Painting

Painting is the most true expression of fine arts on the island. A varied cultural blend of African, European, and North American visual design, it reflects the cultural variety of Cuba.

The first signs of creative expression came from aboriginal cave paintings. Unfortunately, when these communities vanished, the paintings discontinued. The Spanish conquest brought a religious form of painting, one connected to catholic liturgy. The colonial period saw foreign graphic artists and illustrators migrating to the island to depict the landscapes, customs, and memorable places in their artwork. National painting began to take spirit during the mid 19th century. Taste and the appreciation of painting developed in Cuba as the intellectual environment of the island was introduced to new influences. Commercialization of Cuban art was not set in motion until the 20th century. The artists of this period were dedicated to originality, while embracing the heritage of their island.

Today, Cuban artists are plentiful and flourishing in a mixture of past and future, all the while preserving the characteristics of Cuban individuality.

 

One of Cuba’s supreme exemplar of naïf painting (a naive, simplistic, childlike style), Ruperto Jay Matamoros, passed away in Havana, 2007, just one month  before his 96th birthday. The National Plastic Arts laurate and National Visual Arts prize winner in 2000 was buried in his home town of San Luis, in eastern Santiago de Cuba.

Matamoros started creating on canvas at an early age with expressions of what he saw in the local landscape, the flora and fauna, and the people that lived in the countryside. However, it wasn’t until later in life when he finished his duties as a driver, plumber, gardener, messenger, and interior decorator, did his artistic talent truly blossom.

Among the shows that propelled him to fame were the exhibition of watercolors and sculptures shown at the Ministry of Justice and the prize he achieved at the National Museum of Fine Arts in 1964, the personal exhibition of his works at the Havana Gallery in 1965, and the successful emergence of his paintings at the 2nd Triennial of Naif Art in Bratislava and the Grenoble Biennial (France) in 1969.

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Cuban art is attracting the world and coming into its own. This tiny island has in times gone by coped with cultural influences from around the globe, and its artists have expressed these struggles through passionate artwork. But because of the embargo, the art market has been at a crossroads and on the fringe of world culture. Now, with a growing hope and anticipation for political and social changes (due to the new presidents of Cuba and the United States), the well-trained artists of Cuba are coming into the planet’s spotlight.

Luminous Shadows: The Artists of Eastern Cuba is a documentary focusing on the art and artists living and creating in Cuba’s easternmost provinces of Oriente. The artists of this culturally rich region share their heritage, concerns for social and environmental issues, the beauty of their homeland through studio visits and interviews in city & countryside settings. This inspiring and passionate DVD was produced by Clyde & Brigid Hensley of Arte de Cuba.

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The Grolier Club of New York, a society of bibliophiles (lovers of books), has fostered interest in the book arts for over 100 years through exhibitions, publications, lectures, and the formation of a research Library devoted to the arts of the book. On the 50th anniversary of the Cuban Revolution, and in conjunction with Cuban Artists' Books and Prints, an exhibition is scheduled from May 20-August 1, where experts will be discussing the imaginative resourcefulness of Cuban cultural survival. Some of those speaking include Holly Block (executive director of the Bronx Museum), Tonel (Antonio Eligio Fernández, Cuban artist and leading art critic), Carlos Estévez (Cuban artist), Cristina García (author of Dreaming in Cuban), and Ben Rodriguez-Cubeñas (president of The Rockefeller Brother Fund and founder of the Cuban Artists Fund). Among the topics discussed will be art bookmaking and community projects in Cuba, Cuban art in the context of Caribbean and Latin American art, and the struggles & guiding principles of working artists in Cuba. The organizer of the exhibition, Linda Howe (a Wake Forest University professor), will describe her experience working with the bookmaking collective Vigia Press, as well as celebrated Cuban artists represented in the United States and throughout the world.

 

Music

Music is undeniably the most influential aspect of the personality of the Cuban people than all other expressions of art. It defines their spirit and makes the island unique. Music is instinctive to the Cubans who nurture its existence through improvisation. The island’s inhabitants speak in song and walk with rhythm. Cuban music’s primary roots began in Spain and West Africa, and have evolved through the centuries with the influences of various genres from countries such as France, Jamaica, and the United States. The indigenous rhythms have been significant in developing and maturing numerous musical styles in the 19th and 20th centuries — jazz, salsa, rumba, classical, bolero, tango, big band are just a few of the melodic beats. Son, “the sound,” is Cuba. Son comes from the heart of the mountains and is inspired by nature.

The late ’90s introduced a resurgence of Cuban rhythms worldwide. The Buena Vista Social Club is probably the most well known conveyer to the world of the charms of Cuba's beloved musical culture. 

 

Beny Moré is well-thought of by many as probably the greatest of Cuban singers. He was gifted with an expressive tenor voice, and all the rhythms of Cuban music . . . son, mambo, cha cha cha, bolero, Afro-Cuban . . . seemed to flow naturally through his body. 

Moré was born in the former province of Las Villas in central Cuba, the eldest of eighteen children. Learning to play the guitar as a child, he made his first instrument at the age of six out of a board and a ball of string. At the age of seventeen, Beny moved to Havana where he sold fruits, vegetables, and medicinal herbs for a living. After only six months, he returned to his birth home to cut cane for a season with his brother. With the money he earned, and his brother’s savings, Beny bought his first real guitar . . . returning to Havana to play in bars and cafés. After his first breakthrough by winning a radio competition,  Moré rose to prominence as a singer for the famed band Trio Matamoros, eventually leading the band himself.

Beny Moré is remembered and honored in Cuba. In September of every year, a festival bearing his name takes place in Cienfuegos. An Havana salsa club is named after him. On the malecon in Manzanillo, a statue of him can be found. The fictional film (directed by a distant relative) based on his life, El Benny, was released in 2006. Most flattering of all compliments to this great vocalist are those made by the scores of Cuban singers who refer to him in their songs.       

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   Orlando “Cachaito” Lopez, who became an international sensation as part of the Buena Vista Social Club, passed away in Havana at 76 years of age. He was one of the last surviving original members of the group. Singer Compay Segundo, pianist Ruben Gonzalez, and vocalists Ibrahim Ferrer and Pio Leyva have all died in recent years. Ry Cooder, an American guitarist and producer, brought these unknown veteran musicians, living quietly in Cuba, together in 1996 . . .  proving that advanced age and the aura of an olden era could add up to chart success.

Lopez was born into a family of at least thirty Cuban musicians, all of whom were bass players. His father Orestes and his uncle Israel “Cachao”, a multi-Grammy winner who died in 2008, were known for pioneering mambo music by mixing Cuban and African styles. Originally playing the violin, “Cachaito” switched to playing the bass after his grandfather urged him to follow in the family’s musical footsteps.

“Cachaito” achieved international fame after joining the Social Club and was considered to be Buena Vista’s “heartbeat” in the band’s mix of traditional Cuban rhythms. In fact, he was the only musician to play on every song from the 1997 Buena Vista Social Club album from which they made their name. But Lopez was also a luminary in his own right, independent of the Buena Vista Social Club . . . his debut album Cachaito won a BBC Radio 3 Award for World Music in 2002.

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Tata Guines was Cuba’s most famous percussionist. Known as the “King of Congas”, he passed away this last year, 2007, in his native Cuba at age 77. During the 1950s, Guines played with Frank Sinatra, Miles Davis, and Dizzy Gillespie, but returned home after Fidel Castro came to power in 1959. He was once quoted as saying, “Fame did not extend beyond the stage. Once you left the stage, it was like the signs said ‘Whites only’.”

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Israel Lopez, the legendary bassist and composer known as Cachao, has passed away at the age of 89. A modest and gentle man, his innovations broadened the musical parameters of the times by allowing his musicians to improvise freely and helped break down the aristocratic borders that once divided Cuban society. A musician whose sense of originality was so strong, he couldn’t help but advance Cuban music and leave it much better than when he began. Cuban exiles are characteristically ignored by the island’s official media as if they never existed, but the official newspaper, Granma, dedicated an article to Cachao’s passing. 

A child prodigy who began playing bass at age 9, Cachao was classically trained and became a member of the Havana Symphony at age 13, a position he held for 31 years. He performed with such composer/conductors as Igor Stravinsky, Mantovani, and fellow Cuban Ernesto Lecuona. With his older brother Orestes, a bassist, cellist, and pianist, he was also part of the string-and-flute charanga (Cuban dance music) orchestra, Arcaño y sus Maravillas. The brothers composed more than 2,500 danzónes (the official dance of Cuba). In the development, they updated the French-derived aristocratic parlor music by adding a closing section called “Mambo”, giving the pieces a looser, syncopated feel which eventually dancers fell in love with.

Cachao is featured on the Gloria Estefan album, “90 Millas,” and he is the subject of a new documentary, “Cachao: Una Mas” (Cachao: One More Song),” produced by San Francisco State University’s International Center for the Arts, premiering this year at the San Francisco International Film Festival. “I bring a certain grace to my music that I’ve obtained over the years,” Cachao said in a 2004 interview. He compared himself to a “cook who doesn't use measures anymore (and) begins by tossing in salt, a branch of this, a grain of that and comes up with a great dish." However, after it is all done he cannot tell you how he made it. "That’s the way it is with me. There are things that I do that I can’t measure. They just happen.”

 

Music and Dance

The history of Latin music and dance, which became popular throughout Europe and the Americas in the 20th century dates back to the 18th century. In Cuba, music underwent a transformation in the 19th century making it unique to this Caribbean island. The most significant event creating this uniqueness of style came about at the beginning of the 19th century when the Spanish establishment granted the African slaves permission to create “Cabillolos” (councils). This allowed the slaves to preserve their ethnicity and merge those traditions with the Spanish and French influences they encountered. Since the occurrence of councils, the distinctive music and dance of Cuba has been developed, redeveloped, and innovated giving the world danzon, son, mambo, cha cha, rumba, and salsa.

Danzon style developed in the second half of the 19th century, and has been an essential root for Cuban music continuing to present day. Recognized as the official dance of Cuba, it is no longer an active musical form. The danzon evolved from the contradanza, a European country dance brought to Cuba by French colonists fleeing the Haitian Revolution. It became a distinctive creole blend of African rhythmic and dance styles with melodic elements from the contradanza, hence an authentic synthesis of European and African influences.
 
Son is one of the most significant music and dance styles from Cuba. It’s a style that became popular in the second half of the 19th century in the eastern province of Oriente, a result of combining Spanish and African influences. Son combines the configuration and fundamentals of Spanish cancion and guitar with African rhythms and percussion instruments of Bantu and Arara origin. The African rhythms were used to call forth different gods. Cabillolos exist to this day in Cuba keeping alive various rhythms for over 200 different African gods.

The mambo originated in Cuba during the 1940’s from the danzon. Almost immediately, the dance was all the rage in the United States, becoming one of the most well-liked Latin American dances. The fusion of swing and Cuban music produced this fascinating rhythm, creating a new sensational dance. Mambo means “conversation with the gods”, and in Cuba, designates a sacred song of the Congos. Considering the mambo’s origins and the fact that it can be performed in a most erotic and sensual manner, this dance is referred to as the “diabolo” (the devil’s dance) in some parts of Cuba.

One of the most special gifts of the mambo is that it showed the way to the growth of the cha cha, which got its creation in 1950’s Cuba. The cha cha is a physically powerful and rhythmical dance, incredibly playful with immense partnership and solo elements. The music rivals the class of the swing sounds. This dance has grown to be one of the most popular and exciting of the Latin rhythm and dance styles.

The rumba is the spirit and soul of Cuban music and dance. Its popularity nurtured in the late 1920’s and has been admired ever since. The fascinating rhythms and body expressions are what make this dance so likeable. It is a mixture of three different rhythms, each one enjoying its own story, feel, meaning, and timing. The rumba embraces the flavors of the Latin tropics, and is visibly the dance of love.  

The salsa is the last introduction of the Latin dances to have its roots in Cuba. “Salsa” is the Spanish word for sauce, or in American Spanish, a spicy flavor. The accepted usage of the word “salsa” for danceable Latin music happened when Cuban composer Ignacio Pineiro wrote the song, “Echale Salsita”, in 1933. He conceived the idea after tasting food that lacked the Cuban spices. The song was written as a protest against tasteless food. The salsa is so fashionable today that salsa clubs are popping up all over the United States where Latin populations are most prevalent. This dance has even found its way into the competition scene.

 

Ballet