ART OnCuba 03

It is a universal constant for members of a generation to look into the past to find answers and paths to follow. It is usual to admire a person we only know through books, or to be fascinated by a social movement that took place some time ago, that a historic event intrigues us or, simply, that a given period seems magicalto us, precisely the moment in which we should have been young. The there andthen… instead of the here and now.

And it is a reality that finding the protagonists of those times that move usenriches us intellectually, changes our point of view, shows us new paths. Theway in which the past may glide into the present, or rather the way in which twouniverses, two ways of saying and doing, converge, may be disturbing.

Also, following the course of our own times, we leave things behind which,little by little, blur and almost always are worthwhile to reactivate, to live anew.At times it is urgent to reconnect.

Art OnCuba is marked by these intergenerational meetings and temporarydisplacements. Back and forward. Let us begin by saying that, as a team, weexperience them all the time, for our own good. And let’s continue with themany opportunities created, through work, to revive old friendships andcreate new connections with those protagonists of the history which oncemarked us so deeply in the classrooms, which we only knew through writtenwords. Anecdotes begin to take increasingly realistic shape, memories becomeincreasingly vivid.

This edition suggests a timely trip through various significant moments andtimes of public art by Cuban artists, since the irruption of national authorsin public sculpture, during the times of the historical avant-garde, to the roleof events and producers of present projects. It was a real pleasure to have thesupport of Aldo Menendez in this undertaking, especially with his text onthe reinterpretation by an important number of creators in the eighties of thevery concept of public art, taking it to positive extremes marked by creativity,rupture and social activism. It is also worthwhile to highlight the interviewWilfredo Prieto granted to Direlia Lazo, a very relevant way to know in depth theprojects this artist has carried out away from the premises of galleries, or havinginner and outer spaces enter into a dialogue.

Some exhibitions called our attention, among them Alexis Esquivel’sMemorial Garden, curated by Suset Sanchez for the Centro Atlantico de Arte Moderno in Las Palmas, Grand Canaria; An Empire State of Mind, in Lehman College, New York, which moves away from the stereotypes in a Cuban art show; and the indispensable Agustín Cárdenas. Las formas del silencio (The Forms of Silence) which marked the reunion of the Cuban audience with the oeuvre bythis sculptor, who received the National Plastic Arts Award in 1995.

Two creators from different generations lead this edition of the magazine: Roberto Fabelo, with a new and surprising series of drawings on pages of an anatomy volume, and José Bedia, with comments on his work experience inrecent years.

A concise panorama of the ups and downs of the international market inwhat has to do with Cuban and Latin American art, and the profile of exhibitionspaces in Havana and New York, complete the contents.

This has been, in brief, an intense intergenerational displacement… withsuggestive results. It is worthwhile to frequently travel in the time machine.