Its privileged location has made the area the perfect destination for circuit tourism, a modality in which Cuba is expanding, thanks to the variety of heritage cities throughout the country that can be visited.

Since its founding in 1514 as the Villa de la Santísima Trinidad, the region was an important center of the island’s sugar industry. Its plantations, mills, towers, boilers, mansions, and other constructions related to the sugar cane economy dotted the area, to become cultural and historical attractions today.

A JOINT EFFORT

This past year, according to Reiner Rendón Fernández, Ministry of Tourism (Mintur) representative in the province of Sancti Spíritus, 641,000 tourists visited the region, making for 1.85 million tourist-days considering both the state and private sectors together.

(Granma)

Crafts, as we know them, are an elemental and meaningful human art form, which have transcended from the merely manual to a more complex and artistic plane.

Utilitarian objects, for daily and domestic use, have been subject to increasing stylization. As such, the majority of objects for sale at FIART 2016 are more elaborate pieces.

This creative process, with the manual dexterity required for elaboration, and the real attention to detail, can hardly be produced on an industrial scale. This is probably the main attraction of these handicrafts, with their own intrinsic meaning, offering the privilege of obtaining a one-of-a-kind piece.

Besides being an excellent opportunity to appreciate perhaps the most representative of these crafts, FIART has become a space for the promotion and commercialization of these works.

At the Pabexpo fairgrounds in western Havana and under the motto “Art, Utility and Functionality”, visitors discovered different types of pieces, this year spread across almost 500 stands, including some 250 Cuban artisans, and 80 foreign guest exhibitors from 18 countries (for the first time from Portugal and Haiti, as well as the already familiar Argentina, China, Korea, Colombia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Indonesia, Mexico, Panama, Ecuador, Italy, Canada, Venezuela, Spain , India and Peru), together with those classified as institutional — including the FCBC, Galería Génesis, Coral Negro — all located in Exposition Hall D.

Mercy Correa, FCBC director of crafts, told this publication that increasingly quality pieces are demanded, which perhaps explains a decline in the number of national and foreign exhibitors, “and this will continue because it is a question of hosting a Fair that is an expression of the very best of our crafts and those of other countries.”

The variety of proposals, however, allowed us to observe the different techniques used to shape and work common materials such as wood, clay, metals, leather, stone, paper, plant fibers, and textiles.

FIART 2016 (December 6-18) focused on textiles as an art form, with 50 stands in Pabexpo’s Exposition Hall B. The province of Cienfuegos (located in the central south region of the island about 250 kilometers from Havana) stood out among exhibitors, as a region that is renowned for this craft.

The historic center of Cienfuegos was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2005. As such, the general design of this year’s Fair centered on the architectural traditions of this city recreating, for example, the bandstand of its central park and its singular Arch of Triumph.

The extended Exposition Hall C was again a space for furniture, this time with a smaller sample to make room for ceramics and jewelry, while Hall A was mainly dedicated to footwear.

FIART continues to be an essential space for the development of Cuban crafts and their encounter with international styles and, as its organizers have commented, increasing care is taken to present the true essences of this art form, in order to rightfully call it popular art.

(Granma)

The province of Matanzas and ceramics will be the main attractions of the fair, as a way of awarding the discipline well-deserved recognition within the field of art, and at the same time, ensuring its presence in our daily lives.

On this occasion Fiart 2015 has 62 international stands, 33 institutional representatives from across the entire country and 254 artisans with representatives from almost all Latin American nations, including Peru, Panama, Colombia and Ecuador – with the largest number of participants – and others such as Spain, India, China and Romania. The customary stands of record label Egrem, la Casa del Abanico, Artex, Génesis, and the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry (ICAIC), etc, will once again be present in this edition.

Almost all Latin American countries will be represented at Fiart-2015, among them Peru, Panama, Colombia and Ecuador. Photo: Anabel Díaz
In addition to the usual exposition and sale of handicrafts, exhibitions of bonsai trees and ceramic works, this year visitors will also find a tribute to Alejandro Alonso, director of the Museum of Ceramic Art, an award ceremony for winners of the national ceramic art competition, and the Gramos exhibit, by artist Raúl Valladares in the recently restored Víctor Manuel Gallery in the Plaza de la Catedral.

However, there will also be spaces for reflection and debate. Under the title, Ceramic Art: the useful and the aesthetic, a series of theoretical events will be held December 8-11 during Fiart.

Kicking off the series will be a conference entitled “Impact of ceramic art on the development of visual arts in Matanzas,” by expert Helga Montalván. Also taking place will be book presentations and conferences dedicated to ceramics, museums and the development and evolution of this art form around the country.

During the fair, organized annually by the Cuban Cultural Goods Fund with the support of the Ministry of Culture, Cuban and foreign exhibitors come together in an important exchange on craft techniques, quality, abilities and the excellent offers which always attract a large and diverse public to Pabexpo.

(Granma)