A R T T H R O B _ D I A R Y

Diary
Sue Williamson writes about Havana: continued.

Monday, March 23

This is my last morning in the small Cuban fishing town of Cojimar before moving back into the city of Havana to finish work for the Biennale, which opens on Friday. My show, which I have entitled The Truth is on the Walls at the Wilfredo Lam Centre in the old part of Havana, will open the following morning, on Saturday, March 29.

Before I go, I am to meet two fishermen I interviewed last week, Reco, who used to fish with Ernest Hemingway, and Mario, two months younger than the 90 year old Reco. They will take me into the fishermen's area, where each has a fishing shack and they moor their boats. The area is fenced off, a military zone, but last week my assistant Annia and I met a security person called Cheecho (should have learned the correct spelling on that one!) who said there would be no problem with me coming into the area. This morning I plan to take videos and photographs.

But when I reach the barrier between the beach and the fisherman's zone, Cheecho is nowhere to be found, and as a foreign person, I am not allowed to enter. I have to be satisfied with taking photographs of Reco and Mario on the beach. It's frustrating.

Tuesday, March 24

In the Wilfredo Lam Centre in Havana, I am using my future exhibition space as a studio space, to paint sheets of cardboard in the particular shade of saturated turquoise blue seen on woodwork all over Havana, and the complementary deep yellow, cutting out letters from the cardboard to serve as moveable text.

This morning I receive a welcome visit to my working space. The only African to take part in the Cuban Revolution was Ronald Herboldt, a Cape Town sailor who got stuck in Havana and decided to stay and get involved in the fighting. He married a Cuban and had two daughters, until forty years later he decided to return to his home country. His story was filmed in the Jack Lewis's documentary Brothers in Arms. His wife, Maria, stayed in Havana with one daughter, Jenny, and these two women come to meet me this morning. I have brought a parcel of medicine from Maria's other daughter Thelma, who now lives in Cape Town. Herboldt died of a heart attack soon after his return, so the meeting is an emotional one.

Wednesday, March 25

An SMS announces artist Berni Searle has arrived in town and is ready to party even after the 30 hour flight from Cape Town via Paris, so we head through the dark streets for the Wilfredo Lam where the first big Biennale event is being held ñ the presentation of the catalogue. A great thing for me about Havana is that even though the streets are dark, narrow and badly lit, I feel safe walking about at night, and feel certain that a single scream would bring instant help from the always friendly Cubans.

At the Centre, the courtyard is packed, the mojitos are flowing, amazing snacks are being passed around, and people are clamouring to get their copy of the substantial and beautiful catalogue. The Cubans have always known how to throw a party.

Thursday, March 26

Well, the answer from the local authorities in Cojimar has finally come back. I am not allowed to put text up on the old hotel Campoamor. Or for that matter, anywhere else in Cojimar. Not for the month long period of the Biennale, not even for a few hours, long enough to take a photograph. As I was invited by the Biennale to carry out a public art project based on text drawn from interviews in Cojimar, this is more than a little strange. Clearly, freedom of speech is being sacrificed to a fear of controversy.

Will have to come up with Plan B. I have written one text message up on the wall of my space, a comment by an artist in Cojimar. In English, his statement was THE BLOCKADE IS ALSO IN THE MIND, and also in Spanish, EL BLOQUEO ESTA TAMBIEN EN LA MENTE. Other comments reflecting different points of view would have gone up on other buildings.

Now I will have to be content with putting up Photoshopped images of the texts I would have liked to have done. Hardly very satisfactory.

Friday, March 27

The grand opening of the Biennale, in the old Cabana Fortaleza. Crowds stream through the exhibitions spaces, listen to the speeches, enjoy the afterparty concert.

Saturday, March 28

The opening of the three shows at the Wilfredo Lam Centre. With more flashbulbs flashing in my face and video cameras trained upon me than I have ever experienced, I give a walkabout of my show to the charismatic Minister of Culture, the writer Abel Prieto. When I have to explain my project in Cojimar, and say that I did not get permission to carry it out, Prieto asks brusquely, 'WHO didn't give you permission?' I say that it was the Cojimar authorities, and the minister promises to personally escort me to Cojimar tomorrow to put up the text. Wonderful.

Further arrangements are made over a restaurant lunch for Biennale guests, presided over by the Minister, a genial raconteur. I phone artist friends in Cojimar to tell them the project is going ahead after all, and to be ready to help the next day.

Sunday, March 29

But the next morning, a note is slipped under my hotel room door at 8a.m. It's from the Ministry of Culture. My presence is required at a 9 a.m. meeting at the Wilfredo Lam Centre. There, I am told that in fact the ministry has no control over the local authorities at Cojimar who have confirmed that they will not allow any text to go up anywhere.

Should I go ahead anyway, I am told, I might be endangering future biennales by my refusal to respect local law. The Minister has said I may put the text up in his office, but for me this not an option. As an interior space, it is not a public place, and will defeat the idea.

Or if I wish, I can put the text up on another derelict building, in the elite suburb of Miramar, home to the diplomatic corps. Backed into a corner, knowing that a number of the artists who have agreed to assist are leaving Havana tomorrow, I agree. The discourse around projects like this is always a part of the work, and for this reason I will accept whichever outdoor venue is offered. We load the cardboard letters into two cars.

Leaving the crowded streets of old Havana, we drive deeper and deeper into an area of large properties, security guards and swimming pools. The heavily fenced clinic where Fidel Castro goes for treatment is pointed out. Finally, we are driven up to and through a security boom. Wherever we are going, it is well away from public gaze.

Our destination turns out to be a nondescript factory type building, which we are told we may not enter for fear of ground glass in the air. We are in an area used for film locations. There is a banana plantation behind the building. No one is around. It would be hard to find a less public place in the whole of Havana.

The photo shoot goes forward. The English BLOCKADE text is mounted on to the front of the building and photographed. The Spanish BLOQUEO text is held up word by word by the artists and Cuban friends who have come to support the project, against a background of the banana plantation and photographed. We have very little time. The Minister has sent a message asking us to join him for lunch at the opening of a community centre project some distance away.

The community centre opening is a lot of fun, with three organizers wearing amazing white latex costumes with maps and little buildings representing the area on them, and there is a sense of relief at having at least taken some photographs of the BLOCKADE text.

But at the same time, as an artist who comes from a country where the state for many years, under apartheid, went to extreme lengths to suppress information and the spread of ideas, it is a déjà vu situation for me, a clear recognition of the same attempts to manage and control artistic endeavours here in Cuba.

For the sake of the cultural vitality and health of a country which I respect and admire in so many other ways, I hope this changes soon.

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	Fisherman Mario on the beach at Cojimar in the Wilfredo Lam Centre, Havana The barman pours mojitos at the catalogue launch party The Fortaleza Cabana is one of the main biennale venues Photo: Husain Essop Artists Mike Waugh and Andrew Putter erect cardboard type in Miramar Amazing street map costumes at a community centre opening				Diary Sue Williamson writes about Havana: continued. Monday, March 23 This is my last morning in the small Cuban fishing town of Cojimar before moving back into the city of Havana to finish work for the Biennale, which opens on Friday. My show, which I have entitled The Truth is on the Walls at the Wilfredo Lam Centre in the old part of Havana, will open the following morning, on Saturday, March 29. Before I go, I am to meet two fishermen I interviewed last week, Reco, who used to fish with Ernest Hemingway, and Mario, two months younger than the 90 year old Reco. They will take me into the fishermen's area, where each has a fishing shack and they moor their boats. The area is fenced off, a military zone, but last week my assistant Annia and I met a security person called Cheecho (should have learned the correct spelling on that one!) who said there would be no problem with me coming into the area. This morning I plan to take videos and photographs. But when I reach the barrier between the beach and the fisherman's zone, Cheecho is nowhere to be found, and as a foreign person, I am not allowed to enter. I have to be satisfied with taking photographs of Reco and Mario on the beach. It's frustrating. Tuesday, March 24 In the Wilfredo Lam Centre in Havana, I am using my future exhibition space as a studio space, to paint sheets of cardboard in the particular shade of saturated turquoise blue seen on woodwork all over Havana, and the complementary deep yellow, cutting out letters from the cardboard to serve as moveable text. This morning I receive a welcome visit to my working space. The only African to take part in the Cuban Revolution was Ronald Herboldt, a Cape Town sailor who got stuck in Havana and decided to stay and get involved in the fighting. He married a Cuban and had two daughters, until forty years later he decided to return to his home country. His story was filmed in the Jack Lewis's documentary Brothers in Arms. His wife, Maria, stayed in Havana with one daughter, Jenny, and these two women come to meet me this morning. I have brought a parcel of medicine from Maria's other daughter Thelma, who now lives in Cape Town. Herboldt died of a heart attack soon after his return, so the meeting is an emotional one. Wednesday, March 25 An SMS announces artist Berni Searle has arrived in town and is ready to party even after the 30 hour flight from Cape Town via Paris, so we head through the dark streets for the Wilfredo Lam where the first big Biennale event is being held ñ the presentation of the catalogue. A great thing for me about Havana is that even though the streets are dark, narrow and badly lit, I feel safe walking about at night, and feel certain that a single scream would bring instant help from the always friendly Cubans. At the Centre, the courtyard is packed, the mojitos are flowing, amazing snacks are being passed around, and people are clamouring to get their copy of the substantial and beautiful catalogue. The Cubans have always known how to throw a party. Thursday, March 26 Well, the answer from the local authorities in Cojimar has finally come back. I am not allowed to put text up on the old hotel Campoamor. Or for that matter, anywhere else in Cojimar. Not for the month long period of the Biennale, not even for a few hours, long enough to take a photograph. As I was invited by the Biennale to carry out a public art project based on text drawn from interviews in Cojimar, this is more than a little strange. Clearly, freedom of speech is being sacrificed to a fear of controversy. Will have to come up with Plan B. I have written one text message up on the wall of my space, a comment by an artist in Cojimar. In English, his statement was THE BLOCKADE IS ALSO IN THE MIND, and also in Spanish, EL BLOQUEO ESTA TAMBIEN EN LA MENTE. Other comments reflecting different points of view would have gone up on other buildings. Now I will have to be content with putting up Photoshopped images of the texts I would have liked to have done. Hardly very satisfactory. Friday, March 27 The grand opening of the Biennale, in the old Cabana Fortaleza. Crowds stream through the exhibitions spaces, listen to the speeches, enjoy the afterparty concert. Saturday, March 28 The opening of the three shows at the Wilfredo Lam Centre. With more flashbulbs flashing in my face and video cameras trained upon me than I have ever experienced, I give a walkabout of my show to the charismatic Minister of Culture, the writer Abel Prieto. When I have to explain my project in Cojimar, and say that I did not get permission to carry it out, Prieto asks brusquely, 'WHO didn't give you permission?' I say that it was the Cojimar authorities, and the minister promises to personally escort me to Cojimar tomorrow to put up the text. Wonderful. Further arrangements are made over a restaurant lunch for Biennale guests, presided over by the Minister, a genial raconteur. I phone artist friends in Cojimar to tell them the project is going ahead after all, and to be ready to help the next day. Sunday, March 29 But the next morning, a note is slipped under my hotel room door at 8a.m. It's from the Ministry of Culture. My presence is required at a 9 a.m. meeting at the Wilfredo Lam Centre. There, I am told that in fact the ministry has no control over the local authorities at Cojimar who have confirmed that they will not allow any text to go up anywhere. Should I go ahead anyway, I am told, I might be endangering future biennales by my refusal to respect local law. The Minister has said I may put the text up in his office, but for me this not an option. As an interior space, it is not a public place, and will defeat the idea. Or if I wish, I can put the text up on another derelict building, in the elite suburb of Miramar, home to the diplomatic corps. Backed into a corner, knowing that a number of the artists who have agreed to assist are leaving Havana tomorrow, I agree. The discourse around projects like this is always a part of the work, and for this reason I will accept whichever outdoor venue is offered. We load the cardboard letters into two cars. Leaving the crowded streets of old Havana, we drive deeper and deeper into an area of large properties, security guards and swimming pools. The heavily fenced clinic where Fidel Castro goes for treatment is pointed out. Finally, we are driven up to and through a security boom. Wherever we are going, it is well away from public gaze. Our destination turns out to be a nondescript factory type building, which we are told we may not enter for fear of ground glass in the air. We are in an area used for film locations. There is a banana plantation behind the building. No one is around. It would be hard to find a less public place in the whole of Havana. The photo shoot goes forward. The English BLOCKADE text is mounted on to the front of the building and photographed. The Spanish BLOQUEO text is held up word by word by the artists and Cuban friends who have come to support the project, against a background of the banana plantation and photographed. We have very little time. The Minister has sent a message asking us to join him for lunch at the opening of a community centre project some distance away. The community centre opening is a lot of fun, with three organizers wearing amazing white latex costumes with maps and little buildings representing the area on them, and there is a sense of relief at having at least taken some photographs of the BLOCKADE text. But at the same time, as an artist who comes from a country where the state for many years, under apartheid, went to extreme lengths to suppress information and the spread of ideas, it is a déjà vu situation for me, a clear recognition of the same attempts to manage and control artistic endeavours here in Cuba. For the sake of the cultural vitality and health of a country which I respect and admire in so many other ways, I hope this changes soon.