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Finally, out of box! 
(Photo by Matthew Barney)
Big things are happening between the art scenes of Cuba and USA! It’s called “Chelsea visits Havana” presented by Fundacion Amistad. It was organized by Alberto Magnan and Dara Metz (of Magnan Projects). This is the first U.S. based exhibition to travel directly from the United States to Cuba in decades.
(Photo by Nan Goldin. Nan one month after being battered, 1984)
As part of the 10th Havana Biennial Chelsea visits Havana offers the Cuban art community and general public a window into the current art scene in New York. The exhibition is part of Fundacion Amistad’s cultural diplomacy initiative, Bridges to Culture. The exhibits began late March but it will run through May 17, 2009. A sign of the changing times, Chelsea visits Havana is also the first major group show to be accepted by both countries and approved for exhibition in the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, Cuba’s renowned national arts museum.
It has been over twenty (20) years that a large-scale show of this kind featuring U.S. artists has been mounted, and fifty (50) years since artworks have been directly shipped from the United States to Cuba. Ten of the exhibiting artists will travel to Havana for the historic event. All of the featured artists are represented by galleries in the New York City neighborhood of Chelsea, regarded as one of the international epicenters of contemporary art.
(Painting by Will Cotton, “Chocolate Bath” 83″ by 83″ oil/linen 2002)
Chelsea visits Havana is an historic opportunity for Fundacion Amistad and its Bridges to Culture initiative which uses the power of art to surmount the cultural, political and social boundaries between the United States and Cuba. This concept even supersedes the U.S. government trade embargo, which classifies Art as a cultural asset explains Luly Duke, President and Founder of Fundacion Amistad.
(Painting by Delia Brown. “Homework”, 2008)
Participating artists and galleries include:
Marina Abramovic (Sean Kelly),
Alejandro Almanza Pereda (Magnan Projects),
Assume Vivid Astro Focus (John Connelly Presents),
Radcliffe Bailey (Jack Shainman),
Matthew Barney (Barbara Gladstone Gallery),
Matthew Benedict (Alexander and Bonin),
Guy Ben-Ner (Postmasters),
Long-Bin Chen (Frederieke Taylor),
Delia Brown (D’Amelio Terras),
Edward Burtynsky (Charles Cowles Gallery),
Will Cotton (Mary Boone Gallery),
Jules de Balincourt (Zach Feuer),
Christoph Draeger (Freight + Volume),
Walton Ford (Paul Kasmin Gallery),
Nan Goldin (Matthew Marks Gallery),
Dinh Q. Lê (PPOW),
Loretta Lux (Yossi Milo),
Nicky Nodjoumi (Priska C. Juschka Fine Art),
Tony Oursler (Lehmann Maupin Gallery),
Trevor Paglen (Bellwether Gallery),
Jack Pierson (Cheim & Read),
Matthew Ritchie and James Case Leal (Andrea Rosen),
Duke Riley (Magnan Projects),
Tim Rollins and K.O.S. (Lehmann Maupin),
Jonathan Schipper (Pierogi 2000),
Andrew Schoultz (Morgan Lehman),
Devorah Sperber (Caren Golden),
Brian Tolle (CRG),
Jade Townsend (Priska C. Juschka Fine Art),
Carlos Vega (Jack Shainman Gallery),
Michael Waugh (Schroeder Romero)
Doug Young (Roebling Hall).
A full-color, dual language catalogue of Chelsea visits Havana will accompany the exhibition and is available for purchase through Fundacion Amistad. Fundacion Amistad is a New York City based 501 (c) (3) not-for-profit organization that has worked to improve mutual respect and understanding between the U.S. and Cuba for over 11 years through their cultural initiative projects and humanitarian aid programs.
The “Chelsea Visits Havana” images are available upon request.
Contact Info:
In New York: Dara Metz. Ph: 212.244.2344 / info@magnanprojects.com
In Havana: Alberto Magnan Ph: 011.535.278.0939
(The images above are not necessarily exact pieces in the show)
For more homework, go to: Fundacion Amistad.
Here’s to fostering cross-cultural ties through visual means…. We hope this can be one of the first communicators between both countries.
J
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Yet another beautiful book has been released on Cuba. You know how much I can’t stand to see those generic Cuban images coming out of the country with 1950’s pastel cars and ladies with cigars in her mouths. Obviously these images exist in Cuba, its just that I like it when photographers dig deeper, and see the country with unique eyes.
Case in point: “Camp Adentro” (deep within the country), a photo narrative by Philadelphia-area photographer Susan S. Banks. She studied with Mary Ellen Mark in Oaxaca, Mexico. Mary taught Susan the value of developing a photo essay.
When I see these images, it brings me back to that place of my favorite Cuban music — the 1930’s era of music created in these exact areas — “guajiro” music as they call. It’s a combo of folk, country, blues, and straight-up peasant music — very SOULFUL. Guajiro is like Cuban country music, guitar driven, and Spanish as much as its Afro.
Susan stumbled upon this family in Pinar Del Rio. They are a group of tobacco farmers who have never been photographed before. Even more so, this family grows all their own food, gets by without electricity, and has no needs for telephones, much less own one. It’s a world that is part country, part gypsy, but all about family, neighbors, animals, valley, and tobacco. This is as raw as raw can get.
The photos are as strong as a good poem. Susan shoots in 35mm, handheld Leica M6 and natural light.
The book is available now.
J
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(Raul Got Word of Trash Talking Behind His Back)
The saga of the “Raulistas” vs the “Fidelistas” lingers on. Remember the axing of 2 top Fidel Castro officials a few weeks ago? (read Big Change in Cuba).
Up until now, mystery has surrounded the sudden cabinet changes. For a split second, my optimistic brain had entertained the idea that this shift was a move towards positive change? Seems like it was just an old fashioned bust where the “Fidelista’s” were disrespecting Raul, so it was time to clean house… naturally.
Only time will tell what type of government Raul will truly construct. According to Charlie Rose’s episode tonight, the black caucus under Obama just recently visited Cuba and met with Raul. There was lots of talk about how Raul respects Obama and that he wants to meet the American President. I’ll report these talks as they occur.
But back to our original story — what sparked Raul to fire (pictured above) Perez-Roque and Lage?
(Conrado Hernández, right, Director of the Official Office for the Basque Government in Havana with Juan Jose Ibarretxe on a 2002 visit to Cuba)
Let’s begin with a Cuban named Conrado Hernández who has big fabulous parties on his property in Matanzas. Conrado served as the islands liaison between the Cuban government and business interests in the Basque region of Spain. Conrado used to invite both Perez-Roque and Lage over to the ranch. One of the times Conrado taped their conversations, some shit-talking was recorded.
On top of making “vulgar jokes” about Fidel Castro’s age and health, they made fun of Raul’s incompetence. The other guy sitting in the taped talks was Fernando Remírez de Estenoz, the head of the Cuban Communist Party’s Foreign Relations Department. The guys even dissed on Raul’s new vice president, José Ramón Machado Ventura.
(Conrado Hernández recorded Raul-dissing talks with Cuban officials during parties at his ranch in Matanzas.)
Nobody really knows why exactly the Cuban government decided to raid Conrado’s home, but the point is, they found the recordings. They also found an unauthorized diplomatic passport. According to Cuban officials, the bogus passport was given to him by Mr. Roque. The confiscated tapes were allegedly being slipped to Spain’s Intelligence Officials (the Spanish Embassy in Cuba extremely denies this).
The rest is what transpired:
• February 14th — Conrado was arrested when he was at the Havana airport. He’s been held for over a month.
• March 2 — Raul Castro announces the whole story to his office. It was a room of both “Raulistas” and “Fidelistas” and a time of reckoning between the 2 camps. According to the New York Times, after Mr. Pérez Roque got canned, there was a dramatic standing ovation (presumably from the “Fidelistas”) in the lobby when he left the building for the final time.
• March 6 — Raul calls a meeting with his top 20 Officials. Raul describes (in broad strokes) the details of the situation… and actually played parts of the tapes for those in the room, thereby consolidating the “Raulistas” into a tighter team.
In Cuba, the word “traitor”, “loyalty”, and “betrayal” are used more often than in a Sicilian mob movie. For this particular battle, it was a win for the “Raulistas” considering they had evidence in hand.
Like sands through the hourglass, these are the days of our lives.
J
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Cuban writer Yoani writes from the island about her 3rd time application to travel outside her country. Below are frustrated words of the eloquent blogger who has no hopes to leave the island and see the world. Here’s hoping Yoani gets her chance one day!
This time they’ve been more direct: “You are not authorized to travel,” the woman told me quietly, almost nicely, dressed in her olive-green. My attempt to get permission to leave ended without much delay and with the same negative response. I demanded an explanation from the officer, but she was only a wall of contention between my demands and her hidden bosses.
While they were telling me “no,” I recalled the declarations made by Miguel Barnet* a couple of months ago. The president of the Writers and Artists Union of Cuba (UNEAC) affirmed that all Cubans can travel, except those who have a debt to the justice system. I spent the day looking for some legal reason hanging over me, but nothing came to mind. Even the rice cooker that I bought on credit at the ration store I paid for in full, even though it only worked for two months before completely breaking down.
I have never been charged in court yet I am condemned not to leave this Island. This restriction has not been dictated by a judge, nor could I have appealed it to jury, rather it comes from the great prosecutor—with full rights—in which he’s set himself up as the Cuban State. That severe magistrate determined that the old woman sitting next to me in the office at 17th and K would not receive the ‘white card’ because her son ‘deserted’ from a medical mission. The boy who waited in the corner couldn’t travel either, because his athlete father plays now under another flag. The list of the punished is so long and the reasons so varied, that we could establish a huge group of forced islander “stay-at-homes.” It’s too bad that the vast majority are silent, in the hopes that one day they’ll be allowed to leave, as one who receives compensation for good behavior.
One of the first places of pilgrimage for those who don’t get the exit permit should be the office of the naive president of UNEAC. Maybe he can explain to us the crime for which we’ve been condemned.
To augment the papers in my collection of negatives, here is the latest document received from SIE (Immigration and Emigration Section). I am also posting my visas (above), to record the fact that my problems are not about entering another country, only about leaving mine.
– Yoani
———-
It’s such a shame that so many educated Cuban youth, with all their enormous potential, are forbidden to travel outside their own country. Just to add to the layers of misinformation about Cuba’s Travel laws, another privileged Cuban citizen (with travel rights) misspoke at a press signing. Miguel Barnet is considered one of the Cuban writers most published abroad — and is President of the Artists and Writers Union of Cuba (UNEAC). This week, he criticized those who believe his countrymen cannot freely leave the island as he, who has traveled widely, does and says the only ones who can’t travel are those in prison. “People believe that we Cubans can’t travel and I’ve been to more than 47 countries,” Barnet said during a meeting with the press in a bookstore in Panama City. “Cubans are traveling,” he stressed, “the only ones who don’t travel are those in prison,” affirmed Barnet.
Ask most people in Cuba if it’s easy to travel, and they’ll roll their eyes and laugh back squirmishly. Instead of just telling their people they can’t travel, the government instead insists that you need to fill out applications, swim through gallons of red tape, pay high application fees (unrefundable if you get declined), and of course the government delivers millions of declines. In short, unless the government approves your exit, you can’t leave the country. Period. The rest is semantics.
J
