The year 1993 saw the opening of the collective exhibition “Las metáforas del templo” [The Metaphors of the Temple] at the Visual Arts Development Centre. The then students of the ISA, Carlos Garaicoa and Esterio Segura, organisers of the exhibition, understood that there was a group of students at ISA with common approaches and a work that was strong enough to be launched into the Cuban art world with a rejuvenated meaning. Almost all of them had been members of the DUPP project, including Jorge Luis Marrero, Ernesto García Nodarse, Alberto Casado, Fernando Rodríguez, Alexander Arrechea, Dagoberto Rodríguez, Marcos Castillo, Abel Barroso, Osvaldo Yero, Douglas Pérez, as well as Esterio and Garaicoa. With “Las metáforas del templo,” the link with the official institutions and their legitimising mechanisms was restored, and more importantly, the complementary links regarding art criticism and theory was renewed. To this end, a very dynamic colloquium was held, with renowned experts, such as Gerardo Mosquera, Lupe Álvarez, Madelaine Izquierdo, Félix Suazo and Abdel Hernández.

A number of significant approaches were put forward during the debate: the assumption of a ‘new Cuban art’ upheld by Lupe Álvarez, which has given rise amongst artists to so much controversy; the parable of “analytical reaffirmation” sustained by Mosquera, where a parallel was drawn between the excessive growth of Cuban art and the outbreak of a crop of weeds; and the notion of metaphor as a “sense of the temple” in the new generation of artists, defined by Professor Madelaine Izquierdo. But the statements made by Félix Suazo and Abdel Hernández were central— at least for me—in their analysis of the new dilemmas Cuban art was facing. Felix’s observations revolved around the transactions between the world of culture and marketing, which Cuba could no longer ignore. Abdel’s views emphasised the rate of change within Cuba: the conditions for artistic production and cultural mobilisation, local references, and the interaction with the Latin American and international art scenes.

Meanwhile, in what could be considered a kind of conceptual platform of “Las metáforas del templo,” Carlos Garaicoa and Esterio Segura made known their distinctive position in their words to the catalogue:

The fact that these artists have united under one same title is justified by two aspects. On the one hand, a background of similar circumstances, not only historic but responding to pedagogical concepts inherited from artists and aesthetes who have made a mark on the younger generations of Cuban artists; and, on the other hand, the emergence of certain tendencies in their work which show not only a readjustment within the positions and stance of Cuban artistic space, but also a new attitude towards language in itself, marked, no doubt, by this period of decline and silence mentioned before.2

This exaltation of formal values reached highly sophisticated levels in the work of artists, such as Henry Eric, Osvaldo Yero, Geysel Capetillo, José Ángel Vincench, and Kadir López. The work of Los Carpinteros particularly stands out. This group, to the amazement of the public and the critics, carried out an impressive revitalisation of the handicraft methods of traditional carpentry. In my opinion, the most substantial curatorial work regarding the revaluation of arts and crafts was made in 1995 with the exhibition “El oficio del arte” [The Craft of Art] in which its curator, Dannys Montes de Oca, set out to restore the aesthetic paradigm as a social and commercial requirement.

Other artists became involved in the revival of older methods such as engraving and photography, smoothly positioning themselves as enlightened artists thanks to their use of techniques and the emphasis on the self-reflective, when dealing with social situations. I could mention the photographers René Peña, Juan Carlos Alom, Ramón Pacheco, Manuel Piña, Carlos Garaicoa, Abigail González and Eduardo Hernández, and engravers Belkis Ayón, Ibrahim Miranda, Agustín Bejarano, Isary Paulet, Sandra Ramos and Abel Barroso. I was the curator for “Vindicación del grabado” [Vindication of Engraving], at La Acacia Gallery in 1994, in which I showed the relationships amongst these young engravers, and the elements that distinguished them within the Cuban printing heritage.

Sculpture continued to flourish during the decade with installations, recurrence to popular images, and the use of ephemeral materials. To my mind, Alexis Leyva (Kcho), Fernando Rodríguez and Carlos Estévez would play a major role within this tendency. However, at the same time, sculpture would take an autonomous direction, reaching its full and purest expression in the works of Esterio Segura, Rafael Gómez, William Pérez, Guillermo Ramírez Malberti and Julio Neira. The interesting thing about this is that, in the face of conventional assumptions about artistic practice, these three specialties were able to integrate an approach to technical mastery would no longer be, as in the old days, the reason for the exclusion or establishment of hierarchies, but values added to a modern cross disciplinary vision.

Design also took a qualitative step, especially poster production, and informational and environmental practices. The innovative technical solutions and procedures came, in most cases, from young graduates from the Industrial Design Institute (ISDI), around the middle of the first five years of the decade, with a maturity of style and interesting connections with the artistic effervescence of Cuban graphic design in the 1960s. A curious trend was the progressive move towards other creative areas, such as painting, installation, digital and audiovisual art. Pepe Menéndez, Roger Sospedra, Ernesto Díaz, Raúl Cordero, Luis Noa, Sandy Pozo, Eduardo Molto, Osmany Torres, and groups such as Ordo Amoris, Spam and Nudo, are some of the most significant examples of this experimentation in other creative mediums.

Garrido, Yasbel Pérez, Cirenaica Moreira, Lidzie Alviza and Aziyadé Ruiz.

Events of national importance, such as the Contemporary Cuban Art Exhibitions, the Engraving Meetings and the Prizes for Curators and Critics, all sponsored by the National Council of Visual Arts, also contributed significantly to clarify the thematic guidelines and to sort the levels of prominence within the art work, in accordance with art works and authors. Thanks to these events, a great number of artists from the provinces, some from very remote areas, were able to bring their work to the attention of the public and place their pieces in important galleries in the capital. Organised by the Wifredo Lam Contemporary Art Centre, the Havana Art Biennial, in particular, would prove an exceptional opportunity for Cuban artists to subject their work to the international gaze, as well as to keep up with the latest trends of theoretical thought. In spite of the embargo, renowned curators and directors from famous galleries and museums around the world visited Havana during the nineties to witness and document the vast programme of activities conceived by the Biennial. We could even say that the prestige of a number of Cuban artists in the art scenes of Europe and the United States today, is due, to a large extent, to their previous recognition in this “Third World” event.

I have emphasised a group of names, tendencies and events that enriched, both formally and thematically, the conceptual line of the nineties. However, I do not wish to leave out a group of figures from the eighties who continued to be influential. I am referring to Eduardo Ponjuán, whose work at the Art Institute received critical acclaim; to Lázaro Saavedra, initiator of another important pedagogical effort called ENEMA; to José Ángel Toirac, who includes curatorial devices and regularly explores the cultural and social alternatives of the island; and to Tania Bruguera, who was first known through her live performance art, of solid didactic proportions.

However, to say that the vigour and evolution of Cuban art in the nineties was only conceptual would be a serious mistake, repeating the reductionist and exclusionary view with which sometimes contemporary Cuban art is seen. This was undoubtedly a decade of convergence, a time when certain differences or antagonisms between generations began to ease, and in particular between the hedonistic and epic inclination of the seventies, and the critical, conceptual approach that was encouraged at the beginning of the eighties.

To be honest, I hadn’t seen such different modes of expression converge in the same space for a long time;, artists from the sixties, seventies and eighties sharing the same identical promotional fate. It is my opinion that this convergence was brought about by the reevaluation of technical and aesthetic principles and their concrete immersion in a metaphorical approach, which increased our awareness of the potential of Cuban art not only for its formal efforts but also for its allegorical anticipations. “Amistades Peligrosas” [Dangerous Liaisons], the collective exhibition organised by the art critic Rufo Caballero at the Visual Arts Development Centre in 1995, invited us to examine contemporary Cuban art and its interrelationship with metaphor, becoming one of the most daring and integrating curatorial approaches of the decade: “… the new signifiers which can be appreciated today in the roads of Cuban art requires an analysis of the profound mechanisms of the stimulants of change, which in turn—and this is the paradox—reveal in greater depth certain social circumstances,” expressed Rufo Caballero in his essay of curatorial argumentation.3

Yet, the gradual expansion of the art market, as a palliative against the economic crisis, would be the factor that would finally bring together different generations and methods.

During the first stage, from the mid eighties to the end of the decade, international collectors showed a marked interest in conceptual art, which was intensified with the removal or at least decentralisation of institutional regulatory mechanisms. Gallery owners from Latin America, Europe and the United States, such as Nina Menocal, Ramis Barquet, Peter Ludwig and Alex Rosenberg, became the intermediaries for the insertion of Cuban art in the international market. Many artists who lived in Cuba continued throughout the nineties to comply with these people’s demands and to the opportunities that they represented, while other artists began an independent search for commercial alternatives. In any case, it was individual effort that paved the way of commercial transcendence for Cuban art. José Bedia and Tomás Sánchez were artists who during those years went the farthest in their search for international recognition and glory, although other painters who had gained recognition in Cuba, such as Roberto Fabelo, Pedro Pablo Oliva and Nelson Domínguez, were already pushing to raise their prices at the auction houses of Christie’s and Sotheby’s.

In order to compensate for the imbalance of individual effort and to create more efficient control mechanisms, the Cuban Government, throughout the decade developed events and projects that favoured a plurality of influences and styles; for example, the reorganisation of the entire gallery system, the creation of new work groups which would stimulate - to different degrees—the spirit of debate, and the encouragement of participation in auctions and art fairs. Priority was given to promoting and selling works by acclaimed artists as well as attracting young artists who had been successful in the foreign market. But if something was lacking in this new initiative, it was that it eluded—and continues eluding— the launch of new figures, the investing in work of emerging artists, and, especially, creating a domestic compensatory market and a group of collectors. Perhaps this is one of the principal dilemmas handed down to the new century by the nineties: How can we develop our commercial proposals to respond to the quantitative and qualitative growth of Cuban art today? How can we reconcile the irregularities of that pragmatic, fluctuating world with the fierce defence of certain utopias?