During the organization of the 10th Havana Biennale, the curatorial team proposed as a strategy for projection, to leave the precincts of the Morro-Cabaña Military Historical Park, which had hosted the event for the last six editions. At that time it was not possible because the city did not have available spaces that allow presenting a mega exhibition, a format that had characterized the Biennale throughout its history.
For the 11th edition, and having the Alejo Carpentier monumental hall of Gran Teatro de La Habana, researchers at the Wifredo Lam Contemporary Art Center took up the challenge of this new modular space and present the main exhibition there in 2012. Shortly before the opening, the Biennale director, Jorge Fernandez, made this decision public. It was not long before he received the call from Henry Perez, director of the Morro-Cabaña Park who told me that he felt betrayed because the event had been removed from its historical space.
I felt compelled to visit him. Then he showed me the best price and facilities and I was at the crossroads to see wasted the golden opportunity for the collateral samples of Cuban art. My colleagues from the National Council of Plastic Arts (CNAP) accepted the challenge of organizing in record time a major exhibition to the insular art. It was a complex exercise. We did not have enough curators or resources for a large museum deployment.
The idea of providing a zone of confluence from the relations of our company with all artists in the country worked. Many submitted projects, others were invited, and a meeting logic where aesthetic, themes and generations were happening spontaneously was structured. It was a big party for the national art, and although it was not a cured program or projected from the research management, we gathered across the bay to numerous artists who, for the first time had a leading space in the context of a biennale.
For some it was a success, for others a curatorial disaster. The truth is that those attending the 11th. Biennale enjoyed a significant group of works by contemporary Cuban artists. In this12th edition with more time and resources, we decided to commission the project to a group of specialists of the main institutions of CNAP under the premise of diversity and in order that the thematic curatorial are exceeded, aesthetic or generational discrimination, to integrate a great aesthetic corpus everything valid in the field of visually it had been generated by Cuban artists in diverse meanings.
As part of the cultural policy of the Revolution, we then found a place where inquiry, diversity, combination of aesthetics, languages and techniques became cornerstones. Thus the mega-project emerged, which is called Zone. In this effort the curators’ team is in the first place, which without ignoring their commitments in each institution have devoted their energies to build a common logic of thought.
The efforts of Artecubano Editions in the catalog, and Art Engineering in the design and manufacture of the general graphic have joined. This curatorial and promotional conjunction contributes to a more dynamic, attractive and inclusive reading. The production of some works, the impression of the general catalog and the graphics were financed by the Cuban Fund of Cultural Assets, unprecedented initiative by its proportions and resonances, establishing a path of relations between the business culture system and compliance with the cultural policy.
It has been gratifying to see the enthusiasm with which the artists have taken this endeavor. We share, for several months, an atmosphere of complicity between artists, curators, scholars, researchers and critics. Despite the hostility that some international media pointed today to the Biennale and Cuban artists, in Havana is perceived a climate of total commitment to the creation and the national culture, heritage of a nation that persists in building a future where utopias are yet possible.
(Posted on May 17, 2015 in http://www.trabajadores.cu/20150517/zona-franca-espacio-para-la-utopia/)
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