C U L T U R E

• Culture has made a deep impression throughout the year
December.30.09
ONE year is an apparently short space of time in life. When it concerns appreciating what has occurred over that period in the field of culture alone, it so happens that it has made a deep impression on the memories of many people.

• First ALBA Casa Cultural opens its doors in Havana
December.17.09
THE Casa del ALBA Cultural in Havana, the first in a network being promoted in the region of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America, was formally inaugurated on Sunday, December 13 in an event attended by Cuban President Raúl Castro, Hugo Chávez and Daniel Ortega, the heads of state of Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua, respectively, and Ralph Gonsalves, prime minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

• El Premio Flaco captures attention
December.15.09
AMONG the 11 prizes presented during the Havana Film Festival by institutions and organizations linked to the world of culture, specialist film journalists and critics, four were directly presented to Juan Carlos Cremata for his film El premio flaco.

• 31st Festival of New Latin American Cinema concludes
Coral Prizes are no surprise
December.14.09
THE Havana film festival jury was indulgent this year. The Coral Prizes went to the most predictable films. Although they were genuinely the best films at the festival, this has never stopped past juries from making more controversial decisions.

• Curtis Hanson and Robert Kraft in Havana
December.7.09
TWO famous Hollywood figures have arrived in Havana. One, Robert Kraft, is an American songwriter and the other, Curtis Hanson, is an American filmmaker. They both have their own private interests in coming to Cuba.

• Havana Film Festival inaugurated
December.4.09
SINGER Omara Portuondo and pianist Chucho Valdés, two symbols of Cuban culture, were the stars of the inaugural gala (December 3) of the 31st International Festival of New Latin American Cinema.

• INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL OF NEW LATIN AMERICAN CINEMA
The secret in many eyes
December.3.09
EL secreto de sus ojos (The Secret in Their Eyes), the latest film from Argentine Juan José Campanella, with well-known actors Ricardo Darín, Guillermo, Francella, and Soledad Villamil in the leading roles, has been chosen to open the 31st International Festival of New Latin American Cinema. It comes to Havana with many guarantees, among them the fact that the Academy of Cinematographic Arts and Sciences of Argentina has selected it to compete for a place in the Oscars.

• 31ST INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL OF NEW LATIN AMERICAN CINEMA
Ten intense days of film in Havana
November.23.09
THE Havana Film Festival is an annual fiesta where filmmakers, the public and critics converse in order to agree and disagree. The exception of unanimity is in the shared desire to possess the gift of ubiquity. The Official Selection alone comprises 110 films, and the Parallel Section over 170. Omnipresence is an impossibility.

• Raúl attends song concert
October.14.09
THE certainty that the music of Juan Almeida Bosque will continue to enrich the spiritual heritage of the nation was confirmed yesterday with the song concert staged at MINFAR’s Universal Hall entitled "With an outstretched hand" and attended by President Raúl Castro Ruz.

• An entire century of poetry
October.1.09
IMPASSIONED is a good description for the book El siglo entero, by the researcher, essayist and poet Virgilio López Lemus, published by Editorial Oriente and available in the country’s bookstores.

• The return of Mi socio Manolo and Cheo Malanga
October.1.09
THE play Mi socio Manolo recently returned to the Havana stage – in a version of the classic text by playwright Eugenio Hernández Espinosa (winner of the Cuban National Theater Prize) written in the 1970s and set in a marginal neighborhood in Havana.

• Arts in the World
REVEALING LOOKS IN PARIS
October.1.09
IN the land of Henri Cartier-Bresson, two Cuban masters of photography, Liborio Noval and Roberto Salas, admit that they "were lucky" in being able to seize the perfect moment to capture the historic images currently being exhibited in Paris.¡

• A Bronx cheer for lying
October.1.09
WHEN trumpeter Alexander Abreu demonstrated his talent during the Peace without Borders Concert in the Plaza de la Revolución, that seemed to many of us the finest confirmation that there are performers in Cuba who are as excellent or better than those who always lie to gain importance in non-musical terms.

• Four Cuban films in production
September.3.09
FOUR Cuban directors from different generations are currently filming or have their films in different stages of post-production. Two of them are among the most renowned directors on the island - Fernando Pérez and Daniel Díaz Torres – and the other two have been acclaimed since their beginnings - Juan Carlos Cremata and Esteban Insausti.

• ART IN THE WORLD
NATIONAL BALLET ON TOUR
September.3.09
THE Cuban National Ballet is to travel to Spain this September as part of a European tour that finishes in Genoa, Italy in November, according to a statement by the company’s general director Alicia Alonso.

• New novel by Marta Rojas
September.3.09
FROM El columpio de Rey Spencer (Rey Spencer’s Swing) to Inglesa por un año (English for One Year), readers have discovered in our colleague Marta Rojas an exceptional storyteller in her novels. At "Readings by the Sea," a literature promotion event that ended the summer festival on Avenida de la Puerta, her most recent book, El equipage amarillo (Yellow Luggage) from the Letras Cubanas publishing house, made its appearance. She tells us about it in her own voice.
- Synopsis

• Fervor in Ecuador for Silvio?
August.7.09
GUAYAQUIL.—Cuban singer/songwriter Silvio Rodríguez’ upcoming concert in this coastal city is mobilizing his admirers all over Ecuador, who are heading to participate today, Friday, in events celebrating the bicentenary of that nation’s independence.

• Sergio and José María Vitier: the mystery of music
June.25.09
WHEN people talk about Cuban musicians Sergio and José María Vitier, the thought that immediately comes to mind is a verse from a song by Silvio Rodríguez, the composer and trovador who has enchanted generations of Cubans.

• Amada Morado: versatility and artistic rigor
May.15.09
AMADA Morado is an actress who transmits impressive assurance. Her versatility is another characteristic to highlight in an extensive and intense career spanning more than forty years.

• Isidro Rolando: National Dance Prize 2009
May.15.09
ROLANDO Thorndike, one of the most faithful exponents of the technique of Cuban contemporary dance in which generations of national and foreign dancers have been trained, has been recognized with the National Dance Prize 2009.

• Caribe Girls celebrate 10th anniversary with new album
May.8.09
CUBA’S female groups have a rich tradition. They have successfully made incursions into all musical genres, distinguishing themselves for their virtuosity and interpretative quality. Within this panorama, one group that has made its mark for the past decade is Caribe Girls, directed by Thiving Guerra.

• ICOM-ICOMOS headquarters in Cuba inaugurated
May.8.09
IN a recently renovated building, members of the Cuban delegation of the International Council of Museums (ICOM) and the International Council on Museums and Sites (ICOMOS) gather to inaugurate their new headquarters and systematize the work of different specialists. The two organizations are designed to develop heritage work on the island. Their new home was restored years ago by Leonardo Morales – one of Cuba’s most eminent architects, without whom, according to Eusebio Leal, "the modern history of Havana, of Vedado, could not have been written."

• Cuban child wins award in world drawing contest
March 31.09
JUAN Mauro Petrirena, aged 10, has won a bronze medal with a drawing entitled Parque Subacuático (Underwater Park) in the 16th International Children’s Drawing Competition in Japan, in which 51,918 children from 68 countries participated.

• Raúl at ICAIC 50th anniversary celebration
March 25.09
PRESIDENT Raúl Castro last night decorated Alfredo Guevara with the Order of José Martí, by agreement of the Council of State, and presented to the Cuban Film Institute (ICAIC) a certificate of recognition marking the 50th anniversary of its founding.

• Book fair will begin touring Cuban cities
February 23.09
THE 2009 International Book Fair ended yesterday with the presentation of awards to works that stood out for their originality and creativity among the many books available to the public that flooded the San Carlos de La Cabaña Fortress.

• Nelson Domínguez, or shades of ochre, black and gray
January 29.09
"I like doing portraits to capture the essence of people, although I do not at all consider myself a portrait artist," Nelson Domínguez told me one afternoon in his gallery as he sketched an outline of my face on a piece of olive green cardstock.

• Carlos Pérez Peña: 2009 National Theater Prize 2009
January 29.09
"CONSIDERED one of the best performers in our country, Carlos Pérez Peña (Sagua La Grande, May 30, 1938)... This man of the stage is an essential reference point for our activities, committed to a way of making theater that has its own truth in the authenticity of his dedication, in the experience that we all know is shared in his here and now…

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