Eleven Cubans out of a Private Collection

Luis Enrique Camejo, Roberto Diago, Nelson Domínguez, Roberto Fabelo, Alexis Leiva Machado (Kcho), Rigoberto Mena, Manuel Mendive, Pedro Pablo Oliva, Carlos Quintana and Alfredo Sosabravo are some of the boldface names that make up a vast collection that Luciano Mendez, a representative of Banco Sabadell in Cuba, has been amassing for years.

The exhibit of artworks from these eleven artists, recently opened at the Jose Marti Memorial in Havana, is one of those rare opportunities in which a private collection has elbowed its way into a Cuban State-run institution. And as Luciano announced at the ribbon-cutting ceremony, this will be the first of many times in which the Cuban public could feast eyes on his own collection.

On this exhibition, Jose Veigas wrote these words in the catalog: “Luciano Mendez’s decision to showcase a small segment of his collection clearly puts him in the position of being his own curator. And we wonder with a quick answer in hand: who could get that job done better that him? However, we don’t think this has been an easy job for him as the holder of a broad repertoire of Cuban contemporary art. The selection of just eleven painters and a similar number of artworks clustered at the Jose Marti Memorial was surely a hard task to do…”

Once artistas cubanos de hoy will remain open thru late January 2013.