Cuban Art comes to life at Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes

Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes (National Museum of Fine Arts), enriched by one of the largest collections of paintings and sculptures in Latinoamerica, is the biggest in the insular Caribbean. It has two buildings: Centro Asturiano is dedicated to universal art and Arte Cubano (Cuban Art) building, destined to the national collection, both located near of Paseo del Prado (Prado’s Promenade).

The “Arte Cubano” building owns a treasure that counts in more than 30,000 pieces. The artistic jewels are reduced to a permanent exhibition of 940 works, gathered in four conceptual nucleus: art in the colony, turn of the century, modern art and contemporary art.

Exposing our history

Thanks to the public benefits and efforts of architect Emilio Heredia Mora, descendant of distinguished Cuban poet Jose Maria Heredia, on 28 April 1913, the museum was officially inaugurated, seat was located in a section of the building known as Antiguo Fronton, situated in center of Old Havana.

In 1917, La Quinta de Toca (Toca’s Mansion), on Carlos III Avenue, becomes its new place. After the death of its founder, the architect Emilio Heredia Mora, management passes to Antonio Rodriguez Morey, who dedicates almost fifty years of his life to this institution.

On February 6, 1924, in the ancient Hermanos La Salle School (La Salle’s Brothers), in Aguiar Street, opens the museum for three decades with thirteen precarious exhibition halls.

In 1955, finally, collections were installed at Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, located on Trocadero Street, between Belgium Avenue also known as “Monserrate” and the Agramonte Street or “Zulueta” as some people call it, very close to sea.

With Cuban Revolution triumph in 1959, the museum changes its conception. It passes from being a multi-faceted museum to become a museum dedicated just to art. Since 1996, it enters in a remodeling process to open again to public in July of 2001 with newly adapted installations and the highest responsibility and specialization.

Collection of Cuban Art exhibited this museum

The most important Cuban collection in the world find in Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes is the ideal setting. The Institution preserves more than 4,300 paintings, 285 sculptures and 12,800 designs and engravings, as well as photographs and graphic art specimens.

In relation to colonial period, some pieces conceived in the 17th century were preserved, outnumbered by the 18th with its baroque aesthetic characteristic. From that last period, stand out Jose Nicolas de la Escalera and Juan del Rio paintings. In both, religious theme and portrait predominate, although de la Escalera prefers the religious theme, highlighting his work “La Santisima Trinidad” (The Holy Trinity).

In the early nineteenth century, the most frequent painting is the portrait, but in contrast to the 18th century, differ in poses and attitudes. In the nineteenth century, lithographic technique reached a great boom with the incorporation, by the engravers, of customs scenes and the so-called landscape painters.

In Cuban academicism, the “costumbrismo” and other pictorial tendencies passed from the XIX century to the XX century represented by paintings like “Embarque de Colon por Bobadilla”, painted by Armando Menocal; “Marina” by Leopoldo Romanach and “Atardecer”, by authorship of Domingo Ramos.

Have a wide representation the artistic avant-gardes of first half of the XX century and the series of great Cuban masters, including: Victor Manuel, Carlos Enriquez, Amelia Pelaez, Mario Carreno, Juan Roberto Diago and Wifredo Lam.

It’s a prolific period dominated by most diverse moods, suggested in works such as “Los Ninos”, oil painting by Fidelio Ponce, the surrealist “Rapto de las Mulatas” by Carlos Enriquez and the series of paints depicting roosters by Mariano Rodriguez.

The contemporary art section, usually the most visited, includes works by artists living in Cuba or in other countries, in which the strong presence of hyperrealism and symbolism in the post-revolutionary context is noted.

With no doubt, the production of the ’90s during the past century attracts the attention of the visitors, because it narrates the history of a difficult time in Cuba, becoming naked and pitiful gaze, from the artistic production.

A building dedicated to Cuban art

The codes of rationalist architecture are present in the Arte Cubano building with movable panels and free plants that facilitate the adjustment of the exhibition spaces, although the edifice exhibit traditional elements of Cuban architecture.

Divided into three exhibition floors, Museo de Arte Cubano makes it easy for the public to travel through it, without crowding, and delight the unusual and surprising creativity of these atypical Caribbean artists.

Beyond the exhibitions

Cultural options are diverse and accompany exhibitions into the Cuban Art building, mixture of luxury and modernity, warmth of the property is like home to important creative projects with children of the community.

Its theater is one of most important musical epicenters of Old Havana, where the intimate song and “nueva trova” find its ideal setting.

Those who come to the museum have the possibility to buy reproductions in their shop in all formats, serigraphs, postcards, catalogues and books.

Art is also present in functional objects: a cup of coffee, a shower curtain, a towel, or simply in an umbrella. An excellent option to feel the presence of art inside home.

However, the national history surrounds the Cuban art building. In front of its main entrance, the Granma Yacht’s Memorial, annexed to Revolution’s Museum, awaits for the visitors in this effort to captivate them with an important part of the Cuban History. Another suggestive option to retrace a city of museums, a city in constant interchange between past and present.

Talking about Cuban Art

If we are talking about Cuban Art, Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes contains the most representative of national visual artists. Make a visit is unequivocally an election that exalts the spirit of those who enter in his halls. A valuable approach to a priceless part of the culture of the Caribbean largest island.

Originally published at havanaprivatesuite.com.