Photographic Exhibit: The Revolutionary Cuban Epic
Opening:
thursday, 7/13/2006, 7:30pm
Visiting hours:
7/14/2006 to 8/18/2006
Monday to Friday, from 9am to 9pm,
Saturdays from 9am to 4pm.
Where:
Senac Lapa Scipião Gallery
67 Scipião St. São Paulo - SP
São Paulo – SP - Brazil
Phone: 55 3866 2500
queroparticipar@institutomidiaeartes.com.br
By: Instituto de Mídia e Artes
The "Revolutionary Cuban Epic" was organized by Cuban photographer and researcher, Marucha (Maria Eugenia Haya, 1944-1991), who was responsible for the Cuban Phototeca in 1986.
Marucha was the first person to organize the photographic material produced during the first years of the Cuban Revolution (1959-1969) in an essay entitled "Notes for a history of photography in Cuba" published for the "History of Cuban Photography" exposition, exhibited in the Carrillo Gil Museum in Mexico in 1976.
After this essay, Cuba inherited approximately 60 epics that reflect the photographic characteristics of the revolutionary period.
Despite the Revolution rendering a strong character to the photographic style of the 1960s, it is not correct to state that Cuban photography of that period was limited to the Epic. It resides in the richness of contrasts and the absence of a style unit.
To understand Cuban photography of the 1960s, one cannot think in terms of style units. The greatest exponents of that period, those that gave form and coherence to their work, are not classified in the same artistic movement. They greeted epic photography with traces of their own past experiences.
The Epic and Its Exponents
Raúl Corral (Corrales) (n.1925) Graduated in Photojournalism before the Revolution, he worked for the Cuba Sono Film (advertising agency for the Popular Socialist Party) since the mid-1940s. He worked as a photographer for the Prensa Obrera of Cuba and afterwards for the Hoy newspaper and the Ultima Hora, Bohemia, Carteles and Vanidades magazines. But it was at Cuba Sono Film (which was dedicated to reports about Cuban social and economical conditions), that he forged his etical sense used later on in his photographic registry of the Revolution.
Osvaldo Salas (1914-1992) graduated as a photographer in New York and his images were published regularly in several American magazines, including Life. His images conserve that New York style similar to the post-war photographers, with special talent in portraits. After meeting Fidel Castro in New York, Salas continues his career with the philosophic and moral objective of returning to Havana two days before the triumph of the revolution.
Alberto Días (Korda) was one of the most famous advertising and fashion photographers in Havana. He was an exceptional photographer, notably influenced by Irving Penn and Richard Avedon.
A partner in the Korda studios, with all the skills and knowledge of an advertising photographer, he was able to transfer the characteristic glamour of a photograph produced in a studio into images such as The Heroic Guerrilla, taken accidentally with a 35mm camera during the act celebrating the victims of the explosion of the boat, La Coubre.
Besides the three abovementioned photographers, there are many others who photographed the epic magnificently. Here one finds Roberto Salas, son of Oswaldo Salas and a figure equally aware of the period's political movements; Liborio Noval, who worked as an advertising photographer until the beginning of the revolution, when he began to work for the Revolución newspaper, and now works as a photographer for the Granma newspaper; Perfecto Romero and Ernesto Fernández, who used to work as an illustrator for Carteles magazine and who had already done an interesting photographic essay before 1959: Havana in English, and who after 1959 began to work for the Revolución newspaper.
Despite the existence of artistic unity with regard to visual, stylistic and formal construction (after all, the use of a 35mm camera and the use of natural light cannot be considered style restraints), the period between 1959 and 1969 differs significantly from the others.
On several occasions, Korda repeated that to be able to speak about the photography of the revolution, it was necessary to speak about Corrales, who, according to Korda, was the father of revolutionary photography.
This paternity is characterized by a profound ethical sense. Corrales' photography goes beyond iconography. It describes revolutionary change from the point of view of the ethical transformation that first instigated it. He did not start his work with the epic after the success of the revolution. His ethical commitment, a strong characteristic of his epic photography, has accompanied him ever since the beginning of his career. From the outset, Corrales was a photographer of the people for the people.
There is a very long list of photographers from this epic period who are not present. From the very beginning, the Revolution attracted the attention of all of the Cuban photographers. Starting in 1959, and for a long time thereafter, Cuban photography was overcome by an unusual case of thematic coincidence. An analysis of the characteristics that unify the body of epic Cuban photography allows some of its students to affirm that it is not limited to a decade of work. Its ethical and iconographic character is also present before and after this period, even though the peak of its maturity coincides with the period between 1959 and 1969.
