Nothing surprises us anymore about the telluric force that the artistic movement has in the Trinidad of Cuba: it was necessary to see the dozens of creators of several generations that gathered for the Pase de revista, the exhibition at the Benito Ortiz Art Gallery, the one they wanted to be present with at the International Gastronomic Seminar organized by the Office of the Conservator of Trinidad with the assistance of the Excelencias Group, as it is known that its president, José Carlos de Santiago Bartolomé, is also the honorary ambassador of the Ibero-American Gastronomy Academy.
Atner Cadalso, art critic and curator of Pase de revista, expressed in the opening speech the high satisfaction of the creators present there with the tangible fact that Arte por Excelencias has accompanied them for more than ten editions, from the number 24 that circulated during the 12th Biennial of Havana in 2014, and that already contained the Art Dossier with a dozen Trinitarian artists, along with other great Cuban artists such as Eduardo Roca (Choco), Alberto Lescay and Kcho, who still appeared in the same magazine.
We have shown the life and work of more than twenty Trinitarian creators, who have been continuously in our pages: the performative boldness of Alejandro López, the three-dimensional canvas of Roldley Pérez Navarro, the carved exceptionality of Jorge César Saenz, the vital photography of Yran Marrero Jiménez, the painting on the embroidered canvases of Yudith Vidal Faife, the original Indian portraits of Lázaro Morgado Orellana, the multiple findings of Yassiel Elizagaray about everything he touches ...
And even the payroll becomes small because the then project of local development of plastic arts also allowed to see images of creations of Ismael Rodriguez, Osley Ponce, Julio César Cepeda, Rudy Rubo, William Bonilla, Ariel Broche, Miguel Angel Valdivia, Carlos Matta and Luis Blanco Rosindo, many of them trained and graduates of the then Oscar Fernández Morera School of Art in Trinidad and now distinguish themselves by holding a solid artistic proposal in the galleries of the city of Sancti Spiritus.
Among the distinguished guests who attended our inauguration were Katherine Muller Marín, director of the Unesco Regional Office for the Caribbean; Rolando Escobar, first secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba in Trinidad; Gladys Collazo, president of the National Heritage Council; Tania Gutiérrez, president of the Municipal Assembly of Popular Power; and José Carlos de Santiago, president of the Excelencias Group, along with the directors of the Offices of the Conservative of Baracoa and Santiago de Cuba, among other personalities attending the First Trinidad Gourmet Seminar 2018.
It is true that the magazine AxE 40 had already been presented in a fraternal trinity gathering at the Don Pepe Café, thanks to its always friendly owners, in the presence of friends and collaborators of the medium who gathered over the heat of the summer stage: the artisan artists of the Urdimbre Project, inveterate cultural promoters such as the researcher Carlos Sotolongo, the historian Víctor Echeganusía, the director Alberto Turiño and other plastic artists and cultural promoters.
These pages contain the official note of the VII Meeting of the Intergovernmental Council of Crafts, as well as the reasons for the nomination of Trinidad as an Artisan City of the World. It contains a beautiful insert on the exhibition Cuban Artisans today, held at the Victor Manuel Gallery, in the Plaza de la Catedral, and coordinated by the Cultural Assets Fund.
Of what there is no doubt is that every time the Trinidad of Cuba is ready for an international festival of the arts. Hopefully and we will be heard on time.
