IDENTIDADES 1 ENGLISH IDENTIDADES 5 ENGLISH | Page 90

Many on the island have no access to
the Internet. How do they get access to
all this information?
We share what images we have in our
database free of charge and on a large
scale (on DVDs and thumb drives), nationally, particularly among independent broadcasters affiliated with official
Cuban institutions. This is particularly
the case if they are actively working and
have contact in Cuba’s emerging civil
society. We also disseminate our information via attractively designed and
apolitical, promotional, postcards.
CubaRaw makes available to anyone
who is interested in a beginner’s photography course, including textual and
audiovisual materials, both concretely
and virtually. Its focus is theoretical and
practical, and teaching independent
broadcasters and journalists how to
technically and artistically communicate
via photographs and other audiovisual
materials. They, in turn, can become
CubaRaw collaborators, and share and
promote this methodological information.
Who offers these workshops? What is
his or her goal?

In 2013, Orlando [Luis Pardo Lazo]
asked me to take charge of the Agency.
After that, Claudio Fuentes and I took
up the project once again, with photographer Silvia Corbelle, and with the
invaluable collaboration of painter Luis
Trápaga, whose home hosts CubaRaw’s
headquarters: the home-gallery El Círculo. It is thanks to this space that we
can realize all our exhibits, which
would otherwise exist only virtually, on
the Internet. This means they would be
available only to the international community that closely follows anything
having to do with Cuba, and just a few
privileged folks here. In recent years,
the number of galleries like this has
increased. Many artists’ and cultural
promoters’ homes are functioning the
same way. Their owners are very enthusiastic, despite the fact they lack resources. This is especially the case in El
Vedado, where there are also a number
of important, official galleries, “real”
ones, with large salons and professional
lighting, in contrast to the precarious
situation of those that fight to exist in
Havana’s alternative, underground, cultural life.

Claudio Fuentes Madan offers these
workshops. His goal is to offer independent bloggers and journalists a better
understanding of photography as a language, and how to achieve more autonomy in their work.

How does the idea of El Círculo come
about?
The first time we thought about the
name was on account of a series of
drawings by Luis Trápaga called El
Círculo Vicioso [The Vicious Circle].
Our statement read: a children’s play
circle, a chalk circle, a chromatic circle,
a polar circle, a never-closing circle.

You were telling me that the Agency’s
work somehow diminished in 2011.
What happened?
In 2011, the Agency was a bit neglected
due to the large amount of multifaceted
work that piled up for its coordinators.

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