The Individual, Auto/biography and History in South Africa

decoration and public display of political allegiance. This time, the representations of
Mao went beyond merely projecting images of a leader. These woven silk pictures
were portable visual biographies, through which the life and achievements of Mao, the
leader, were narrated for circulation and display.
Kunzle’s exhibition, which marked the thirtieth anniversary of Che’s death,
incorporated Cuban images of Guevara as well as portrayals from other Latin
American countries, the United States, Europe and Vietnam. A group of Cuban posters
depicting Guevara’s ideals of solidarity with Third World societies was also included.
Overall, the exhibition examined two legacies, that of “the omnipresent image of Che
Guevara as a heroic figure” as well as the vitality of the political poster as a “weapon
against injustice”. In the exhibition, the origins of the Che myth were traced in part to
photographs depicting Guevara’s death in 1967. A famous photographic image by
Bolivian photographer Freddy Alborta of the display of Guevara’s corpse to the press
by the Bolivian army as proof of his death was meant to “extinguish Guevara’s
legend”. However, on being sent around the world, the photograph “enhanced the
religious aura surrounding his martyrdom and ennobled his cause”. The image of
Che’s dead body was likened to that of the dead Christ giving rise to artistic variations
of Che in Christ‐like posture. More generally, as Che’s bearded face and starred beret
were reproduced on posters, murals, T‐shirts and banners, his charismatic image
became “a political archetype”. 128
For over thirty years, protest posters “transmitted and promoted Che’s ideals, hopes,
and dreams” as well as those of others who sought “to challenge the status quo”. 129 Yet
the Che image of 1967 Cuban posters was very different from the Che produced in the
United States in the 1990s, in which he had become a “commercial logo”. The “hero
iconography” that emerged in Cuba in the first few years after Che’s death was “far
128 Carol A Wells, ‘Preface’, in David Kunzle, Che Guevara: Icon, Myth, and Message, p 11; UCLA
Latin Americanist, No 31, Fall 1997, p 7. Carol Wells was the Executive Director of the Centre for the
Study of Political Graphics in 1997.
129 Carol A Wells, ‘Preface’, in David Kunzle, Che Guevara: Icon, Myth, and Message, p 11.
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