Cuban Art & Living

Walk Tall, Cuba

by

Marjorie Pravden

Cuba, oh Cuba.  Pearl of the Caribbean, Sibling in the Sea. 
You are at a crossroads, on the brink of either monumental or cataclysmic change in your land.  And you must walk tall.

Walk tall, Cuba.  You are proud.  You, too, are American.  From South to Central to North America, we are all of the Americas.  You know this, deeply.

In the weeks and months at hand, stride forward with head, high, but, consider lessons learned from your long history and our times together. 

You are strong and you are resilient.  But keep your eye on me. 

Remember, I have waltzed in and out of your life, at will, when it suited me, when there was something to gain … then I left you at the ball.

Walk Tall, Cuba.  I fear for you.  It is your nature to trust, but remember, barely three weeks before the end of what you call ”the Cuban-Spanish War,” I intervened.  When I arrived, your brave warriors had been fighting for three years, and were winning.  I took your victory away from you.  I took the glory.  I “remember the Maine,” but … remember, in the end, it was Spain and I who went to Paris to sign the peace treaty.  You were not even invited to the party.

Walk Tall, Cuba.  I weep for you.  Stand with me, not behind me.  For five long centuries, you have been dominated by powerful giants. You’ve danced with the Crown, the Bear and the Eagle.  And, regardless of what is thought about your leaders, the last fifty years represent the first time in five hundred years that you have governed yourself.  Even I, through the tenures of ten of our presidents, could not change your leadership.

Walk Tall, Cuba.  You are eager, especially regarding the “blockade” as you call it.  But, be cautious.  Look beyond my words.  This time, I am well-meaning … but I do have agendas.   Remember at the end of the Spanish-American War, in the Platt Agreement?  I vowed to “ensure your independence, to protect you from all foreign invaders.”   But, I needed Guantanamo Bay to do that.

Walk Tall, Cuba.  I ache for you.  The support you have gained is world-wide.  But, beware the seduction of too much capitalism.  Do not allow me to exploit your noble people, your exquisite land.  Not with my money.  Not with my influence.  Because you’ve been reintroduced to capitalism slowly over recent years, you might escape the perils that Russia and Eastern Europe experienced.  Go slowly.  Don’t  let  me  eat  you  up.

Walk Tall, oh Cuba, you indomitable, passionate, and politically-conscious men and women, who are more like us than we are different.  You, with your southern joy of living and northern work ethic.  Your entrepreneurial spirit is alive, and your laugh is not lost.  Here on the brink of extraordinary change, the world can be yours.

Cuba, oh Cuba, oh Cuba.   Pearl of the Caribbean, my Sibling in the Sea.  Your drums are on the wind.  Stand Tall.  Stand  Tall.  This is the hour, the here and now, your opportunity to fly beyond the leagues of the horizon and deeper than the depths of your rich seas, to forge a new beginning with me, your brother in history, your sister in time, across the Florida  Straits.

 
ANNOUNCING …

Cuba! Gallery of Fine Art is now featured in the July issue of SPACES, a slick Space Coast style and design magazine .  The article, “Artistic Pearls of the Caribbean” is nine pages of beautiful photos of Cuban contemporary art as it hangs in The Gallery and in the homes of art aficianodos; written by Maria Sonnenbert and photographed by Brian Abrahamson.  We are grateful to the magazine and Editor, Karen Huffman for this generous exposure.  To read the article, go to the abbreviated online version at www.spacesonline.com/edition/July2008/article2.shtml.

Dr. Victor Bruno a professor at the University of Havana was here on university business a few years ago, visiting my dear friend, Dr. Marcelo Alonso, when it was decided to have a party.  I volunteered to make the mojitos (móe-hee-toes) but Dr. Bruno would not have it as he was, he said, always the mojito maker at departmental functions at the university. 
 
This is his delicious recipe…the way Cubans in the birthplace of the mojito, drink them.  And the way we drink them at Cuba! Gallery of Fine Art Openings.  No soda water, bitters or other fancy ingredient.  Just a good lemonade with mint and rum.

1/3 cup white sugar
3/4 cup lemon juice
3 cups plain water
Rum
Fresh mint

Pop a Rubén Gonzalez CD into the Bose.  For a batch, mix sugar, water and lemon juice.  Pour glass half full of the mixture.   Bruise the stem of a mint sprig, not the leaves, against the side of the glass with a spoon to release the oils into the liquid.  Drop in the sprig.  Dance over to the refrigerator.  Add ice to trap the mint at the bottom.  Add rum and stir.  Salud!
 

Eduardo and Orlando’s mother, Nena, insists I come for dinner at the Garcia’s, every time I’m in town. 

Hugs and Kisses, then knee to knee in the tiny, tidy living room on the 2nd floor of a Havana walkup.  News is shared that makes friends feel like family.  Orlando got a passport, father Paco lost 25 pounds, Eddy and Yuliett are getting married in November.  Small gifts from Florida are presented.

In time, Nena moves on to the kitchen, the twins and I squeeze into their room and sit on the bunkbed next to the computer.  Orlando brings out their newest works.  I purchase a dozen sepia photographs and note a stunning painting on the wall, Eddy’s first significant work in oil.  Two artist friends drop in and the talk is young and lively.

At dinner the talk is of changes in the  Cuban “system,” the Castros, the Bushes, ironies, inequities, hopes and dreams.  We are all the same, we agree.  It is the governments that are different.

After dinner,  Eddy gives me a gift from his unjaded heart - the painting on his wall.  And when it’s time to leave, every eye glistens, and hopefully, we talk of change.  For now, only one of us is fortunate enough to cross the Gulf Stream both ways, but the friendship we have is a sturdy bridge across those waters of time and space.

Hooray! Our new “Art Photos” page is up on the website for your enjoyment and collection.  http://www.cubagalleryflorida.com/cuban-art-photos

Angeles de la Habana is a 20-image series which recreates the magic of the architecture, the streets, the people and the angels of Havana.  Conceived and executed by twin brothers, Eduardo and Orlando Garcia using a combination of both traditional and digital photography, the series has won acclaim inside Cuba and a prestigious art award in Bolivia.  

Don’t prejudge the digital element of these photos before you have a look at them.  They are hauntingly beautiful.  The twins invite you to “see what you will” in the images.  But they also describe what they had in mind in their creation, such as, “It is wonderful that a comfort during the difficulties of life can be the memory of a loving person”  and “Sometimes we feel loneliness: moving around in the world without touching it.” 

We are convinced that Eddy and Landy have “old souls.  

My interpreter, José tells lots of stories about life in Cuba, sometimes moving to the edge of laughter and tears at the same time.  Last week, pointing out a cannabalised trash can, he said, ”Ask anybody in Havana who takes their garbage to the curb about the enterprising spirit, here.” 

It seems the sturdy metal wheels of the country’s large plastic trash cans had been going missing, one and two at a time.  After a little while, they starting reappearing on all manner of things like toys, tricycles and delivery carts.  The system was silent about this.  After all, everybody knows the economy would collapse if the black market suddenly disappeared.

But when the wheels started showing up in schools around the country, the government got involved.  Many of the small trucks that transport school lunches from the central kitchens often a mile or two away, are breaking down and staying down.  Into the vacuum appears sturdy handcarts sporting “the” wheels.

Read the rest of this entry »

Bulletin:  This is to let everyone know we’ll be going to Cienfuegos and Havana this Friday, May 23, and will return with new works of unique and beautiful original art on May 31.  We’ll try to have them photographed and up on the website by June 15th.

Getting ready for a buying trip to Cuba always necessitates a day of shopping here at home.  When Cuban friends know I’m coming, they place orders for things that are cheaper in the US.  

So today, I’m off to Walmart, Office Depot and Toys R Us.  Raquel, who runs the casa particular (private home) that I stay at, wants a “stretchy” pantsuit, my interpreter needs a computer battery pack, his friend’s nephew, a robot toy.  But the most fun is shopping for gifts for the artists, fat tubes of much needed titanium white oil and acrylic paint, wrapped with a colorful ribbon, and presented after all the business is done and it’s time to leave.

Understand, this is a very selfish thing I do.  I just love the gesture when the artist smiles and raises the gift with both hands to the sky, then down to his lips, and kisses it loudly.  So Cuban!

Watch the website - June 15th!

I’ve just finished reading “Cuba, A New History,” and would like to recommend it to anyone who knows little or nada about the country and wants to better understand it.  

British author, Richard Gott has been traveling to Cuba and digging into the archives of Havana and Madrid for decades to write this epic.   The specter of 328 pages of unusually small type is at first daunting, but then the scholarly writing and the fascinating story win over.

After moving from the days of settlement, slaughter and slavery to Spanish brutality, wars of independence, and a Republic of masacres and dictatorships, Goff then dedicates more than half the book to Castro’s Revolution. 

In the end, Gott plays with the question on all of our minds, “What will happen when the Castro era is over?” He says if you look at the long running themes of bloodshed, you could justifiably assume there will be blood in the streets.  However, he says that, and I paraphrase, the last 49 years has been the Cuban people’s longest continual era of relative peace in 500 years.  And that, he speculates, is what could make all the difference.

“Fernando, there seems to be an overall, underlying sadness in the people.  How about you?  Would you say you are generally happy?   The waiter has been receptive to my probing in the past and he didn’t disappoint. 

His reply was a question of his own.  “Are you happy?”

Not ready for it, I had to think about it. “I have moments of happiness.”

“We have moments of happiness too.  My children and I do not live in fear.”

“You mean fear of the system?”

“No, I mean we can walk in the darkest streets alone.  My children are safe in school.  There are no guns.  And there is opportunity here.  We must find that opportunity however we can.  We must take it.”

I recently met a Miami doctor in the restaurant of Havana’s old José Martí airport.  Since we were the only two people in the room, we lunched together, and he shared his medical experience in Cuba.

“I’m not Cuban.  I’m American and I am 75 years old.  I’ve been coming to Cuba twice a month for seven years to do  arthroscopic knee surgery. We don’t do knee replacements here because the Cuban doctors can’t do the follow-up.  They are excellent at working in developing countries because their abilities are like that of 40 years ago… thorough, knowledgeable and caring .  But they don’t have the technology and don’t know what to do with the medicine that surrounds it.

“Anyway,  I just go in, do my work, and I do not discuss politics, U.S. medicine or anything.  I just do my job.

“I use to do this in the hospital in Havana, but the foreign student doctors would gravitate to me to learn. It was I who should have been listening to the Cubans.  So now, I work at a hospital in Pinar del Rio, where there are not all those foreign student doctors around.  I think I wore out my welcome in Havana.