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  • Nuevas adquisiciones noticias | Belkis Ayón

    David Castillo & Belkis Ayón Estate announce two major acquisitions of the artist’s rare multi-panel works by The Museum of Modern Art, NY and National Gallery of Art, D.C. In collaboration with the artist’s estate, David Castillo will present the first gallery solo exhibition of Ayón’s work since her death in 1999, which will be on view from January 30 – April 25, 2024. On the occasion of the exhibition, the gallery is releasing a monograph on the artist featuring two historical interviews and selected key works, published by [NAME]. "I use collagraphy because it seems to me the most appropriate technique to express what I want to." Belkis Ayón, Resurrección , 1998, collagraph, 108.87 x 85 inches Belkis Ayón Resurrection 1998 Resurrección was acquired by The Museum of Modern Art at Art Basel in Basel / David Castillo (Booth D14). Between 1991 and 1998, Belkis Ayón made a series of large-format multi-panel collographs, chief among them, Resurrección (1998). Containing varied elements of the Abakuá and using Sikán as the central figure, Resurrección, depicts subjects, emergent and upright, foregrounded by a slumped male figure clad in symbolic head painting. Of the four main figures, Sikán punctuates the composition in hue and in gesture, tracing allegories of her myth across a personal autobiography. David Castillo Booth D14 at Art Basel in Basel 2023 Belkis Ayón, Sin Titulo (Mujer en Posición Fetal), 1996, collagraph, 89 x 67 inches Belkis Ayón Untitled (Woman in fetal position) 1996 Sin Titulo (Mujer en Posición Fetal) was acquired by National Gallery of Art at Art Basel in Miami Beach / David Castillo (Booth F34) Belkis Ayón’s masterful collographs illustrate the sacred mythologies of the Abakuá, an Afro-Cuban belief system and secret society only men can join. Ayón’s works depict teachings that were forbidden to her as a woman; Sikán—the only woman represented in the religion’s pantheon is put to death for revealing Abakuán secrets. Ayón reimagined this figure’s tragic story across her collographs, bringing them both—one human, one myth—together to navigate male-dominated worlds. David Castillo Booth F34 at Art Basel in Miami Beach 2022

  • Textos | Belkis Ayón

    TEXTS REVIEW INTERVIEWS REVELATIONS

  • Belkis Ayón (1967-1999) | Cuban Printmaker

    Belkis Ayon in the collections of Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), N.Y. and the National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. Collection

  • News | Belkis Ayón

    NEWS Belkis Ayón at the 34th São Paulo Biennial The 34th edition of the Sao Paulo Biennial will feature the work of Belkis Ayón (Havana 1967-1999). The event, one of the most prestigious in the world and an indisputable reference for the art of our continent, will host 16 works by the renowned Cuban artist. READ MORE February, 2020: Nkame arrives at the Chicago Cultural Center The traveling exhibition Nkame: A Retrospective of the Cuban Printmaker Belkis Ayón (1967-1999) will be inaugurated on February 29, 2020, at its sixth venue, the Chicago Cultural Center. READ MORE IV National Collography Contest Belkis Ayón Announcement for the IV national Collography Contest Belkis Ayón. April 9-12, 2020. Cienfuegos ​ IV Edition postponed due to the epidemiological situation with the Covid-19 READ MORE Behind the veil of a myth. New book about Belkis Ayón's artwork Behind the veil of a myth, with texts by the curator Cristina Vives, was produced by the Station Museum of Contemporary Art and the Belkis Ayón Estate. READ MORE Nkame arrives at the Station Museum of Contemporary Art in Houston, Texas After the successful presentations in different cities of the United States while traveling through this country, the exhibition Nkame. A Retrospective of the Cuban Printmaker Belkis Ayón (1967-1999), arrives at the Station Museum in Houston, Texas. READ MORE Nkame: A Retrospective of the Cuban Printmaker Belkis Ayón, selected among the best of the art of 2017 worldwide by ARTnews magazine ... among other very important contemporary art exhibitions of the year, Nkame ... was selected in position number 4, among the best exhibitions in the world of the year 2017 ... READ MORE Nkame: A Retrospective of the Cuban Printamker Belkis Ayón, selected among the best of art of 2017 by the New York Times Nkame featured this summer at Museo del Barrio, NY (June 13 - November 5) was selected among the best of the art of 2017 by the New York Times ... READ MORE Nkame: A Retrospective of the Cuban Printmaker Belkis Ayón (1967-1999) at the Museo del Barrio, New York. The exhibition Nkame: A Retrospective of the Cuban Printmaker Belkis Ayón will be inaugurated at the Museo del Barrio in New York on June 13. This will be the second venue to host the artist's first personal exhibition at an institution in the United States ... READ MORE Nkame: A Retrospective of the Cuban Printmaker Belkis Ayon (1967-1999) at the Fowler Museum at UCLA This will be the artist's first personal exhibition at an institution in the United States. The exhibition brings together 43 works and a documentary by the American filmmaker Sun Meidia ... READ MORE Memories Belkis Ayón's work will be part of the exhibition "Memories" that will open next Thursday, April 14 at 6:00 pm in the Gallery Orígenes of the Gran Teatro de La Habana «Alicia Alonso». READ MORE The 2015 Palma Digital Prize is awarded to the website of the artist Belkis Ayón READ MORE An interdisciplinary course in order to improve English language skills The mysterious character in the image is a student who selected the piece by Belkis Ayón and covered his face alluding to the work it represented ... READ MORE Callaloo Art & Culture in the African Diaspora Magazine illustrated its cover with the piece La Cena, 1988 by Belkis Ayón Issue 4 of the Callaloo Art & Culture in the African Diaspora Magazine illustrated its cover with the piece La Cena de 1988 by Belkis Ayón, of which we can find a dossier with more of her works and specific aspects of her artistic life. READ MORE Agglutinated between the esoteric and the Manic Art Under the title of Witches, but also Warlocks, the Aglutinador space and the Maniac Art Museum these days exhibit a sui generis sample that blends art with rites and religious beliefs from different parts of the planet. READ MORE The book Nkame wins Second Prize for the best books published in Spain in 2010 The Ministry of Culture of Spain has awarded the Awards for the Best Edited Books in 2010. These awards do not have an economic endowment but are highly valued by publishers for what they mean of recognition and prestige to their editorial work, as well as for the dissemination that it entails, being included in the book promotion actions and exhibited at the main national and international fairs. READ MORE Curatorship Award 2009 The National Council of Plastic Arts presents the CURATORSHIP AWARD to Cristina Vives for NKAME. BELKIS AYÓN (1967-1999). ANTHOLOGICAL EXHIBITION. READ MORE Book NKAME. Belkis Ayón The National Museum of Fine Arts, the National Council of Plastic Arts, José A. Figueroa, and the Belkis Ayón Estate presented at the MNBA Theater. ARTE CUBANO Building, the books: NKAME, Belkis Ayón and José A. Figueroa. A Cuban Self-Portrait. READ MORE

  • En cofidencia irregular | Belkis Ayón

    In irregular confidence David Mateo March 4, 1997 © LA GACETA DE CUBA Magazine, No 2, March / April 1997, year 35, p. 50-51.v ​ … Not a single word of anticipation or impatience. She knows that she is the main reason for this conversation and yet she waits patiently for Segura to finish explaining her sculpture project to me. I have the impression that I have seen her many times in that same deferential attitude, lavishing everything as if everything were superior to her. I do not even know if it is by adhesion or remembrance that I have come to think that his serenity has nothing to do with a marriage courtesy, but that even condescension continues to be his second virtue after colographies. “It seems that your work aspires to become universal, I tell him, as he hands me a group of matrices on a small table in his apartment in Alamar. The first one represents a fish woman, beginning in the spiritual world of one between two Jicoteas women; but the poetic atmosphere that the relationship between each one of them acquires is so moving that the allegory of the Abakuá legend and its particularly liturgical iconography almost seems to diminish; I had already noticed something similar with the inclusion of the Holy Spirit in one of the winning works at the Maastrich International Biennial. ​ To some extent I have always been distant from the Abakuá mythology because my position is rather that of an observer. Distance is precisely that perspective in which I place myself to establish analogies and incorporate any universal experience into the particular logic of myth. I could give you the example of the work Repentida, which was one of the winners in the recent Engraving Meeting, in it a woman appears tearing her skin as a symbol of the ambivalence between what we want to be and what we really are. It seems to me that the Abakuá theme is going to be the starting point for a long time, the pretext for comparisons with life. The universe that its characters and incidental narratives enclose is enough by itself to prefigure any reason for human existence, an equivalence that I have begun to glimpse much more now with the relationship studies that I am carrying out between the mythical Abakuá and Christian religiosity. , for the purpose of creating something of a kind of personal holiness. ​ -But won't you deny me that this process of interlinking between the specific circumstances of the myth and the social cosmogony is produced through a merely female speculation? Do you remember when I told you that you insert a feminine ideal where there never was? ​ I have never thought that my work is feminist. I've never had that built-in calling. The first person who tried to draw attention to this aspect was the critic Eugenio Valdés, and it may even be that there is some reason that my work induces a certain femininity, because it reflects my own existential uncertainty; but I have not conceptualized it that way. The legend of the Sikán is a theme that I have been working on in my engravings since San Alejandro and what has always caught my attention is the condition of victim of the female character, but from a rather generic position, weighing the connotations and the analogies that could be derived from such a situation. ​ And why then your insistence on self-representation? ​ It is true that I am the model of my figurations. They shift with me from one state to another continuously, and even lose weight along with me. They are characters that I submit because I like the idea of ​​deciding their destinies. They are the only alternative of revenge, or correction, lightening the term a little, with which I can count in reality; however I live a less mythical life, I exist from a much more objective perspective, much more objective. ​ The imposition of destinations should consequently alter the meaning of the Abakuá fiction that you allude to. Aren't you afraid of offending the legend? What do the believers you have come in contact with think of that? ​ The Abakuá who have valued my work are mostly intellectuals, and in one way or another they have identified with the project. So far I have not found any detractors. The very mystery of the legend, how hidden some of its meanings have been in the historical development is what has given me precisely the opportunity to make certain speculations, but my position has never been to recriminate the brotherhood, but for the contrary to respecting it and promulgating it in its broadest cultural sense. ​ In this part of the conversation we have already reviewed about six or seven matrices, meticulously delineated with synthetic material, sandpaper, carborundum, gesso and all kinds of rare products in the colographic tradition. It occurs to me to ask Belkis what could happen if all those singular montages that are already ready to give the effects that she has been anticipating, had been drawn or painted on a canvas, and that is when her frankness turns into stupor: ​ I have always been a very bad draftsman. Perhaps because they never demanded an Academy in the Elementary School studies, in the end I decided on engraving. Without realizing it I was creating a kind of trauma with drawing and painting and so I began to look for a type of image that was credible but did not emphasize anatomical delicacies. Then I discovered that with this synthesis of details I protected the mystery of the images more, and that I had to continue emphasizing poses, gestures, and gaze, trying to avoid certain definitions. I may one day get over the trauma and start painting, but I haven't thought about doing it yet. ​ What in your opinion are the immediate antecedents of all this form of representation of yours? ​ I really liked Russian Byzantine icons. I spent a good deal of time looking at them in art books, until one day I discovered that they were perfectly comparable to all Abakuá imagery. I remember that it was a time when I was researching Afro-Cuban cults and specifically the Anafouranas when something curious happened to me: I was in a class in San Alejandro trying to make a kind of dancing devil and Pablo Borges, who was my teacher at that time, told me with the spirit of being impressed, that what I was doing could bring me serious implications, and it was from that moment that I became interested in this type of representation; although in those days my approach to the matter was purely esoteric. In the libraries they denied me the information and enough I had to ask for a letter of authorization in the School. As far as the Legend of the Sikán is concerned, I consider that the reading I did of the book "El monte" by Lidia Cabrera was transcendental, although my awareness of the episode was total when I studied "Los Ñañigos" by Enrique Sosa. I have been about to comment to Belkis about two categories of the Canadian critic Northrop Frye: myth and commitment, which, although they were not issued specifically for the field of Plastic Arts, through them an approximate allegory of his work could also be attempted artistic. But I have only been on the verge of doing it, because in the end I have reserved it for myself, procuring a few more reasons for the literal intervals of this parliament. Something that may even run the risk of forced matching and that goes something like this: "The engravings of Belkis Ayón could be interpreted from the maxim of the critic Northrop Frye, in which he assures that art is" a laboratory where new myths of commitment were prepared, released. " Fabular selection occurs in her case by way of visual and epic identification, mediated almost entirely by a deeply feminine aesthetic rationality - which apparently does not mean the same as feminist, although it is an approach to a deeply macho myth. - We would say that your work assumes a story in which an unequivocal value judgment is represented, from the point of view of the sexual nature of the person who stars and transmits it, although that judgment provides or alludes to cosmogony phenomena such as good and evil, betrayal and sacrifice and the confrontation between victims and perpetrators, and it is precisely within those limits of chaos that she incurs, restoring patterns of behavior and imposing alternative roles. If it were allegories of Frye's notions, his "new myth of commitment" would lie in the fact of opposing a sense of critical analysis to the hermetic interpretation of the mythological event and also in the additional purpose of extending those same collation experiences towards other manifestations of the interhuman bond. Short tense ending and clearly blessed, where the speculator is relieved of his guilt complex: Belkis, it is one thing that I believe in the conformity of all our irregular conversations or our considerations about the plastic arts, and another that I go around commenting on vindications in Cuban engraving, relying on the work of 6 or 7 artists, among which I intend to include you by the way, without even having consulted you before. That is why I take the opportunity now: Am I or am I not right? ​ I believe that important technical concepts and principles are currently being revitalized in Cuban engraving. In my particular case, I would tell you that I am very interested in the level of discursive and aesthetic credibility that matrices can achieve in their final printing, and therefore I try to generate value effects, including color, by experimenting with novel materials. In other young engravers, the tradition has also been altered from many points of view, fundamentally with the experimentation of new supports, with the flexibility of the criteria on seriality with the dynamization, and sometimes even challenge or parody, of technical methods. habitual and in the very consolidation of the ethics of the trade ... and if all this can be called renewal, then I do not think it is bad that someone like you continues to comment on it. ​ PREVIOUS article back to texts

  • Exposiones personales | Belkis Ayón

    SOLO EXHIBITIONS Phillys Kind Gallery, New York, 1998 Couturier Gallery, Los Angeles, California, 1998 St Barbara Church, Aachen, Germany, 1995 1989 Proposal at the age of twenty (Belkis Ayón and Isary Paulet), Servando Cabrera Art Gallery, December 23-January, 1989, Havana. . . 1990 Sikán Kien, Leopoldo Romañach Art Gallery, June 30, Caibarién, Villa Clara, Cuba. . Sikan Kien, the powerful and wise, Art Gallery III Congress, August, Ranchuelo, Villa Clara, Cuba. . . 1991 Sacred memory, Alamar Art Center, June 22, Havana / Art Center, Guantánamo, Cuba. . . 1992 Art Cubain Contemporain (Belkis Ayón and Eduardo Yáñez), Center d'Exposition de la Gare L'Annonciation, May 1-27, L'Annonciation, Québec, Canada. . Engravings, Saw Gallery, May 7, Ottawa, Canada. . . 1993 Evidences of vindication (Belkis Ayón, Isary Paulet, Ibrahim Miranda), Centro de Arte 23 y 12, October-November, Havana. . I always go back. Engravings by Belkis Ayón, Provincial Center of Plastic Arts and Design, November 30-December, Havana. . . 1994 I always come back, Galleria Colorenero, May 17-June 11, Milan, Italy. . Belkis Ayón and Santiago Rodríguez Olazábal, [Galleria] Cheiros, Palazzo Colonnese Valeri, December 8-January, 1995, Vicenza, Italy. . . nineteen ninety five I always go back. Personal exhibition Belkis Ayón, Grau Gallery, Visual Arts Development Center, July, Cienfuegos, Cuba. . Unterstütze mich, halte mich hoch, im Schmerz. Belkis Ayón (Hold me in pain. Belkis Ayón), Kirche St Barbara, November 3-19, Breinig / Ludwig Forum fur Internationale Kunst, Aachen, Germany. . . nineteen ninety six Belkis Ayón, Cuban artiste, Galerie Bourbon-Lally, April 19, Pétionville, Haiti. . Two Contemporary Cuban Artists: Belkis Ayón and Nelson Domínguez, Hofstra Museum, Hofstra University, April 21-August 2, Hempstead, New York, United States. . . 1997 Ángel Ramírez + Belkis Ayón. The New Wave of Cuban Art - I, Gallery gan, March 31-April 26, Tokyo, Japan. . Grand Pas de Trois. Sixth Biennial of Havana, (Norberto Marrero, Belkis Ayón and Juan Carlos Menéndez), Zulueta esq. a Refugio, 5th. floor, apt. 52, May 3-31, Havana. . . 1998 Desasosiego / Restlessness, Couturier Gallery, March 6-April 11, Los Angeles, California, United States. . Bernardo Marqués / Belkis Ayón, Havana Galerie, August 27-December 5, Zurich, Switzerland. . Belkis Ayón / Elsa Mora. Recent Work, Phyllis Kind Gallery, September 19-October 31, New York, United States. . Belkis Ayón & Ángel Ramírez. The New Wave of Cuban Art –II, November 6-December 20. Gallery Gan, Tokío, Japan. . . 1999 Rites. Photographies by René Peña; Collographies by Belkis Ayón, Bourbon-Lally Gallery, May 14, Pétionville, Haiti. . . 2000 I always go back. Collographies by Belkis Ayón. Tribute exhibition, Seventh Havana Biennial, Galería Habana, November 15-December 18, Havana. . . 2001 Images from silence. Collographies and matrices by Belkis Ayón, National Museum of Fine Arts, July, Havana. For a return. Collographies of Belkis Ayón, Caguayo Foundation, Provincial Center of Plastic Arts and Design, November 2, Santiago de Cuba, Cuba. . . 2002 Belkis Ayón. La Huella Múltiple 2002 (personal exhibition), April 19-May 19. La Casona Gallery, Havana. . . 2003 Belkis Ayón Early Work, Patricia Doran Graduate Gallery, Massachusetts College of Art, April 4-19, Boston, Massachusetts, United States. . . 2004 Resurrection. Belkis Ayón (1967-1999) Collographs from Cuba, Massachusetts College of Art, Arthur Ross Gallery, University of Pennsylvania and Brandywine Workshop, October 11-January 4, 2004, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. . . I always go back. Collographies of Belkis Ayón, Recoleta Cultural Center, May 21-June 21, Buenos Aires, Argentina. Reunion. Exhibition of Belkis Ayón and his students. Exhibition in tribute to the artist, José Antonio Díaz Peláez Gallery, San Alejandro Academy, July 6, Havana. . . 2005 I always go back. Colographs by Belkis Ayón, Colón Art Gallery, June 3-30, Colón, Matanzas, Cuba. I always go back. Colografías of Belkis Ayon, Provincial Art Gallery Villa Clara, July, Santa Clara, Villa Clara, Cuba. . . 2006 Belkis Returns. Collographies of Belkis Ayón, Ranchuelo Art Gallery, February 3-28, Ranchuelo, Villa Clara, Cuba. The challenge of permanence. Anthological exhibition of Belkis Ayón (1967-1999), Pedro Esquerré Gallery, CPAV, May 12-June 11, Matanzas, Cuba. Belkis Ayón. Origin of a myth, Villa Manuela Gallery, October 6 to November 4, Havana. . 2007 Sikan. Revelation of a myth, Art Gallery Raúl Martínez, Jan. 17- Feb. 15. Ciego de Avila, Cuba. . . 2009 Nkame. Belkis Ayón (1967-1999), Anthological Exhibition, San Francisco de Asís Convent, September 11 - December 20, Havana, Cuba. . .

  • Colectivas2 | Belkis Ayón

    COLLECTIVE EXHIBITIONS Ajiaco: Stirrings of the Cuban soul Lyman Allyn Art Museum, New London, Connecticut, United States ​ ​ September 12, 2009 - February 21, 2010 Read more Roots & More. Journey of the Spirits Afrika Museum, Berg en Dal, Holland ​ ​ April 7 - November 7, 2009 Read more Cuba, Mexico, United States, Portugal ​ November 2006 - 2010 ​ Confluences Inside Read more return to collective exhibitions

  • National Collography Contest | Belkis Ayón

    NATIONAL COLLOGRAPHY CONTEST BELKIS AYÓN find out MORE

  • Critique | Belkis Ayón

    CRITIQUE Remembering Belkis Ayón, on the 10th anniversary of his physical disappearance. Isbel Alba . February 4, 2015 A date not to forget: In the collective imagination, September 11 has become a date of loss and pain after the terrorist attacks perpetrated against the Twin Towers, in New York, in 2001. However, today, I am going to highlight another item , perhaps more intimate because it is ours, perhaps more questionable because it was caused by our own design, leaving us incognito and the terrible feeling that accompanies certain misunderstood, bitter gestures. It is about the Cuban artist Belkis Ayón Manso (1967-1999) ... READ MORE Belkis Ayón. Preamble to an infinite journey to earth Norberto Marrero . December 1, 1999 For us, weary of the tumult and bad nights, arriving in Alamar (land of promise) meant, among other things, being able to verify that there was still a full place, devoid of hatred and betrayal; a castle where we could exercise ourselves in the greatest and clearest spiritual tranquility. Then Belkis would appear with her huge eyes of an Egyptian goddess, she ushered us in, and no one dared to let go of her spirit anymore, and we stayed hanging comfortably by her smile, her contagious optimism ... READ MORE The respectful arbitrariness of Belkis Ayón Orlando Hernandez . February 19, 1992 It does not seem unusual to me that it is a woman. Make it a woman again. That this woman is now called Belkis (and not Sikán or Sikanekue) does not change things at all. Nor that the setting, the time, the details turn out to be something different. The story is the same again. To be repeated. Unceasingly. As in the beginning of the myth, it is necessary for a woman to appear again. The same? Other? Perhaps it is indifferent. Every religious knows ... READ MORE

  • Exposiciones colectivas | Belkis Ayón

    COLLECTIVE EXHIBITIONS 1983 II National Salon of Plastic Arts. Middle Level Schools. Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, Havana, Cuba. . 1986 VII Biennial of San Juan of Latin American and Caribbean Engraving [November 19/1986 February 28/1987]. Arsenal de la Marina, San Juan, Puerto Rico. . 1987 La Joven Estampa Award. Haydeé Santamaría Gallery, Casa de las Américas, Havana, Cuba. . Encounter of Engraving 87. National Museum of Fine Arts, Havana, Cuba. . III International Exhibition of Engraving, New Delhi, India. . . 1988 Malerei und Grafik aus Kuba [January-February]. Kunsthalle Rostock, Rostock, GDR Cuban Art in Boston [May 9-23]. Massachusetts College of Art, Administration Building, Boston, MA., United States. 3rd Hall of Awardees [May]. National Museum of Fine Arts, Havana, CUBA. First Exhibition of Cuban Graphics in Guadalajara [July 7]. Cabañas Cultural Institute, Museum Area, rooms 127 130, Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico. VIII Biennial of San Juan of Latin American and Caribbean Engraving [September 30-December 30]. Arsenal de la Marina, San Juan, Puerto Rico. II Latin American Biennial of Graphic Arts. Museum of Contemporary Hispanic Art (MOCHA), NY, United States. . . 1989 Tribute (collateral to the Third Havana Biennial) [November]. Alamar Art Center, East Havana, Havana, Cuba. The 15th International Independent Exhibition of Prints in Kanagawa'89 [November 23-December 10]. Kanagawa Prefectural Gallery, Kanagawa, Japan. . 1990 Intergrafik'90 [April 17-May 27]. Berlin, GDR 6th International Biennial Exhibition of Portrait, Drawings and Graphic. Tuzla 90 [July 31-October 31]. The Yugoslav Portrait Gallery, Tuzla, Yugoslavia. La Joven Estampa Award [October 13?]. Haydeé Santamaría Gallery, Casa de las Américas, Havana, Cuba. [November 22-December 9]. Kanagawa Prefectural Gallery, Kanagawa, Japan. Young Cuban Recorders. Nucleus of Contemporary Art, Joao Pessoa, Paraiba / Museu Assis Chatebriant, Campina Grande, Paraiba / Federal University Gallery, Rio Grande do Norte / Evasión Gallery, Sâo Paulo, Brazil. . . 1991 Seventh Triennale India 1991 [February 13-March 14]. Lalit Kala Gallery / Rabindra Bhavan / Bahawalpur House Complex, New Delhi, India. Challenge to colonization. Fourth Biennial of Havana [November 15-December 31]. National Museum of Fine Arts, Havana, Cuba. Contemporary Cuban Engraving. Fourth Biennial of Havana [November]. Colonial Art Museum, Havana, Cuba. The Second Bharat Bhavan International Biennial of Prints [December 9-31]. Roopankar Museum of Fine Arts, Bharat Bhavan, Bhopa, India. . . 1992 Silk Screen Prints from René Portocarrero Serigraphy Workshop [January 15-February 14]. La Peña Cultural Center, Berkeley, CA., United States. Von dort aus: Kuba [March 12-May 31]. Ludwig Forum für Internationale Kunst, Aachen, Germany. Africa in America [July 3-19]. Casa das Artes e da Historia, Vigo, Spain. The Cuban Round [July 4-August 31]. Van Reekum Museum, Apeldoorn, The Netherlands. X Mostra da Gravura Cidade de Curitiba / Mostra America, Afro America A. Spiritual Contribution X. Mostra da Gravura [Outubro 16-Dezembro 6]. Romário Martins House, Curitiba, Brazil. Young Recorders [October 16-December 6]. Provincial Center of Plastic Arts and Design, Havana, Cuba. 20 Cuban Plastics [November 12-?]. University Artistic Center, National University of Cuyo, Mendoza, Argentina. The 17th International Independante Exhibition of Prints in Kanagawa'92 [November 19-December 6]. Kanagawa Prefectural Gallery, Kanagawa, Japan. Art Festival, Shanghai, China. . 1993 La Joven Estampa Award [June August]. Haydeé Santamaría Gallery, Casa de las Américas, Havana, Cuba. 1st Internationale Grafiek Biennale [June 24-August 9]. Maastricht Exhibition and Congress Center (MECC), Maastricht, The Netherlands. Punti Cardinali dell'Arte. XLV Biennale di Venezia [Giugno-Ottobre]. Istituto Italo Latino Americano, Venezia, Italy. Empassant de Collectie [October 1-December 4]. Van Reekum Museum, Apeldoorn, The Netherlands. Encounter of Engraving '93 [October-November]. Provincial Center of Plastic Arts and Design, Havana, Cuba. With their own hands [December / 1993-January / 1994]. Engraving Gallery, Experimental Graphic Workshop, Havana, Cuba. Five Creative Women. Palacio del Segundo Cabo, Havana, Cuba. Graphica Creativa 93. The 7th International Print Triennial. Alvar Aalto Museum, Finland. . 1994 La Jeune Peinture Cubaine [Janvier 18-Février 11]. Maison de la Culture du Lametin, Fort de France, Martinique, France. Arte do momento [February 28-March 6]. Gessy Lever Social Center, Valinhos, Brazil. Art of the moment [Março 11-18]. Biblioteca da FURB, Blumenau, Brazil. Art of the moment [Março 23-29]. Auditorio Alceu Amoroso Lima, Brazil. Art of the moment [April 11-16]. Latin American Gallery, House of the Americas, Havana, Cuba. Vindication of the Engraving [March 24-?]. La Acacia Gallery, Havana, Cuba. Cuban Art of Today / Art Cubain Actuel [Avril 14-Mai 7]. Galerie de L'UQAM, Université du Québec à Montréal, Montréal, Québec, Canada. A gap between heaven and earth. Fifth Biennial of Havana [May July]. Provincial Center of Plastic Arts and Design, Havana, Cuba. Cuban Art. The Last Sixty Years [October 15-December 31]. Panamerican Art Gallery, Dallas, TX., United States. The Shapes of the Earth [February-March]. Buades Gallery, Madrid, Spain. Kunst aus Kuba [March-April]. Museum Bavaria, Zürich, Switzerland. One of Each Class. Ludwig de Cuba Foundation [March 26-?]. Center for Conservation, Restoration and Museology (CENCREM), Havana, Cuba. [Video catalog] International Exhibition of Contemporary Art of Non-Aligned Countries [April 28-June 30]. National Gallery, Jakarta, Indonesia. Kuba Kunst Heute. Grafiksammlug Schreiner [July]. Stadtgalerie Bamberg, Villa Dessauer, Bamberg, Germany. Made in Cuba [July August]. «Luis Miró Quesada» room. Cultural Center of the Municipality of Miraflores, Lima, Peru. Art of the Moment II. Cuba Mexico Brazil [July-August]. Espuela de Plata Gallery, Center for the Development of Visual Arts, Havana, CUBA. / [October]. Michoacan Institute of Culture, Michoacán, Morelia, Mexico. Cuban Mystic. Arte dell'ultima generazione [October 18-November 5]. Openspace, Palazzo dell'Arengario / [Ottobre 18-29]. Spazio Vigentina, Milano, Italy. . nineteen ninety five Current Cuban Plastic [October 24/1995 February 3/1996]. Fotocentre (Gallery of the Union of Journalists of Russia), Moscow, Russia / [1996]. Embassy of the Republic of Cuba, Beijing, China. . XI Mostra da Gravura Cidade de Curitiba [Outubro 31 December 29]. Fundaçao Cultural de Curitiba, Curitiba, Brazil. Contemporary Cuban Painting. Cuban Afro-Caribbean Painting Show [November 7-?]. Veracruzano Institute of Culture, Veracruz / [November 23-?]. "Ramón Alva de la Canal" University Gallery, Veracruzana University, Veracruz / [December 6-?]. Cabildos Room, CD. Mendoza, Veracruz / [December 18-24]. Town Hall, Orizaba, Veracruz, Mexico. Estampa Edition 95. International Exhibition of Engraving and Contemporary Art Editors [November 7-12]. Superior Room of the Old Spanish Museum of Contemporary Art, Madrid, Spain. 1st. Contemporary Cuban Art Salon [November 15/1995 January 15/1996]. National Museum of Fine Arts, Havana, Cuba. Warehouse Gallery, Lee, MA., United States. Alex Rosenberg Fine Art, NY, United States. . Women Beyond Borders [1995]. Wifredo Lam Center, Havana, CUBA. / [nineteen ninety five]. Santa Barbara Contemporary Arts Forum, Santa Barbara, CA., UNITED STATES. / [nineteen ninety six]. ICC Contemporary Gallery, Jerusalem, ISRAEL / [1996]. Kunstlerhaus, Graz, AUSTRIA / [August 7/1998]. Wifredo Lam Center, Havana, Cuba. . nineteen ninety six Dream World. Young Cuban Plastic [February-March]. House of America, Madrid, Spain. Zonder Woorden [March]. Van Reekum Museum, Apeldoorn, The Netherlands. Arte do Momento. Encontre Latino Americano de Artes [Março]. Pavilhâo Antonio Palácio Neto, Mons. Bruno Nardini Municipal Park, Valinhos, Brazil. Cuba 20th century. Modernity and Syncretism [April 16 June 9] Atlantic Center of Modern Art, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria / [July 2 September 1]. La Caixa Foundation, Palma de Mayorca / [October 8 November 17]. Center d'Art Santa Mónica, Generalitat de Catalunya, Barcelona, ​​Spain. Skulpturen und Grafische Werke aus Kuba [September 25-November 2]. Museum Leuengasse, Zürich, Switzerland. The budding womb. Contemporary Cuban Graphic Art Show [November-December]. Exhibition Hall, Faculty of Arts, University of Antioquia, Colombia. . Transgressing the Limits / Today as Yesterday. The Multiple Footprint. Collective Exhibition of Contemporary Engraving [December / 1996 January / 1997]. Visual Arts Development Center, Havana, Cuba. . 1997 ARCO'97 International Contemporary Art Fair [February 13-18]. Juan Carlos I Fair Park, Madrid, Spain. Represented by Galería Habana, Havana, Cuba. Pervasive Referents. Belkis Ayón, Attila Richard Lukacs, Elsa María Mora, Manuel Ocampo [April 19-May 31]. Phyllis Kind Gallery, NY, United States. '97 Kwangju Biennale. Unmapping the Earth. Speed. Hybrid. Power. Becoming [September 1-November 27]. Art Museum. Kwangju, South Korea. Take part in the «Hybrid» section. Polychrome of black. Contemporary Cuban art [September 11-?]. Quintana Monterde. Contemporary Art, Mexico, DF, Mexico. Encounter of Engraving'97 [November]. Visual Arts Development Center, Havana, Cuba. . . 1998 Comment peut-on être cubain? [Février 10-Mars 12]. Maison de L'Amérique Latine, Paris / [Juliet]. Counvent des Minimes, Perpignan, France. XII Biennial of San Juan of Latin American and Caribbean Engraving [April 30-September 30]. Arsenal de la Marina, Institute of Puerto Rican Culture, San Juan, Puerto Rico. ART BA'98. 7th Art Galleries Fair [May 15-24]. General San Martín Municipal Exhibition Center, Buenos Aires, Argentina. Contemporary Art of Cuba [June 2-July 5]. Urasoe Museum, Okinawa / [July 18-August 2]. Hillside Forum Daikanyama, Tokyo / [December 1-7]. Iwaki City Cultural Hall, Iwaki, Japan. Contemporary Art From Cuba: Irony and Survival on the Utopian Island [September 26-December 13/1998] Arizona State University Art Museum, Tempe, AZ./[January 15-May 2/1999] Center for the Arts at Yerba Buena Gardens, San Francisco, CA./[June 5-August 15/1999]. Canbrook Art Museum, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan / [September 4-November 7/1999]. Austin Museum of Art, Austin, TX. / [February 11-April 23/2000]. Grand Rapids Art Museum, Grand Rapids, Michigan / [May 19-September 10/2000]. Museum of Latin American Art, Long Beach, CA, / [October 10-December 10/2000]. University Art Museum, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA./[January 13-March 18/2001]. Spencer Museum of Art, University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS./[May 11-July 14/2001]. University of South Florida, Contemporary Art Museum, Tampa Bay, FL., United States. Creole Kongo. Artists in Crossroads. Boricua Gallery Workshop [October 23-November 20], NY, United States. Estampa Edition 98. International Exhibition of Engraving and Contemporary Art Editors [November]. Fairground of Casa Campo, Madrid, Spain. . 1999 La Huella Múltiple 1999. Center for the Development of Visual Arts / Center for Conservation, Restoration and Museology (CENCREM), [January 15-February 13], Havana, Cuba. The 4th Kochi International Triennial Exhibition of Prints [March 12-]. Kochi, Japan. Afro-Cuban Contemporary Graphic Art. Roca, Miranda, Torres and Manso [April 7-August 13]. The Kennedy Center, Washington, DC, United States. Working for English [May 14-June 27]. Concourse Gallery, Ground Floor and Stalls, Barbican Center, London, UK Rituals Contemporary Room [May-June]. House of the Americas, Havana, Cuba. International Fair of Modern and Contemporary Art [September 16-20]. Carrousel del Louvre, Paris, France. Kunst-Welten im Dialog [November 5/1999-March 5/2000]. Museum Ludwig, Cologne, Germany. Cuban art. Beyond paper [December 3-1999-January-2000]. Conde Duque Cultural Center, Madrid, Spain. Gallery Gan, Tokyo, Japan, 1997 Casa América, Madrid, Spain, 1996 Apeldoorn, The Netherlands, 1992

  • Siempre vuelvo | Belkis Ayón

    I ALWAYS RETURN Havana Gallery, Havana, Cuba ​ November 2000 Tribute Exhibition General coordination: Katia Ayón and Dalia González Texts: Yolanda Wood, Hilda Ma. Rodríguez, David Mateo Sponsor: Gan Gallery, Tokyo, Japan. SponsorS: National Council of Plastic Arts Wifredo Lam Contemporary Art Center National Union of Writers Artists of Cuba Cuban Fund of Cultural Assets ​ VIRTUOSE OF LABYRINTHS From the same source of her power Their wounds come from Adrianne rich To Belkis Ayón We believed you to be a stone with an eternal edge, Unconquered Legends Challenge And we abandon ourselves to the lightning of your laughter, To the gravity of your image. Virtuous of labyrinths that she devoured with her hands, Persephone without temples or diaries, You left us only the crumbs of your cracks And the sob of a fleeing cortege. We thought you were a sumptuous abode of the tall word And we entrusted ourselves to the towers that wavered your iron silhouette We no longer listen to the whirlwind that stirred your waves, We do not notice the mist, nor the fragility of your shadow, And we get caught up in spasm and helplessness. We loved you the owner of the unfathomable magic, Of forges and bonfires But we didn't know about your bellows In the deep place of the unspeakable. A single blow burst out of grief, Anguish struck, erased the tracks And the silence and the pain left us Of the one who is still waiting. Hilda Maria Rodriguez September 1999 ​ ​ BACK OVER THE SENSES Once, naively, I thought I was penetrating the reserved universe of Belkis Ayón; I imagined that I could add to my curriculum of author revelations the unpublished fact that she did not know how to draw very well, and that it was her face and body that had always served as patterns for the elaboration of her images. The moment Belkis made that unusual confession to me, which I made public in La Gaceta de Cuba, I was able to allow myself to be seduced by the gesture of deference that she herself implied; although I also came to think that it was an attitude derived from a certain carelessness, a certain presumption, in someone who was not afraid to expose her imperfections because she had already entered the sacrosanct precinct of legitimation. I convinced myself in those days that her greatest expertise was then focused on knowing how to compensate for the lack of ability to carry out a precise sketch, a meticulous drawing, with the implementation of an impeccable, refined and strict collographic procedure in each phase of her particular method, and in which the impact of the composition fell fundamentally on a series of value and color effects. To all this was added, in my opinion, the suspicion of having known how to choose within the Cuban cultural heritage a legend little addressed by the plastic arts, in whose narrative nucleus the experienced woman the most deplorable of the principles: the absolute exclusion. By believing that I was breaking into the confidential space of Belkis Ayón's artistic production, the only thing I had actually managed to do with the appropriation of that news was timidly touch its vertices. I was not able to understand that this argument not only offered me the indispensable coordinates to unravel the devices that she used in the consummation of her works but also to be able to investigate the concerns and uncertainties that haunted her as a creator and individual. In other words, Belkis deposits in me, as perhaps she has done in other inquirers, the necessary indications for me to commit myself to develop a much deeper investigation, which would make the retaining wall demolish once and for all, the limit that I prefixed the difference between the public valuation of her work and her personal subsistence. Analyzing today the creation of this artist as a result of the unfortunate outcome of her life, it is presented to me in a very different way: much more humanized and visceral; stripped completely of the restraint implied by a technical concern; finally rescued from the desire to continue being legitimized as a project with a florist and almost anthropological spirit, without taking into account its purely existential foundation. I also realize that what I interpreted at the beginning as an absence of a definition, could now paradoxically become a reliable test of synthesis capacity. For if what seemed to interest her, was the use of the body as a depository model of dramatic force, it was logical to suppose that she eliminated everything superfluous, everything insignificant, in order to arrive at the scene of expression; it was enough then with a gesture, with a contortion, with a look ... When Belkis emphasizes the Sikan conflict, she seems to want to emphasize her own conflict. The cause of one was unfolding more and more until it became the cause of the other. The fantastic passage must have been the pretext, the excuse; and recreation with the figuration of the royal road to show the traces of anguish, of dissatisfaction that no one knew how to capture and dissolve, not even the beings closest to it. Despite the fact that some of us already felt a growing contradiction between the gloomy atmosphere, the excess of adversity that her works reflected, and the peaceful and optimistic character that she showed before others; even though, in the last days of her life, we forbid a very strange struggle to appear at times behind her gaze, a force something like between disturbed and apprehensive, which she knew how to hide very well with her inscrutable smile. David Mateo November 2000

  • nkame presentación del libro | Belkis Ayón

    PRESENTATION OF THE BOOK NKAME. BELKIS AYÓN July 20, 2009 © Belkis Ayón Estate The National Museum of Fine Arts, the National Council of Plastic Arts, José A. Figueroa, and the Belkis Ayón Estate presented at the MNBA Theater. ARTE CUBANO Building, the books: NKAME, Belkis Ayón and José A. Figueroa. A Cuban Self-Portrait, with the participation of Orlando Hernández. NKAME.Belkis Ayón: this book documents in a meticulous way, the life and work of the Cuban artist Belkis Ayón PROJECT DIRECTOR: Dr. Katia Ayón EDITORIAL CONCEPT: Cristina Vives AUTHORS: José Veigas, Cristina Vives, David Mateo, Lazara Menéndez DESIGN: Laura Llópiz 296 PAGES | 400 IMAGES | BILINGUAL SPANISH / ENGLISH EDITION TURNER EDITORES MADRID WITH THE SPONSORSHIP OF: Daros Latinamerica Collection, Zürich, Switzerland | The Von Christierson Collection, London, England | Afrikan Museum, Berg en Dal, The Netherlands | Cisneros-Fontanalls Foundation, Miami, USA | Alex and Carole Rosenberg, New York, USA | Brownsote Foundation, Paris, France | Caguayo Foundation, Stgo de Cuba, Cuba Belkis Ayón (1967-1999) left after her death a set of essential works for contemporary engraving. The religion and the Abakuá Secret Society (original from African Calabar, and settled in Cuba since the 19th century) served the artist as a "source" and a "reference" to construct a universal discourse against marginality, frustration, fear, censorship, impotence and in favor of the search for freedom. This society, created by men and for men, stigmatizes and segregates women and, in turn, maintains strict discipline and maintains unassailable ethics and mystery. Belkis penetrated the space of the rite as far as she was allowed, and studied all the sources of information at her reach. As a result, she created a breathtaking iconography and interpreted the religious myth from her position as an artist, woman, black, and Latina in the late 20th century. Nkame, synonymous with praise and salutation in the Abakuá language, pays tribute to a creator who left a message of life with her death. José A. Figueroa. A Cuban Self-Portrait: this book narrates more than four decades of the life of a country through the photographic work of José A. Figueroa. RESEARCH AND EDITING: Cristina Vives ESSAYS BY: Cristina Vives, Dannys Montes de Oca DESIGN: Pepe Menéndez 384 PAGES | 384 IMAGES | BILINGUAL SPANISH / ENGLISH EDITION TURNER EDITORES MADRID WITH THE SPONSORSHIP OF: The Busson Foundation Trust José A, Figueroa (Havana, 1946), began his professional life as a photographer in September 1964, when he began working at the Korda Studios in Havana. Due to his age, social extraction, and training, he is part of a generation of "transition" that was at the triumph of the Cuban Revolution in 1959, too young to be its manager, but adult enough as a conscious and analytical witness. His life and work, place him between "the inside" and "the outside" of that story. Also has allowed him to document, evaluate and symbolize many facets, both of the public and private life of the nation - two sides of the same coin - over many years; most importantly, it's a work made in Cuba or from a Cuban perspective. These characteristics and circumstances are, indeed, rare among their contemporaries or predecessors, seen individually. A Cuban self-portrait is approximately a portion of that story, through the work of one of the essential names in the history of Cuban photography. Promotional price of sale to the public in the presentation: 250 MN. Courtesy of the Belkis Ayón Estate; José A. Figueroa and the sponsors. PREVIOUS NEWS BACK TO NEWS

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