Collectivism after Modernism - autonomous learning - Blogs

136 Rachel Weiss
things to a head: censorship of exhibitions became a routine response by the
authorities, 109 and the summary removal of the more liberal cultural administrators
who had been advocates for or protectors of the young artists left
the situation even more polarized. Although under the weight of this continual
tension and confrontation some of the collectives began to fray, the
showdown between artists and power also had the opposite effect, becoming
in itself a collective referent and galvanizing unity and collective purpose
not only among the small groups that had been such irritants but also among
virtually all of the active and visible artists in the city. If the groups discussed
above functioned collectively according to a range of deWnitions, methodologies,
and linkages, they also functioned, increasingly until around 1989, as
a collective of collectives.
Performances, exhibitions, interventions, debates, disturbances,
aggressions, retaliations, counterretaliations all piled up like tightly packed
isobars in the years between 1986 and 1989. “The moment of splendor of
these groups was 1987 and 1988,” writes Aldito Menéndez,
It took the Cuban government two years to dismantle this phenomenon which, like a
child, had slipped between its legs . . . Debates and group shows took place in galleries,
museums, universities and all kinds of cultural centers, and in private homes, parks and
streets. We were not focused on personal beneWt or transcendence, but rather on fraternal
collaboration based on common goals . . . Artists met almost every day, since there was a
strong sense of the historic role that we were playing, and the leaders of the movement
wanted to achieve certain goals by setting out collective strategies to meet them before
we were neutralized. We were working against the clock, and immediacy and the ephemeral
were the only means of achieving transcendence. . . . None of this would have been
possible if it had not been for the popular support we received from the outset. Nothing
was easier for the experienced and efWcient Cuban censors than to repress a bunch of
crazy youths, but the massive popular participation in our events created international
repercussions that made the work of the censors quite difWcult. Here we must ask: why did
the Cuban people support modes of expression that were strange and incomprehensible?
Very simply because the same worries and needs that motivated us were shared by them,
and because these angry and rebellious methods established an alternative mode of public
communication that compensated for the lack of liberty in the mass media. Our works
expressed popular sentiments, and the public ratiWed this by their approving presence. 110
At a certain point this sense of mutual purpose and will made the
collectives obsolete: there were numerous crossovers and collaborations that
had blurred the boundaries of the grouplets, their work often addressed similar
or overlapping issues, and there had been a rich and cumulative dialogue
among the artists, all of which enhanced the sense of being one large polis.
“We shared ideas,” recalls Lázaro Saavedra,
actually we worked together from the point of view of discussions, reXections. For instance,
we came to similar conclusions regarding the pedagogy of art, . . . battles we felt we had
to win. There were various nuclei of interests that had to be renewed . . . that was the