Havana, 11 November 2021. Thirty-seven years of history bear witness to and validate the importance of holding the 14th Havana Biennial – despite pandemics, blockades and boycott attempts – given the commitment to continue serving as a point of convergence for horizontal dialogue and open interaction among creators, curators, cultural leaders and intermediaries in the circulation of art from different latitudes.
The event has the backing of the artists, curators and specialists who will participate, as was announced to the press by its director Nelson Ramirez de Arellano, who called for respecting and supporting the efforts of those who, around the world, have put their energies into making the Biennial possible.
Today attempts are being made to promote a boycott of our country’s most important contemporary art event; tomorrow any other festival could be the target, since what some are trying to destroy is the possibility for life to resume its course in our nation, the eminent artist stated.
Attempts to prevent the 14th Havana Biennial from taking place are based on “an anti-cultural, exclusionary position, since asking artists to refrain from presenting their proposals, asking professional intellectuals not to express their opinions, is tantamount to censorship, to attacking anyone who wishes, of their own free will, to attend this event. To assume this position of coercion and restrictions not only for Cubans, but for personalities of other nationalities as well, would be to choose de facto complicity with the imperial powers attempting to silence the raised voices of the South,” he insisted.
The legitimacy of the event was also reflected in a statement published in the Mexican newspaper La Jornada, in which more than 150 artists from ten countries express support for the Biennial and the right to exist of this prestigious event, of Cuba and of respectful, solidary, enriching interaction between cultures and peoples.
“It is truly painful that those instigating this campaign owe, to a great extent, their professional training, public recognition and international notoriety to the cultural policy, the artistic education system, the cultural institutions and the event they disparage today,” the letter notes.
Efforts to deprive the public and artists of the festival have their toxic roots in 1984, when for the first time attacks were mounted against the Biennial. But not even in the most difficult times has its organization been renounced, because if anything distinguishes Cuba, it is our culture and persistent creativity. This is why the organizing team developed a special structure and conception of this14th edition, given the reality within and beyond the island.
This is why the exhibition period was extended; why international transportation of works was reduced; why environmentally friendly projects making rational use of resources were selected, and why equipment is being reused.
The Havana Biennial is an anti-hegemonic space that privileges the right of art to be shared, and which from November 12, 2021 through April 30, 2022, will bring together some 300 creators from around the world.
Future and contemporaneity await the opening of this approach to art from traditional and innovative perspectives, always anchored in creative freedom and the decolonizing impulse of art and culture.
Source: Granma
