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Cuba Avant-Garde: Contemporary Cuban Art
from the Farber Collection
Organized by the Samuel P. Harn Museum of Art
University of Florida, Gainesville, Kerry Oliver-Smith, Curator
Over the past three decades, the art of Cuba has had a remarkable impact on emerging global contemporary art. Drawing on a variety of experimental, conceptual, and postmodern strategies, contemporary Cuban artists have challenged accepted artistic and political discourse not only in their own society but in the international arena, reversing conventional art-world notions of “center” and “periphery” and embodying a provocative, ironic, and omnivorously critical approach.
Cuba Avant-Garde encompasses the full scope of contemporary Cuban art beginning with the crucial period of the early 1980s, which saw the resurgence in artistic production and political openness that marked the birth of “New Cuban Art.”
The exhibition includes significant works by internationally renowned artists such as José Bedia, Antonio Fernandez (Tonel), Los Carpinteros, Tania Bruguera, Carlos Garaicoa, Alexis Leyva (KCHO), Luis Cruz Azaceta, Magdalena Campos Pons and Elsa Mora. The artworks presented in Cuba Avant-Garde encompass a broad range of media-large-format paintings, drawings, prints, photographs, sculptures and mixed-media. Collectively, the exhibition highlights the cultural mixing, aesthetic diversity and critical voice that reflect the influence of international contemporary art, but more importantly, emerge from the distinct circumstances of Cuba itself.
Image:
Maria Magdelena Campos Pons, Elevata, 2004. Courtesy of the artist and Cuba Avant-Garde Inc.
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email | call Robin McCarthy at 626.577.9696 extension 300 |