Adiós Utopia: Dreams and Deceptions in Cuban Art Since 1950

Adiós Utopia: Dreams and Deceptions in Cuban Art Since 1950, an aptly titled exhibition on view now at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, is an engaging sample of multimedia artworks from Cuba since 1950 and is the first full-scale exhibition of Cuban artwork in the United States since the 1944 exhibition,Modern Cuban Painters, presented by the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

During a time of favorable relations between the US and Cuba – nearly a decade after the The US abandoned its right to intervene in Cuba’s internal affairs – the MOMA exhibition presented, with approximately eighty oils, watercolors, gouaches, and drawings, a selection of the era’s vigorous modern Cuban art.The artworks included were brought to this country by noted art critic of the time Jose Gomez Sicre. The historic exhibition marked the end of a period of close cooperation between Cuba and the United States that began with the 1940 election of Cuban President Fulgencio Batista.

Adiós Utopia, as it’s title says, picks up with artwork from 1950 – a time during which revolutionary leader Fidel Castro, with later aid from Argentine Ernesto “Che” Guevara, waged guerrilla warfare and incited a civil war against the existing Batista regime. It is through the filter of this warfare and complex political strife that the works shown in Adiós Utopia are made.

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