The artist considers himself an observant man. In fact, a painter starts from how he sees his reality and then projects it on paper. “I have many ways to work. Sometimes I start by staining the canvas in white ─which everyone is afraid of. Other times, I draw what I want to do in a sketch and go live, or I mix the two ways of working”.

His mind is full of ideas and from there he selects the topics that interest him. The creative process that he follows is as simple, or as complex, as seeing the reflection of a dog drinking water and taking that image to a painting, or photographing snapshots with his phone that catch his attention and then have them as materials to work with. “I am always with my eyes open, attentive to what surrounds me and to the provocations of the morphology, the forms and the suggestions that the landscape gives you”.

***
How do you react when all eyes are on you?

“I’m scared of it. If I’m at a conference I get nervous because I imagine what the audience thinks of the nonsense I’m saying. My method is to focus on a person and think that I am having a conversation with them.”

And when nobody looks at it? What is Nelson Dominguez like?

“I am a happy man. Calm. I smoke a cigar while I think about my work or girlfriends”.

-How do other people define it?

“That answer can only be given by someone else.”

-How do you define yourself?

“I like puns and talking to people. I abhor closed and bitter faces. There are times when people get bitter for no reason and are predisposed with life and happiness. Bad character is one of the reasons why a man can last less.

***

-Master, why art?

“By chance. When we are children we are encouraged by many things. He studied at the Camilo Cienfuegos School City, in El Caney de las Mercedes in the Bartolomé Masó municipality of Granma. They invited me to a workshop where they stood up and recorded things. He was about 12 or 13 years old. My friends and I got excited and became the painters of the school, the first after January 1, 1959. I am student 126 of the Revolution”.

-How do you remember your childhood?

“Family life outside the city is simple: work in the fields, eat, sleep and the next day the same routine. As a child I was always very observant. I can now mentally walk, piece by piece, my father’s estate. They are memories that remain in your imaginary archive and that feed you without realizing it.

“I was born on a farm between Los Negros and Matías, in Baire, Santiago de Cuba. My mind is deeply rooted in those places where I traveled through my childhood and adolescence. Once, when I was fourteen years old, I went with my father and he told me: ‘look, you were born on that little piece of land’. I have a project called Rural Galleries, I did an exhibition in the Escambray and the other I will do in that place, on my grandparents’ farm.

“I cannot deny that growing up in that place has influenced my way of conceiving art. In the first moment of my work there is a lot of relationship with the field. The departure was always that, and from time to time a peasant appears in some canvas”.

***
-What does Cuba mean?

“The fundamental reason for being Cuban is the attachment to the land where you were born. That of your parents, your brothers. All that is Cuba. There are many countries where you can live, but always, I don’t know why, you long for this land. I have never thought of settling outside this country, under any circumstances. Being a foreigner hurts a lot.

-What is the decision or project you have taken that you feel most proud of?

“I have many projects: Gallery Hospitals, Rural Galleries, Skinny Pocket. I take them little by little and along the way I involve many people. I’m always up to something. I would say the saying: ‘when I am not in prison they are looking for me’”.

-What is the biggest mistake you have made?

“Falling too much and, above all, without being reciprocated. The best thing is that there is reciprocity, and that is valid for many things in life. I overreach. Sometimes I have no brakes with passions and that has affected me a lot. I advance like this, making mistakes”.

Nelson Domínguez says that the Camilo Cienfuegos School City was a kind of “laboratory” for Fidel to later found the schools in the countryside. “At the beginning of the Revolution, an internationalist brigade from various parts of Latin America came to Cuba. There was a Chilean, an art and trade graduate, who taught us many things about ceramics in the circle of interest workshops, such as preparing a cloth.”

The artist remembers that in that center there was a director, Isidoro Gómez Palacios, who was his tutor and saw something in him. “I had forty options to continue my studies and it was that teacher who told me to forget about all the other possibilities because I was going to take the tests to enter the National School of Art.”

He took the exam and with a lot of work he passed. The first three years were very difficult for Nelson Domínguez, to the point of almost dropping out of school due to poor performance. “He had no training as a painter unlike a group of students who were graduates of art schools and provincial schools. I worked hard and improved in the second year. In the third and fourth I matched up. In the fifth year, together with Pedro Pablo Oliva and Flora Fong, we were the first records of the group”.

After graduating from the ENA, the outstanding Cuban painter Antonia Eiriz chooses him to be her assistant to her. “That has been the greatest of my joys. During that year I learned a lot, teachings that I still use”.

***
What would you like to do that you’re not doing right now?

“Hear a concert that I like. An operates. Music attracts me a lot. I was going to study it but I left it because of the solfeggio. He was bad with numbers. Once I asked Leo Brouwer why I never understood that subject and he told me that music is pure mathematics”.

-What is your biggest flaw?

“Trust. My family says that I think everyone is good, but in the end that is not a defect. The mistake would be to believe that people are bad. All people have their truths.”

-And virtue?

“Falling in love with beautiful things, believing in people and their good intentions. I also highly value altruism and solidarity.”

***

-What did his time at the National School of Art mean?

“It was the school that placed me. Also, at a certain age you see art differently. Later I was a professor at that center and together with Luis Miguel Valdés, we made all the study plans of the University of the Arts”.

-And the magisterium?

“I stand in front of a student and start from those times in which I was taught and how important the load of responsibility that a teacher has with a student was for me, although I became aware of it in its full dimension when I practiced teaching .

“I was a professor at the ENA with a teaching system based on the Renaissance where the student chose his professor in some way. I had about 12 students. He worked that day alone with a student. He was teaching her today and I didn’t see him again for 15 days. He went to the national library and brought him boxes of books related to his line of creation of him. Once Arturo Montoto said that he painted as Nelson Domínguez had taught him. I felt proud.”

-What are his characteristics of him as a plastic artist?

“I always take a lot of risks. I am not afraid, nor do I settle for success. Even if a painting has a very nice part and I realize that another part is wrong and that is why it has to be removed, I do it. I work from doubt. I am always doubting myself and my work. That has done me good.”

-Is there any point in common in his works of him?

“Although the themes are different, in the work of a painter there are always points in common. For example, Picasso had seven or eight themes and then he took them down different paths. I think that artists don’t have so many topics to deal with, but it has to do with sensitivity. For example, everyday life is something that really catches my attention.”

***
-What do you prefer to do in your free time?

“I really like gardening, but I’m more passionate about cooking. My detractors say that I am a better cook than a painter. I also write, but for myself. Abel Prieto affirms that I should take literature seriously, but the jealousy I have for the visual arts prevents me from doing so. I can betray everything except painting.”

-What has been your biggest dream?

“Having a nice big house in the country. I recently bought a farm by Nicho de Cienfuegos and I am dreaming of that project. I think that at the end of my life I will live in the country.”

-Any secret that you have not shared in a previous interview?

“Life is full of secrets and they have to be kept secret to be secrets.”

Nelson Domínguez Cedeño defends the thesis that the paintings are not famous or become important because of the topics they deal with, but because of how they are made and the intention that their creator wanted to give them. If you ask about his work, he says that he does not keep track of the exhibitions he has done. “Perhaps we have to tell what I have not yet achieved.”

One of his favorite shows was “Self-Portrait”, when he won the National Prize for Plastic Arts. “I had the right to do it in Fine Arts, but since I had exhibited twice in that place, I decided that it would be in the Pabellón Cuba. Later Lázaro Expósito took the exhibition to Santiago de Cuba, from there to Baracoa and ended up touring the entire country, except for the Isle of Youth”.

Precisely, he feels fulfilled as a plastic artist when he gets his works to be seen by as many people as possible. “‘My friend Alicia’ is an exhibition that has given me many pleasures. Now I will take it to Mayabeque, then to Matanzas, Pinar del Río and it will end on the Island. I like that my creations travel throughout Cuba.”

If you ask him what he prefers between painting, sculpture, engraving or ceramics, he assures that the emotion of each medium is what is important. “I try to respect the parameters of the procedures.”

***
-What are you scared of?

“To the dentist or to get sick, although I know that the day he dies it will be from a bump. Sometimes I fear losing myself in the desire to have money. I feel like a rich man, although I don’t know if he really is, because material possessions are not what make people rich. True fortune is having a little of what you need. No accumulation.

“For example, I really like antique furniture and I’m not an antique dealer. If I see one that I like, I invent how to find money to buy it. That is one of my passions. Look—smile—I just told you a secret.”

-If a new person came into his life, what can he do to get to know him better?

“Speak”.

-If everything disappeared and you could rescue only one thing, what would it be?

“I would be selfish and rescue the most loved one at that moment. At Armageddon it makes no sense to save brushes or paintings.

-If you could start from scratch, what would you change?

“The furniture of my house”.

***

-How is Cuban identity manifested in the work of Nelson Domínguez?

“That Cuban identity is a cliché, just like folklore. To the extent that one reflects the environment ─in black or white, lines or stripes ─ the Cubanness is present. From the moment I am Cuban and I paint in Cuba. It is not the subject that says that, but the final results. I never look for those things. If it appears or is seen by the critics who are the ones who pay attention to those details, then fine.

“I paint for myself and transmit with the brush or my hands what I have inside. Of course, I do many topics related to culture, religious syncretism or others with a load of magic that are a vox populi of society”.

-What are the main paradigms of him within the plastic arts?

“I have admiration for the Cuban school of painting. That work with very strong popular and social roots: Carlos Enríquez, Eduardo Abela, Jorge Arche, Amelia Peláez, Mariano Rodríguez, Martínez Pedro, Mirta Serra, Wilfredo Lam.

“In my works there is always something of them because I have studied them and I don’t believe in the supposed originality. The origin of art is art itself. You always have to know who came before you to see what you’re going to do.”

-And your favorite aesthetic trend?

“I’m not interested in currents. You have to be careful not to fall into isms. They are limits for a painter and there are many who are slaves to the fame they have achieved and do not leave a single method. So, you fall in love with your work and that is another serious mistake for an artist”.

***
-If you make a panorama of his life, are you satisfied?

“Nope. Satisfaction is something that man never gets to know because the trajectory of a person is so short that he does not have much time to analyze what he has done. Someone said that the trees prevent seeing the forest and that happens a lot to human beings”.

-What advice would you give to the version of him from 20 years ago?

“That I paint more, although deep down I feel satisfied with what I have achieved. Each person has their own limits, but I think there are still more surprises to come in my career as an artist.”

-What are his principles and sacred values?

“Loyalty, and not so much that of a couple but towards another human being. Friendship. Sometimes I have two cigars and I take one to an old man who lives up there because I know he will never have the chance to smoke a cigar of that quality. When you share what he has, he feels happier”.

What is it that you would die for?

“I would do it defending my country and that is not a slogan, but a reality. Saving another person. I think I might as well die of laughter.”

The renowned artist does not believe that there is a before and after in his career: “A before is now that I am alive and an after when I am not. I keep going. What I do do sometimes is go back so as not to leave without doing things that interest me. There was a time when my painting went a lot towards the figurative, so I revised and took things up again. Now I am in a period in which I reconcile with the procedures, techniques and ways of doing things that I have used before. Basically what I intend to do is a painting without much complexity. Sometimes the simple is the most difficult because it requires conclusions. The elementary is made of complex things.”

For Nelson Domínguez, learning to paint is the greatest success he has ever had in his life. “Work with joy. Know all the techniques. Perhaps success is going down the street and people recognize you and greet you, but that is social success”.

Along these same lines, he says that the awards depend on a jury. “They are not symbols of stability for anyone. It is a vision of a group of people about your work”.

When he paints, engraves, draws or molds a piece, he feels that he has no way to go. “You start a work and you don’t know how it can end. It is also a pleasure to see a finished painting that you like. But also, you see problems that you cannot solve.”

Nelson Domínguez firmly believes that art is his way of breathing, of living, of thinking, of loving. A communication media. “Sometimes I’m a little selfish and I put my work above everything else, because I think that’s the only way to get where you want to go. I also haggle a lot, for example, I want to learn computers and I don’t do it because I think about the time I won’t dedicate to painting. Is incredible”.

This job has removed the bad habit of wasting time and has given him the pleasure of doing what he wants and loving what he wants through his work or that of other artists.

***
Have you ever thought about taking a gap year?

“Nope. I can’t stand a day off. I am very attached to my work. It’s a beautiful disease.”

-If you could choose one way to die or one you don’t want to, what would they be?

“Drowning is horrible. I would very much like that necessary death to come when I am making love.”

-How would you like to be remembered when you are gone?

“Like a happy person. A deluded man who thought that he was going to live longer than he was given”.

-A word that defines your life…

“Doubt”.

-What do you think is his greatest legacy to Cuban culture?

“First you have to be aware of whether you have achieved a legacy or not. I work to leave things for others. For Cuba. That is my satisfaction.”

(By: Thalia Fuentes Puebla/Cubadebate)

News of his death arrived like a bolt of lightning that strikes without warning, reported the Ministry of Culture, while echoing the words of praise spread by the painter and critic Manuel López Oliva.

Death does not respect root makers either, it has just taken away one of the Cuban artists who knew how to fulfill -with poetry and generational roots- the human and expressive mission that life assigned him, affirmed López Oliva.

Likewise, the creator highlighted Moreira’s fidelity “to the Nation, his nobility of spirit, his values ​​as a draftsman and painter, the paternal and family substance exercised, and the weight of a diverse imaginary.”

In this sense, his prolific work stands out, which “went from his somewhat naturalistic notes of the visions elaborated on the Isle of Youth, to a poetic one that combined his work on billboards with a very professional one,” López Oliva highlighted.

Highlights of his career include his work as an illustrator of editions of the text Don Quixote de la Mancha, his participation in the murals of the Hotel Habana Libre and the building where the Prensa Latina agency was founded, the portraits of heroes and friends, as well as his erotic art. .

Professor of drawing at the San Alejandro Professional School of Plastic Arts, Moreira registered twenty personal exhibitions and dozens of collective exhibitions in his career, while his pieces remain in prestigious collections in Cuba and the world.

He conceived ornamental and symbolic compositions for fountains and urban spaces, “and also made his house – along with his wife, also a painter Alicia Leal – a friendly space for communication,” said López Oliva.

Deserving of the Distinction for National Culture, it is time to say goodbye, but not before thanking his legacy, the one that extolled Cuban culture from the visual arts and was imprinted on his disciples.

(With information from Prensa Latina)

Por: Yurina Piñeiro Jiménez, Ismael Francisco

Ayer algunos decidieron homenajear al Comandante abrazando la ciudad de Matanzas. Kcho con su arte, Gerardo con su tropa en el barrio, Popi con sus valientes de escafandra en el lugar del siniestro…

“El mejor lugar para estar un 13 de agosto, -por la demostración de unidad, solidaridad y otros principios que nos enseñó Fidel- precisamente era Matanzas y por eso estamos aquí”, dijo ayer Kcho en el Taller de Lolo donde junto a obras de artistas contemporáneos dedicadas al Comandante estaban unos dibujos que realizaron los niños para honrar a los bomberos que participaron en la extinción del incendio en la Base de Supertanqueros.

Un día después de extinguido el fuego, en la Atenas de Cuba la tranquilidad de saber que ya no peligran vidas humanas unido al calor hogareño, les alivia un poco las quemaduras a muchos de los héroes de casco rojo o amarillo y les permite traer a la luz a otros titanes anónimos.

Ayer cuando Dilan escuchaba el reconocimiento del miembro del Consejo de Estado y coordinador de los Comités de Defensa de la Revolución, Gerardo Hernández Nordelo, hacia él y los otros rescatistas vecinos del consejo popular Peñas Altas, el joven aclaró quién era el verdadero superhéroe de su grupo.

“Yo quisiera que también se homenajeara a un hombre que no es rescatista ni bombero, pero de no ser por él que nos esperó a todos y se mantuvo allí a pesar del peligro cuando aquel tanque explotó, hoy ninguno de nosotros estaríamos aquí. Es él, el chofer de la guagua”.

No solo se compartió la gloria, sino también el sentir por los compañeros ausentes, aquellos que perecieron en el intento de apagar el volcán de llamas en los almacenes de combustible o los que no pudieron sobrevivir a las marcas del fuego en sus cuerpos.

Un minuto de silencio, unos rostros contrictos, las palabras de una mujer entrecortadas por la emoción; esa fue la manera de acompañar a los familiares allí presentes de algunos de los desaparecidos.

Although a rifle or dagger can save us from death at the hands of an enemy, another weapon, born of, “manufactured” and enjoyed by the spirit, has saved us from a greater evil, that of an empty soul. To leave behind the most primitive aspects of existence and elevate human life, the poet said, culture must be touched with our hands, an incomparable treasure without which we are not complete.

The man who proposed, following José Martí’s ideas to make a Revolution, and change the direction of Cuba understood this reality very well, intent upon transforming the perverse and offensive path the country was on before the victory of 1959. Among so much to be changed, there was one imperative, no less a priority than the others: to illuminate the inner world of those who did not matter to anyone. This is why, among the first beacons of the Revolution, from one end of the island to the other, was the effort to teach an entire people to read and write. That is why books were placed before the newly “opened” eyes.

The books, the schools, education, the campaigns for the 6th and 9th grades, the blessings for those who were winning battles, the reality of so many, who never before had the slightest possibility of studying, became renowned academics, among many other examples, all provide evidence to validate the phrase, never repeated in vain, about the light of learning – the expeditious route to culture – which the Revolution offered to those who, in any other circumstances, would never have seen it, nor been able to enjoy human realization.

In the difficult context of covert warfare, Cuba was obliged to define the direction of our cultural policy. For its leader, aware of the dangers that were looming over the country, culture was the definitive line of defense. For three days, Fidel, with the attitude of a sage, listened to the concerns of writers and artists, and only after this essential communicative effort, did he pronounce his unforgettable “Words to Intellectuals,” today collected in a document to which we must return every time we forget its essence, or wish to better understand the Revolution’s perspective in matters of culture, from its very beginnings.

Touching on a variety of dissimilar questions – which, given the nature of the occasion, were an invitation to think collectively – with expressions that were expanded with sustained interaction based on mutual trust; through the strength of his arguments; through laughter and spontaneous applause, “Words to Intellectuals” was nothing less than a long dialogue, a model of what would be followed again and again within existing cultural institutions and those that would be created by the Revolution.

The roots and sum of this policy, Fidel’s “Words…” were an invitation to contribute, to do for others, to break down the ignorance and the doors closed to the dispossessed: “How are you going to participate in this process? What do you have to contribute to this process,” Fidel asked. And with this he invited artists and intellectuals to construct new realities in Cuba’s emotional and affective “zone.” It was imperative to develop readers, spectators, audiences – a goal that, since then, has been and continues to be a priority for the Revolution.

Inherited from Fidel and our most outstanding intellectuals, this practice is a permanent focus that promotes the continuous improvement of our institutions. This was evident during the Ninth Congress of the Union of Cuban Writers and Artists (Uneac) – an example of democracy in action when it was held after long months of discussion at the grassroots level – when Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel reaffirmed that our cultural institutions exist because of and for creators and not the other way around, and encouraged, in his repeatedly applauded speech, that Uneac be more proactive at the grassroots level, and investigate what missions each institution is meant to address based on who they represent and what areas of discussion they should lead.

He referred to the miraculous country we have become, tangible in the natural way we attend a ballet or dance performance, a music event, a play, a book or art fair, a gallery exposition, a rumba jam session or an art school, and he rightly thanked our founders for such a marvel, who were followed later by Fidel, an intellectual himself, insisting in the most difficult years of the Special Period that culture was the first to be saved, knowing that it was fundamental.

Last March, Díaz-Canel attended the Ministry of Culture’s accountability review, and called on the broad group of participants to wage a battle emphasizing the content of our culture, our history and our values “with intelligence, honesty and courage,” in the war of ideas to which we are constantly subjected. The President insisted that among the fundamental challenges of the Ministry is to make greater progress in responding to concerns raised and proposals made at the Uneac Congress, and recalled the monthly government follow-up meetings held to regularly review fundamental aspects of cultural policy.

Today, after the country has lived months accomplishing unimaginable feats, facing an international panorama racked by a virus that causes pain and death, and besieged as never before by the murderous hostility of Yankee imperialism, which includes inciting a social explosion on the island and promoting unscrupulous individuals as leaders, the President reminds us again why, with what purpose, our culture is being attacked.

“In Cuba, Culture and Revolution have been equivalent since the very origin of our nationality. It is enough to recall that October 20 when Perucho Figueredo wrote the words to the Bayamo anthem on the flank of the horse which he rode into battle alongside Céspedes. Attacking culture, fracturing Cuban culture, is attacking the heart of the Cuban Revolution, attacking our national identity.”

The President speaks, and the people, who have experienced the extraordinary generosity of their Revolution, follow him. Cuba knows how to resist in the most frightening circumstances, and why its history has been told, sung, painted and dramatized in the work of our artists. We know that imperial punishment is as old as our challenges, and that to tire is to give up not only the body, but also the spirituality we have achieved. If Cuba is alive, if it is more alive than ever, it is because of the privilege of having the emotional scaffolding that we owe to our culture.

(Taken from Granma)

But it was practically impossible for a Cuban artist to continue his career in Miami without paying political tribute to the anti-Fidel current dominant in the city – actually anti-Cuban.

Then came the times of the cultural exchange and later diplomatic relations with the Obama administration, and there was a moment of hospitality in Miami for artists who lived on the island. Competition between media programs and channels, more concerned about the ratings that featuring these artists could garner, kept hosts and programmers on good behavior for a while, welcoming on their sets every musician, comedian or actor living in Cuba who visited Miami.

The television industry that had multiplied its profits with a counter-revolutionary editorial line found itself limited, at that specific moment, to harassing artists arriving from the island at airports and asking hostile questions. Their customary commercial product, hatred toward everything Cuban, was no longer as lucrative.

The relief felt, after the traumatizing effect on families of George W. Bush’s aggressive policy, with restrictions on travel and remittances, was noticeable in an environment in which thousands of Cubans living in Florida were investing in the new possibilities opened up by self-employment in Cuba. At that time, for the anti-Cuban right in the Miami media, things were going in a different direction.

As the second decade of the 2000′s progresses, the rise of social media means that television formats, which had benefited from the use of Youtube, are beginning to lose ground to the growing volume of content produced directly for this platform. The circulation of excerpts of talk shows is beginning to be surpassed by the production of programs broadcast via streaming and viewed by a growing number of subscribers to digital channels.

Today, in 2020, the political media industry in Miami is much better positioned on the Internet, moving away from the traditional press and TV – without abandoning them completely – building its presence on Youtube, with new faces, along with a series of aggressive web pages. Unlike television, these programs made for streaming and online viewing, assume even greater impact with the option of commenting and sharing, which social networks offer their audiences.

For artists residing in Cuba, the anti-Cuban media’s positioning means increasing attempts to poison relations between the Cuban community in the United States and their country, as well as efforts to end performances in the city of Miami, along with any economic benefits, which had become possible during the era of cultural exchange.

While the political ambiguity of a group of artists generates largely indifference in Cuba, that right-wing in Miami, with its resurgent hatred, is not willing to forgive anyone: You join the anti-Cuban discourse or you don’t come to Miami. But the new media and social networks go farther, seeking to extend their persecution to those who, in Cuba, defend their right to a political opinion of their own. With the threat of media lynchings, they attempt to silence and intimidate artists who might speak out against the blockade or in defense of any value the Revolution has bequeathed to them.

In an interview with Russia Today, singer-songwriter Amaury Pérez commented, referring to political expressions by artists on social media: “There are people who should be defending some things I have defended. They are scared to death. Because you need to have a tough hide to put up with the things that are said about you.”

Every day, we are witness to how the digital machine dedicated to the media war against Cuba positions any statement by an artist that is politically useful to them – as if it were an event of great public interest – casting them as “opinion leaders” by multiplying their personal comments on Facebook,

In many cases, the low number of likes and comments an artist may receive, when posting their work on their own, is dramatically increased with a publication of this nature.

For several of these artists, the instantaneous, but ephemeral “celebrity” this positioning gives them, which must be constantly reactivated, becomes a kind of publicity. On the one hand, it feeds their ego, and on the other, gives them artificial recognition that few have achieved as a result of their work, while allowing them to keep their promotional profile active.

This mechanism has even attracted individuals well positioned in commercial music, who seemingly would not need to attack the country where they learned their art and has recognized them. When they join the media chorus against Cuba, more than anything else, what they generate is shame.

There are also more than a few individuals who seek acceptance and attempt to maintain sympathetic ties with the Miami art market, which is not willing to include artists who presume to develop a career naively removed from politics.

As a consequence of a poem singer-songwriter Ray Fernández posted on Facebook, in which he condemned acts of vandalism against busts of Martí committed earlier this year – which others seemed afraid to denounce – he was obliged to face a pack of wolves on the web, attacking him with insults of all kinds. Today, in this difficult year for Cuba and the world, it is worth remembering the words with which the cultured musician responded: “Let no one doubt that these are defining times.”

(Source: Granma)

The prize has been awarded since 1994 to “a living Cuban visual artist, resident in the country, whose production is distinguished by its valuable contribution to the development and history of visual arts in Cuba.” Also taken into consideration are important works and recognition of the artist nationally and internationally.

Pedro de Oraá (1931) studied painting and sculpture at the San Alejandro Academy in 1952, joining the group known as The Eleven in 1956, and was among the Ten Concrete Painters, 1958-1961.

Outstanding among his principal personal expositions have been those presented at the Pequeño Espacio Gallery; the National Visual Arts Council; the Raúl Martínez; the Cuban Book Institute; the Fayad Jamís Art and Literature Center in Havana; the Fine Arts Center in Caguas, Puerto Rico; and La Grande Arche de la Défense in Paris.

His abstract works are included in the collections of important institutions including Cuba’s National Fine Arts Museum; Chopo University in Mexico City; the Godwin-Ternbach Museum of Queen’s College in New York; the Museum of Finest Cuban Arts, Vienna; New York’s Museum of Modern Art (MOMA); The Pompidou Center in France; and the Ludwig Museum in Germany.

He participated in the 5th Sao Pablo Biennial at the end of the 1950s, and most recently in a collective project entitled Zona Franca, a parallel exposition during the last Havana Biennial.

(Granma)