The prizes for the 33rd International Latin American Film Festival were awarded on Sunday, December 11, 2011, in a ceremony that was so sober that it could be described as lackluster. With few surprises as several prize-winners had already begun to look like likely candidates, Brazil, Argentina and Mexico were ratified as the big three in the movie industry in the region (the last were the top film producers during the 1940s and 50s).

The making of Great Houses of Havana was a hugely rewarding experiences that allowed me to draw on my professional experience and my Cuban roots to connect to the island, generating great pride in these houses and the sophisticated Cuban culture that gave birth to them.

From debonair racecar drivers to female impersonators, modernist architecture to children living in caves, revolutionaries to showgirls, I WAS CUBA by Kevin Kwan is a riveting and highly original look at Cuba through the Ramiro Fernández Collection, arguably the largest private archive of photographs from Cuba.

". . . revolutions have their utopian period, in which their protagonists, committed to the noble duty of transforming their dreams into reality and putting into practice their ideals, believe that the historical goals are much closer than they are in reality, and that their will, their desires and their intentions, above and beyond all objective facts, are omnipotent." Fidel castro

Despite the long lines and sweltering cinemas, Cubans have been jamming theaters here for several weeks to see “Habanastation,” the new film that takes on a taboo-but-timely subject: growing inequality in Cuba’s socialist system.

An unprecedented tour of stunning and architecturally significant Cuban palacios, mansions, and private homes that have been meticulously preserved, previously un-photographed, and inaccessible to visitors. At a time when more travelers are rediscovering Cuba, this lavishly illustrated volume offers a different view of the island’s cultural achievements.

On my last visit to Cuba this April 2011, I strolled the streets of Infanta, one of my favorite streets in Havana (with a few secret vinyl vendors). This last time, I walked past 3 movie theaters on the broad avenue where I noticed repeated posters of a local Cuban film called Boleto al Paraiso (Ticket to Paradise), by Gerardo Chijona.

Celebrating the relics of Cuba´s revolutionary glory days, this book explores everything from the kinds of interiors seen in Buena Vista Social Club to top—notch luxury hotels and cultural heritage sites. Via a diverse selection of Havana homes, hotels, gathering places, and more, Inside Havana takes you deep into the heart of the city.

Ivy Cooper writes, “Eastman´s interiors whether shot in New Orleans, Italy, Memphis, or Cuba, combine a strong formal composition with a distinctly poetic sensibility and carry the echoes of human present.”[Eastman explains] Someone once said to me, “I like your interiors because they feel like someone just entered, or just left,”…

The Malecon, after midnight. Hundreds of lovers on the wall, as if the night wasn’t steamy enough. Below them the sea, breathing slowly. Beyond them the nightlife of Havana. Not Old Havana, not those postcards. The real city, two million strong, most of which are awake.

It seems 2011 is the year for Cuban cinema to step up its game. Probably the most anticipated Cuban film to come out this year is Juan of the Dead. Not only is it probably the biggest action film coming out of Cuba, but also the first major zombie movie.

Media coverage and stereotypical discussions about places around the world have a major effect on people´s perception of the others and their existence. Modern myths are being created all the time. This is hardly more the case when people, generally trapped in history and ideology, talk about Cuba and its political, economical and cultural landscape. Vincent fell in love with Cuba in 1997 and has visited the country six times since then.

Being in the magazine industry, word starts to spread really fast 1 year before theatrical release with magazine editors in—the-know who screen it at Festivals. Che screened at Cannes and Toronto Film Fest this year. I asked and asked and asked everyone I knew about what they thought. They all shrugged their shoulders and shook their head.

It happened by chance. In 2000, I tagged along with a good friend on a two-week trip to Cuba. I took my 35mm camera and a bunch of film. The first thing I noticed in Havana was that the city was dark at night.

When the slaves arrived in this island from the African continent, they found nothing that linked them to their motherland; neither were there baobabs, the sacred tree that connected them to their gods. The only spiritual welcome these uprooted people received was the ceiba tree—also known as kapok tree or silk—cotton tree—a demigod tree that branches out to spirituality as a mother.

What happened in Cuba was basically the collapse of a dream. That’s obvious, but nonetheless painful. Specifically in the arts, the 1980s was a time of incredibly energetic and critical creativity, the product of a generation of young artists committed to the prospect of true—meaning truly independent—expression.

A new documentary had been released on one of Cuba´s biggest exoduses… The Mariel boatlift. One of the films subjects (a man who fled Cuba on this exodus), finally returns to Cuba to face the country he fled. The 1980 boatlift has received lots of stigma due to Oliver Stone´s depiction in Scarface, the story of a character who arrived on Miami shores from the Mariel boatlift.

No one can really unravel the mystery of Zarza Guirola and his skulls. Some say that they are social x—rays. He reminds me of a certain type of sorcerer who knows well that life is death and death is life. His skeletons not only show a pack of bones; they show the intrinsic self of his characters. Characters who are lost in the masses and the crowds and whom he bares in order to give them back the individuality that is lost with death.

Two recent films about Ernesto Che Guevara, “Che: The Argentinean”and “Guerrilla” by Steven Soderbergh, starring Benicio del Toro, have made the legendary Cuban—Argentinean guerrilla fighter front page news once more. Forty years after his death in the Bolivian jungle on October 8, 1967, Guevara continues to be a legend. But there are many little—known aspects about Guevara…

Coexisting with the recent neoclassical heritage and with eclecticism, and frequently exhibiting a combination of elements from these trends, approximately from the beginning of the 20th century to the 1920s, a number of buildings, which joined in the impetus for renewal and European Art Nouveau aesthetics…

Located to the west of Havana, at the corner of Quinta Avenida and 2nd St. in Miramar, the House of the Green Tiles or the Green House, as it is popularly known, is one of the most striking mansions in this city.

Havana Harvest is a fast-paced international thriller by Robert Landori that reveals the dangerous double—dealings of the CIA in Cuba by telling the story of a CIA operative and his struggle to outsmart the tormentors who intend to silence him forever. …

Since 2002, Sam Tyler has traveled extensively throughout Cuba producing photographic narratives for US publications and exhibitions, exhibiting at the Teatro Nacional with American and Cuban artists in Havana, teaching photography workshops to Cuban youth, all while continuing a nearly decade—long personal project of documenting Cuba. …

Neither of us had any expectations when we, two pale Danes, decided to take a vacation to Cuba last April. Of course, there´d be the stereotypical imagery: colonial architecture, old men with cigars, American automobiles from the 50s, and salsa dancing.

On a day more than ten years ago I arrived in New York City—my second or third trip to America—and studied a line of taxis in the freezing cold: this new landscape, the United States, a country that my country had been at war with my whole life. Or that my country had endlessly claimed to be at war with, at least. My taxi driver was an Indian or Pakistani with the look of one who had few friends.

The 2010 Sylvie Collier film, The Crab, the Crocodile, and Love in Cuba delivers an inside track to Cuba through the art of José Fuster, one of Cuba’s best known and somewhat eccentric artists based in Jaminitas, Havana. Fuster’s style of working is unique. He sells his increasingly acclaimed paintings on international circuits and turns the income into works of art for neighbours

Sons of Cuba is an extraordinary tribute to the indomitable spirit of the Cuban people and a stinging visual critique of the decrepitude of parts of Havana. Director Andrew Lang follows the story of three 11—year—old boxers training to be champions in Havana’s state boxing academy. Cuba leads the world in amateur boxing; its giants of the ring have been garlanded with 63 Olympic medals, 32 of them gold.

Dutch—born Martien Mulder combines portraiture, fashion, landscape and still life photography. She lives in New York and her pictures have appeared in magazines such as Purple, 10 Magazine, French Vogue and Fantastic Man, and exhibitions have been staged in New York, Amsterdam and Tokyo.

Influenced by Cubism and one of the initiators of the Cuban avant—garde movement, she recreates very personal themes, expertly using color in windows, Cuban fruits, tropical flowers and elements that are easily identifiable as Cuban in nature; the marked coloring is generally delimited by thick black lines which are reminiscent of stained—glass windows of 19th century Cuban colonial mansions.

To call Cubans cinephiles is a gross understatement: Cinema looms in the national consciousness. It makes sense, then, that if any major art form offers a vivid, frank window into Cuban society, it´s film. Cuban cinema has gathered accolades from around the globe; a glance at the list below reveals awards and honorable mentions for a great number of films. Before the revolution, Cuban cinema existed in a diluted form controlled by the U.S. film industry.

…what I am relating is not a story,
But an unsullied history - my history.
I have lived an honorable life,
In a style that the world is losing.

It would be much too risky to list the “best books” of Cuban literature, considered one of the richest in the Americas. Instead, we prefer to suggest a number of titles that we believe are essential reading in order to gain an understanding of the culture and idiosyncrasy of the Cuban people.

“I always compare socialism and capitalism to two rooms. Socialism is a room with a solid floor, without traps or holes, mines, or quicksand, but the ceiling is only at 1 meter, and you can´t go any higher.” says a young resident in Cuba today.

Yet another beautiful book has been released on Cuba. You know how much I can´t stand to see those generic Cuban images coming out of the country with 1950´s pastel cars and ladies with cigars in her mouths. Obviously these images exist in Cuba, its just that I like it when photographers dig deeper, and see the country with unique eyes.

The singular apparition that is Bazan Cuba is not what just any camera would register, but Ernesto´s way of seeing, and no one else´s. Of the thousands of pictures of Cuba by Cubans and foreign photographers, none that I know look very much like these. The images here are stamped throughout with the photographer´s name, his perceptions, his mind, and they tell a story that belongs to him alone…

“Ernesto Bazan´s images of the Cuban countryside are remnants of a tropical dream —suffused with tenderness, color and a hint of mystery. You can almost touch the damp earth, where a freshly slaughtered pig lays near a puddle of blood, or smell the hand—rolled puros whose smoke hangs in the air like a milky veil.”

The Royal Ballet´s first ever trip to Cuba marked many milestones and ticked many boxes but above all it was a triumphant homecoming for the magnificent Carlos Acosta (the Cuban lorry drivers son now a star with the Royal Ballet in London) and a tribute to the legendary Alicia Alonso (iconic Cuban legend and current artistic director of the principal Cuban Ballet). Above all, perhaps it was simply a magnificent treat for the Cuban ballet aficionados.

Imagine yourself in front of a 16th—century fortress facing the Malecon in Old Havana, Cuba. The fortress occupies a vast expanse of land with a wall that extends the length of the fortress, surrounded by a deep moat, once legend to have been filled with crocodiles. The fortress is comprised of underground tunnels, old dungeons and hundreds of ancient cannons. It is rumored to have been built to resist pirates, buccaneers and corsairs. Every evening, since the 18th century, there is a symbolic firing of the cannons at 9pm.

Absent for several years from the big stages in Havana—its usual venue is the Favorito, a converted movie house with quite uncomfortable conditions for both audiences and dancers—the company founded and directed by dancer and choreographer Narciso Medina returned to the Mella Theatre with a program that included two new dances plus the piece that has been his trump card for more than two decades—Metamorfosis.

Anyone who climbed around, crouched under, or peered above the herd of inflated metal elephants that made its way around Havana during the first week of the 2009 biennial is familiar with the work of Jose Emilio Fuentes Fonseca (also known as JEFF). His name was on the tip of the tongues of those who visited with the elephants—along with those who murmured about their gargantuan size or wondered just how they´d been …

For approx a month now, a delightful herd of elephants and a strange plague of revolting insects have seemed to capture the interest of Habaneros. “I wonder where the elephants are today.” “Did you already see the roaches?”

This week, this majestic dame of a city plays hostess to the 30th International Festival of New Latin American Cinema. Hundreds of film producers, actors and participants alike have flown in from across the globe, mostly from South and Central America, though there have been eminent European and American visitors here too, with names such as Mike Leigh and Benicio del Toro crowning the list of heavyweights who are familiar to Western audiences.

“My book Havana is just a superficial look, not a soul searching investigation, a quick impression of a place that is unique in it’s geographical position, being much closer to the United States of America than the space station. Both are places ordinary Americans cannot visit. To be one of the poorest nations on Earth, almost within spitting distance of the richest, makes the poverty of Cuba seem more extreme.

Cuba is a land of mystery, at once antique and avant-garde, closed and cosmopolitan, a country of layers and contrasts. This book offers a look at a way of life that may soon disappear. Photographer Eddy Kohli captures the spirit of the people, work, land, and food in brilliant color.

Many like to picture Cuba as a humorless place under Fidel´s watch, in spite of the long tradition of “choteo”—clever Cuban banter—and despite the plethora of jokes about the socialist economy and social problems. There is the one about the Canadian tourist in Havana who enters a record store and asks if they have the song “Morir de amor” (To die of love) by The Fabrisa Sisters “en 45 revoluciones” (in 45 revolutions/a 45 rpm record).

Whoever visits Old Havana´s Historical Centre in April will find a surprising sight: the old city dances. Plazas, parks, streets, museums and old rambling houses seem to be possessed by the spirit of dance, which invoked by dancer and choreographer Isabel Bustos and her company Retazos—Bits and Pieces—turns balconies, windows, stairs and centenary walls into stages.

Habaneros of the 1940s and early 1950s lived with their ears glued to the radio. Cuba ranked first among all Latin American countries in per capita radio ownership, and its capital city was largely responsible for this figure. In playwright Virgilio Piñera's classic drama about this period, Aire Frío, a working-class household that can't afford an electric fan in the summer heat nonetheless owns a radio.

which has over 4000 pictures of Cuba. His book, from which these pictures are taken, was published in 2005 by Corazon Press. The book is available through the publisher at corazonpress.com. It is a 120 page 12"x12" hardcover coffee table book with 2006 duo—tone images; $65 USD. Also available through Air Leaf Distributors and at select book stores. Contact Mr. Kenny for information on buying prints of his work through.

Not many photographers arriving in Cuba manage to elude the island´s exuberant natural scenery and spectacular colonial architecture. Postcard—perfect beaches, clear cobalt seas and buildings of exceptional beauty and splendour will usually take hold of the photographer´s lens. However, if it´s not the island´s natural wonders or its eclectic and diverse urban landscapes that attract the camera, it´s inevitably the gregarious and gesticulating inhabitants who seem to live more outdoors than in their own homes.

This drawing was inspired by the most stunning and beautifully written novel published in Cuba in the last ten years,“Cien Botellas en una Pared” by the prizewinning young Cuban novelist Ena Lucía Portela. Published in 2002, it has been translated into French, but not yet into English. It paints a sharp, compelling tragi—comic picture of the heroine´s progress from school in the 1980s to maturity in the 1990s, against the background of a mansion long given over to multi occupation in Havana´s louche but still distinguished Vedado district.

Towards the end of the 1980´s, Cuban art reached something of a cross—roads as the relationship between individual artists and the institutional system came under strain. At this time the position of the government towards certain artists whose works raised questions and doubts regarding Cuban culture and society was widely perceived as having reached the limits of its tolerance which, prior to this time, had been very open and accepting towards artistic expression.

Águedo Alonso lives in a beautiful house—cum—studio in the vicinity of Club Campestre, approx 30 km from Havana, surrounded by the vivid colours and the imbricate shapes of the exuberant tropical vegetation he loves so much. His intimate parlour quickly reveals our host´s affections—photographs of his children and grandchildren, furniture made of plant fibres, miniature antiques from all over the world, lamps of different styles and epochs, and paintings and installations representative of each stage of his production.

To enter Alicia Alonso´s office is to visit an inner sanctum. She works in a small room tucked away behind the unassuming headquarters of the Cuban National Ballet, on 17th St. in Vedado. Outside, gaggles of young ballerinas gather. Inside, an army of efficient secretaries protect her from the uninvited. The room itself is dark, and spartan. The shutters are drawn.

When in 2003, at the Casa de la Obra Pía in Old Havana, the Arte y Moda fashion show took place, one of the most stunning designs was Peacock Woman, a creation by Ismael de la Caridad based on one of Zayda del Río´s paintings. Still today, this spectacular gown by the renowned Cuban fashion designer is a referent when it comes to translating contemporary Cuban visual art into the codes of the catwalk.

In “The Sugar Curtain,” Camila Guzmán Urzúa (the daughter of the filmmaker Patricio Guzmán) returns to Cuba to confront the possibility of a misremembered past. Armed with a hand-held camera and idyllic childhood memories, Ms. Guzmán Urzúa, a Chilean-born filmmaker who arrived in Cuba in 1973 at the age of 2 and left in 1990, strives to align her rosy recollections with the deprivation and decay of modern Havana.

There were no Hollywood stars or attendant paparazzi. Hype, glamorous red carpet photo shoots and posh after—parties were also nowhere to be seen at the 5th International Cine Pobre Festival, in the eastern Cuban town of Gibara this past April. But don´t take Cine ‘Pobre’ too literally—while even many Cubans may struggle to find this picturesque fishing village on a map, the International Low—Budget Film Festival has …

Blind but beady–eyed, beaky–nosed, old, imposing and profoundly glamorous, Alicia Alonso stands in a single spotlight at the front of the dress circle of the Gran Teatro de La Habana, bathed in waves of applause. Whenever she appears in the audience, everyone in the theatre–not least the prima ballerina assoluta herself–considers a standing ovation her due. The epitome of a Grand Dame, Miss Alonso holds the Ballet Nacional de Cuba in thrall.

During the first two weeks of December, a virulent plague takes hold of Havana. Immunisation is impossible and there´s no option but to surrender. The consolation is that there are so many fellow–sufferers with whom to compare notes on symptoms, cures and pulling extended sickies from work.

Visitors to the Cuban capital frequently remark on how busy the city seems to be, how the life of the city is inescapable and either delightful or irritating, depending on their disposition and expectations as a tourist in a socialist Caribbean island. The fabric of the city is often crumbling, yet Cuban life goes on with a kind of cheerful self–absorption and confidence despite (or because of?) the lack of material trappings and ‘advances’ that we are used to in western cities

The restoration of Old Havana is internationally acclaimed as one of the world´s most innovative and exciting projects of urban renaissance. It is all more the remarkable for the context in which it is taking place: Cuba´s ongoing struggle to establish itself as a political and economic force to be reckoned with.

Beneath the centuries of multi–coloured limewash in Old Havana´s eighteenth century mansions, archaeologists often discover elaborate and beautiful mural paintings in which an exquisite powdery blue predominates. This has come to be known as ‘Havana Blue’ and the colour is still used all over the city, gently echoing the triumphant azure of the Cuban sky.

Theatrical performances were organized in the Island as early as the 17th century during the Corpus Christi and patron saint´s day festivities then held in every Cuban town. The 19th century was a brilliant period in romantic theatre, while popular or vernacular theatre was very well received by audiences.

Bold, beautiful and provocative, they stare confidently out of the page with an irresistible mixture of humour and seduction. Havana in the 20s and 30s was one of the world´s smartest cities, as glamorous and important as London, Paris or New York, and Massaguer´s illustrations capture perfectly the mood of those heady Havana decades.

…In Alicia Leal´s work, in which one can appreciate the appropriation of medieval color theory, spatial layout and a decorative delight in fabrics, floors and curtains reminiscent of Matisse, women play a central role, either providing refuge as in the recurring image of the Virgin of Charity, patron saint of Cuba and eternal protector of mariners and fishermen syncretised with the sensuous Ochún of Afro–Cuban religions; in the poignant Death of Martí…

He has a number of very distinct styles of work. He is most well known for his work with small walking human figures cut out of the bodywork of old cars, water tanks full of holes or containers made of the most varied types of materials. These anonymous little men, sometimes monochrome, sometimes multicolored, which follow the route traced out for them by the artist–demiurge–some in the opposite direction–rapt in thought, alone in the crowd or drawn together in their loneliness, …

It was a great surprise when we walked into Raúl Cordero´s studio, whose location in a central avenue of El Vedado offers a splendid panoramic view of a district where art nouveau, art deco, grandiloquent eclecticism and sober rationalism blend together in a nonconflicting shape–in the words of novelist Alejo Carpentier–‘the style of a styleless city’.

What have you got in your fridge, right now? Prosciutto, black olives, clotted cream, Parmesan, smoked salmon, strawberries, Dom Pérignon? A long–forgotten, green–furred can of something that ceased to be fit for human consumption decades ago, a bottle of vile–smelling solidified milk and some distressing–looking wizened objects, obviously organic but now unrecognisable? Your clothes?…

The Cuban people face many questions about their future at the start of the twenty-first century: Will Cuban socialism endure in the new century? Can the Cuban people continue to endure it? What are its successes? Failures? What will happen to Cuba and the Cuban people after Fidel Castro? The photographs of Cuba: Picturing Change explore Cuba’s greatest strength—her people.