Pedro Álvarez Exhibition Opens at Cuba’s National Museum of Fine Arts

This last Friday of December, the exhibition Keep on Painting, Peter will open at 4:00 p.m. in the temporary exhibition galleries on the second level of the Cuban Art Building at the National Museum of Fine Arts of Cuba.

Curated by José Ángel Toirac, Dannys Montes de Oca, and Jorge A. Fernández Torres, the exhibition traces the artistic legacy of Pedro Álvarez (1967–2004). It brings together oil paintings on canvas, sketches, silkscreens, and works in other media dating from 1985 to 2003. The selection includes pieces preserved by the museum, works from the artist’s studio, and items from other collections, presented in dialogue with works from the institution’s own holdings.

Regarded as one of the most perceptive artists of his generation, Álvarez introduced a renewed vision of reality into Cuban art, drawing upon the history of art itself as a central reference, according to specialists.

As noted by Corina Matamoros Tuma, Curator of Contemporary Art at the National Museum of Fine Arts of Cuba: “His original way of blending history, settings, and symbols from different eras allowed him to speak about the present, and about Cuban circumstances in particular. His works often bring together, within a single scene, Afro-Cuban ‘little devils,’ women drawn from colonial painting, classic American cars known as almendrones, or Coca-Cola emblems. Through this seemingly chaotic mixture, he achieves a fresh and intelligent reading of national reality, rich in analysis and humor.”

Translated by Luis E. Amador Dominguez

Photo: National Museum of Fine Arts of Cuba