Vol. 74/No. 47      December 13, 2010

“Before we knew nothing about the Cuban Five,” said Stephen Young, dean of students at PCYC. “Now I am aware of their struggle.” Young said he would like to help put together a program on the Cuban Five at his school.

The exhibit, titled “From My Altitude,” was shown at Homewood Studios, a street level art gallery in the heart of the Black community in North Minneapolis.

The art show featured 30 works by Guerrero, who learned to paint and draw from fellow inmates in Florence, Colorado, where he has been incarcerated for most of the past 12 years. Guerrero, along with the other four Cubans—Gerardo Hernández, Ramón Labañino, Fernando González, and René González—were convicted on frame-up charges, including “conspiracy to commit espionage” and, in the case of Hernández, “conspiracy to commit murder,” and received long prison sentences.

Known internationally as the Cuban Five, these revolutionaries were arrested in September 1998 in Miami. The five had been gathering information on right-wing Cuban exile groups in Florida that have a long history of carrying out violent acts against the Cuban Revolution, with the complicity of the U.S. government.

Guerrero was sentenced to life in prison plus 10 years. On October 13, 2009, his sentence was reduced to 21 years and 10 months, after an appeals court ruled that the sentences of three of the five—Guerrero, Labañino, and Fernando González—were excessive. The reduction in the draconian sentences was an acknowledgement of the pressure put on the U.S. government from the worldwide campaign demanding freedom for the Cuban Five.

The exhibit was sponsored by the Minnesota Cuba Committee and Obsidian Arts, a Black visual arts organization in Minneapolis.

The students were drawn to several of Guerrero’s works. Lapresha Robinson, a student at PCYC, liked the animal drawings, especially the one showing the leopard. “Very imaginative, such detail and lively colors, you see freedom in his eyes,” she said. “The artist must be strong like a leopard.”

Others were struck by Guerrero’s prison paintings—“Prison cell door” and “One day my prison shirt will be left hanging.” The latter one, especially, was commented on. “He’s going to get out one day, isn’t he?” asked one student. Another student liked the pencil drawings of the mothers of the Cuban Five.

The November 5 opening reception drew a crowd of 60 people and was followed a few days later by a “gallery talk,” initiated by George Roberts, the curator and owner of Homewood Studios. Both of these successful events led up to “A Conversation on the Politics of Freedom in Cuba and the U.S.,” attended by 35 people on November 19, a good number learning about the Cuban Five for the first time.

Many of those who came to the events at the studio were from the neighborhood.

To help raise awareness of the campaign to free the Cuban Five, Roberts printed one of Guerrero’s poems—“If they help you”—on beautiful card stock. These proved popular at the exhibit. With the help of friends, Roberts translated three poems by Guerrero—“A secure place to stand,” “I am a man,” and “Mother mine”—all found in “From My Altitude,” a book of poems Guerrero wrote while in solitary confinement in Miami following his arrest in 1998. The poems were displayed along with the artwork at the exhibit.

Guerrero, as described in his “Outline of my artistic development,” learned to paint and draw from fellow inmates. “Each work expresses not only my human essence but that of the Five, united by unbreakable principles,” he wrote. The “outline” along with other educational material was picked up by those who came to the exhibit.

The exhibit has been touring the United States. There have been shows in California, Colorado, Kentucky, New York, Oregon, Washington, D.C., and at the U.S. Social Forum in Detroit.  
 
 
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