Miranda, and
Lázaro Saavedra. Ibid. Moos & González, p. 44.
584
The exhibition drove hundreds of thousands of Habaneros to CENCREM, curious to see what a group of
‘figurative’ artists could do with the old refrigerators the Cuban government had banned them, because of energy
consumption. 2006 was the year of the “energy revolution” in Cuba, and fridges like those made in the 1950s were
part of the problem, they are now been replaced by Chinese high efficient ones. The exhibition was organized by
Cuban painters Mario Miguel González and Roberto Fabelo in 2005. The project was curated by Jorge Luis
Montesinos and now is touring Europe, France (in the Grand Palais museum in Paris), later on Madrid, Milan, Los
Angeles, New York, to end in Seoul in 2009.
585
Carey Lovelace, who is based in New York, is co-president of the U.S. Chapter of the International Association
of Art Critics. Carey Lovelace, “Art Amid the Rubble” Artnet accessed from:
http://www.artnet.com/magazineus/features/lovelace/lovelace4-12-06.asp
586
Ibid.
587
Ximena Narea, “Presentation;” Margarita Sánchez Prieto, “Concerning the Ninth Havana Biennal;” Interview to
Rubén del Valle Lantarón by Andrés D. Abreu, “Rethinking the Biennal;” José Manuel Noceda, “Notes about the
city, nomadism and culturality;” Dannys Montes de Oca Moreda, “From Forum Idea;” Ximena Narea, “Nordic
presence at the Bienal;” Ibis Hernández, “On resources and methods;”Nelson Herrera, “The largest gallery of the
world;” Ximena Narea, “The refrigerator in the dynamic of the urban culture.” Heterogénesis – Tdiskrift for visuell
konst (Visual arts magazine - Sweden), No. 55-56 (Oct. 2006).
588
Noam Chomsky called it “fruta madura” (ripe fruit) and comments on the large history of intervention by the
United States for control over the Island. Noam Chomsky and Heinz Dieterich, América Latina: de la colonización a
la globalización. (Barcelona: Catedra, 2003).
589
My interview with Luis Camnitzer, January, 2008.
590
Comprised of a constellation of five platforms, realized on four continents over the span of eighteen months
between March 2001 and September 2002, Documenta11 extends in substantive, spatial and temporal terms beyond
the traditional 100 days format of past documenta exhibitions. The first four platforms were devised as committed,
discursive, public interventions, and enacted within distinct communities around themes conceived to probe the
contemporary problematics and possibilities of art, politics, and society. Creating a network of partners,
collaborators, and interlocutors, many institutions and foundations were instrumental in realizing, together with
Documenta11, the platforms. The first platform, Democracy Unrealized took place in Vienna, Austria, from March
15 to April 20, 2001 in Vienna. It continued from October 9 to October 30, 2001, in Berlin, Germany. Platform2,
Experiments with Truth: Transitional Justice and The Processes of Truth and Reconciliation, took place in New
Delhi, India, from May 7 to May 21, 2001, and consisted of five days of public panel discussions, lectures, and
debates and a video program that included over 30 documentaries and fiction films. The third platform, Créolité and
Creolization, was held on the West Indian island of St. Lucia in the Caribbean between January 12 and January 16,
2002. Platform4, held in Lagos from March 15 to March 21, 2002, Under Siege: Four African Cities, Freetown,
Johannesburg, Kinshasa, Lagos, engaged the current state of affairs of fast-growing African urban centers in a public
symposium, along with a workshop, “Urban Processes in Africa,” organized in collaboration with CODESRIA.
Over the course of one year, more than 80 international participants across many disciplines—philosophers, writers,
artists, architects, political activists, lawyers, scholars, and other cultural practitioners—contributed to the evolving,
dynamic public sphere that spelled out Documenta11’s attempt to formulate a critical model that joins
heterogeneous cultural and artistic circuits of present global context. Fragments from the Documenta11 on-limne
archives, accesed from: <http://www.documenta12.de/archiv/d11/data/english/index.html>
591
His friendship with other young curators (and many intellectuals and artists) such as Hou Hanru, Ute Meta Bauer,
Sarat Maharaj, and scholars such as Sudanesse Sahla Hassan, and Autralian Terry Smith among others have also
informed Enwezor’s world-wide view on the art and culture of today’s global world.
592
Making reference to the intertextual juxtaposition of aesthetic approximations such in the case of Isa Genzken’s
Berlin new buildings series and Isek Kingelez’ Ville Fantome series whose utopian structures idolize the occidental
ideal of architectural modernity. “Both artists constructed visions of the future for two cities whose structural
integrity was rudely dislocated by the cold war. The fates of these cities, however, could not be further apart: Berlin
survived its cold-war partition and is rapidly reclaiming its former status as a center of European cultural and
political power. Kingelez pursues a utopia of what Kinshasa might have been from within the rubble of the failed
530
state of Zaire.” Ogbechie, Sylvester Okwunodu, “Ordering the universe: Documenta 11 and the apotheosis of the
occidental gaze.” Art Journal, Vol. No. (March, 2005), p. xx.
593
The author suggests that being literal might become a new dogma, as oppressive as being abstract or modern was
in the formalist aesthetics of high modernism. Massimiliano Gioni, “Documenta 11, The Platforms Report: Finding
the Center” Flash Art No. 225 (July-September 2002), p. 106-07.
594
Rasheed Araeen, “In the Heart of the Black Box,” Art Monthly 259 (September 2002), p. 17.
595
Ibid. Camnitzer interview
596
Luis Camnitzer was appointed educational coordinator for the 2007 Porto Alegre Biennial in Brazil. His writings,
conferences, and studies navigate the inner circles of the art world and the networks of art production, circulation,
and consumption. Ibid.
597
It will take place during March and April 2009. The curatorial team consists of Margarita González, Nelson
Herrera Ysla, José Manuel Noceda, Ibis Hernández Abascal, Margarita Sánchez Prieto, José Fernández Portal, and
Dannys Montes de Oca Moreda.
598
Two of the most progressive officials, former Vice President Carlos Lage and ex-Foreign Minister Felipe Perez
Roque were among a dozen officials who left their posts March 2, 2009. Later on the government called the two
relevant Politians to declare and apologized to the Cuban people for ‘supposedly bad behavior’ during their tenure in
their post. Fidel Castro, himself, also commented on their public declaration calling the “best thing for the country”,
as well as praised other members of the government, old revolutionary comrades, ‘replaced’, saying that they were
stepping out voluntariously after many years of service to the Revolution. The incident reminded the Soviet
practices of silencing the inner circle critics during the Stalinist era.
599
This is the translation of Yoani Sanchez declaration: “Cuba is an island surrounded by sea and is also an island
surrounded by censorship. Some of the information control, and especially with the Internet, have opened up some
cracks for bloggers. The alternative blogosphere is known to a good part of the Cuban population. We accentuate the
awakening of public opinion. The authorities consider the technology to be a wild horse that has to be tamed. The
independent bloggers want to run freely. Difficulties in disseminating our sites are many. Passed from hand to hand
and thanks to flash memory drives, CDs and obsolete diskettes, the content of the blogs goes through the island. The
Internet is becoming a public square of discussion where the Cubans are writing their opinions. The real island is
starting to be a virtual island, one that is more democratic and more pluralistic. Unfortunately these winds of free
expression on the internet are being recognized by government officials. Let us not wait for the authorization to use
the internet or to have a blog or to write an opinion. It is time to jump the wall of control.”
600
In the crowd gather a familiar figure, Gerardo Mosquera in company of Rachel Weiss, was trying to make sense
of the event. Unfortunatelly the sound system did not allow the audience to hear what was happening, after a couple
of hours the sound technitian say “that is it!” and the show ended... Simultaneously, two performances one by
Wilfredo Prieto in Plaza de la Revolución titled “”Una Luz a lo Lejos” (a Ligh on the Distance) and another by
popular artist Manuel Mendive (ina carnival fashion that gather the most popular audience) was taking place in the
National Theater .
601
In an open forum with the organizers and curators I asked about the understanding of the term “globalization” for
a Biennale that call for its resistance. They presented the biennale in tuned with Appadurai’s scholarly approach to
globalization as a set of “scapes”, they wanted the biennale to become a place to show the “global landscape” and
not the space of resistance to the force integration, which would be more relevant for an event produced from one of
the last Socialist nations on the planet. The other question I made was on the administrative dimension, the budget
for such a display of resources and the participation of agencies such as the Spanish Agency of Cooperation (among
other Spanish institutions). The organizers did not answer the question and after some discussion they released the
amount of money the Ministry of Culture gave to the Biennale, $164,2000 CUC. In private conversation with the
curators a sum closed to $300,2000 Euros was discussed in terms of production expenses for the exhibitions. They
praised the participation of new “friends” of the Biennale which gave money and supplied support for the event.
Among them: the Brownstone Foundation, Euro Business Market, EBM Solutions (a Cuban phantom company),
Logística de arte, University of Valencia, and Loop Circus.
531
Miguel L Rojas-Sotelo