IV Edición del Concurso Nacional de Colografía Belkis Ayón, 2021 IV National Collography Contest Belkis Ayón ANNOUNCEMENT The National Council of Plastic Arts, the Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba (UNEAC), and the Graphic Society of Cienfuegos, in coordination with Espacio Ayón, the Estate of Belkis Ayón, the Provincial Council of Plastic Arts, the Provincial Committee of the UNEAC and the Cuban Fund of Cultural Assets of the province of Cienfuegos, summon all interested artists and students to participate in the IV National Contest of Colography Belkis Ayón in tribute to one of the Cuban artists who marked, with her graphic work and pedagogical, a milestone in the history of Engraving in Cuba. Basis of Participation All Cuban students and artists with engravings made in the COLLOGRAPHY technique, printed between 2019 and 2020, who have not participated in a previous exhibition, event, or contest, may participate. Inscription The works must be sent unframed, through certified mail or in person, until March 18, 2020: To the Association of Plastic Artists of the UNEAC of Havana, appointment at 17 and H, Vedado. Tel. 78325781, in the case of artists and students residing in the western provinces (Pinar del Río, Havana, Artemisa, Mayabeque, Matanzas and Isla de la Juventud) To the Graphic Society of Cienfuegos, appointment at Ave. 50, # 2326, between Calle 23 and Calle 25, Cienfuegos 1, Cienfuegos. Tel. 43 517979, in the case of artists and students residing in the central provinces (Villa Clara, Cienfuegos, Sancti Spiritus and Ciego de Ávila) To the Caguayo Foundation, appointment at Calle 4 No. 403 between 15 and 17, Rpto Vista Alegre, Santiago de Cuba, CP 90400, Tel. 22 643492, in the case of artists and students residing in the eastern provinces (Camagüey, Las Tunas, Holguín, Granma, Santiago de Cuba, Guantánamo). Each artist will have the right to present three works (independent or triptych) duly signed and numbered in pencil, which cannot exceed 60 x 80 cm (paper measurements). Workshop or artist tests are not accepted. Selection A Jury will be appointed to select and award the works received. The selected and awarded works will be exhibited at the Cienfuegos Art Gallery, within the program of the 14th Feria de La Estampa, an event that will be officially inaugurated on April 9 and until April 12, 2020, making the final decision of the jury public. on April 9, at 9 pm, the opening day of the competitive exhibition. The exhibition will remain open to the public for 30 days. It will also be presented at the Casa del Benemérito de las Américas Benito Juárez of the Office of the City Historian, Havana, in 2020. The organizers of the contest are responsible for the care of the works sent, running with all the expenses generated by the return of the same to their authors. Prize A single and indivisible Grand Prize will be awarded consisting of 5 000.00 MN (donation from the artists belonging to the Belkis Ayón workshop and Estate), a diploma, and a reproduction of a work by the artist to whom the contest is dedicated. The Jury will award mentions at its discretion, without a financial award. The awarded artist will be invited to the Engraving Workshop "Magenta Rhinoceros" in the city of Toluca, Mexico, for a 10-day artistic residency. The winning works will become part of the Cienfuegos Stamp Cabinet. The awarded artist will be invited to carry out a personal exhibition at the Cienfuegos Art Center in 2022, within the official program of the V National Contest of Collography. The works not selected must contact the Organizing Committee for their return. Participating in the Belkis Ayón National Coloring Contest implies acceptance of these Terms and Conditions. The Jury's decision will be final. More information Organizing Committee of the Belkis Ayón National Coloring Contest ESTATE OF BELKIS AYÓN, HAVANA belkat@cubarte.cult.cu | 7 642 3083 GRAPHIC SOCIETY OF CIENFUEGOS caceres69@azurina.cult.cu | 43 517979 www.ayonbelkis.cult.cu

DRAPETOMANIA Galería de Arte Universal, Santiago de Cuba, Cuba / Consejo Nacional de Artes Plásticas, La Habana / 8th Floor Gallery, New York, United States / Museum of the African Diaspora, San Francisco, California, United States / The Ethelbert Cooper Gallery of African & African American Art, Harvard University, Boston, Massachusetts, United States. April, 2013 - 2015 The exhibition Drapetomanía: Grupo Antillano y the Art of Afro-Cuba, which was presented in Santiago de Cuba and Havana, arrives at Harvard University after having been shown in New York and San Francisco. Originally exhibited at the Provincial Center of Plastic Arts and Design in Santiago de Cuba (April-May, 2013), where it was described as "one of the best exhibitions of plastic arts in recent years in Santiago de Cuba," Drapetomanía now travels to the Ethelbert Cooper Gallery of African and Afro-American Art at Harvard University after have been exhibited at the Center for the Development of the Visual Arts in Havana, The 8th Floor Gallery in New York and the Museum of the African Diaspora (MoAD) in San Francisco. Drapetomanía pays tribute to Grupo Antillano (1978-1983), a previously forgotten cultural and artistic movement, which proposed a vision of Cuban culture that highlighted the importance of African and Afro-Caribbean elements in the formation of the nation. The exhibition offers a revisionist reading of the so-called “new Cuban art” and highlights the need to include the work of artists who tried to think about the Cuban from their connections with the African diaspora. Grupo Antillano's art is part of a long Caribbean tradition of resistance and cultural affirmation, of that "prodigious effort of self-defense" and of "ideological cimarronearía" that, according to the Haitian poet René Depestre, allowed the enslaved masses of the hemisphere rework their pasts and cultures. The title of the show, Drapetomania, refers to an alleged illness described in the mid-19th century by a plantation physician in Louisiana. From the Greek drapetes (escape, flee) and mania (madness), the most visible symptom of this curious disease was the irrepressible and pathological tendency of many slaves to flee and be free. In other words, the doctor described maroon as a disease, a disease, a deviation from the natural order, an expression of the indomitable savagery of blacks. Curated by historian Alejandro de la Fuente, professor at Harvard University, the Drapetomanía exhibition is complemented by the book Grupo Antillano: el arte de Afro-Cuba, edited by the curator of the exhibition, with essays by art critics and historians like Guillermina Ramos Cruz, José Veigas and Judith Bettelheim. The exhibition includes works by Grupo Antillano artists (Esteban Ayala, Rogelio Rodríguez Cobas, Manuel Couceiro, Herminio Escalona, Ever Fonseca, Ramón Haiti, Adelaida Herrera, Arnaldo Rodríguez Larrinaga, Oscar Rodríguez Lasseria, Alberto Lescay, Manuel Mendive, Leonel Morales, Clara Morera, Miguel Ocejo, Rafael Queneditt and Julia Valdés) and a group of contemporary artists who have shown in their work similar concerns to those articulated by Grupo Antillano (Belkis Ayón, Bedia, Choco, Diago, Esquivel, Marta María Pérez Bravo, Montalván, Olazábal, Douglas Pérez, Peña, Elio Rodríguez and Leandro Soto). In other words, Drapetomanía proposes a new genealogy in Cuban plastic arts that connects creators from generations and diverse artistic trajectories through their shared attention to issues such as race, identity, and the meanings of the Cuban. The show will be exhibited at Harvard from January 29 to the end of May of this year. Information provided by Alejandro de la Fuente, Curator.

COLLECTIVE EXHIBITIONS Renderings. New Narratives and Reinterpretations Mechanical Hall at Delaware University, Philadelphia, United States September 3 - 30, 2014 Read more Havana Factory, Old Havana, Havana, Cuba. May 23 - August 23, 2014 Glances Read more Without Masks. Contemporary Afro-Cuban Art. Museum of Anthropology (MOA), University of British Columbia, Johannesburg Gallery of Art, Vancouver, Canada, Johannesburg, South Africa May 2 - November 2, 2014 Read more Shanghai Urban Planning Exhibition Center (SUPEC), Shanghai, China March 3 - April 8, 2014 Rolling they meet. The Art Collection from the National Council of Plastic Arts Read more In the heat of the thought. Works from the Daros Latinoamérica Collection Santander Group City Art Room, Madrid, Spain February 3 - April 30, 2010 Read more previous Next

RENDERINGS: NEW NARRATIVES AND REINTERPRETATIONS Mechanical Hall at Delawere University, Philadelphia, United States September 3 - 30, 2014 In September 2014, the Brandywine Workshop in Philadelphia, opened to the public in the Mechanical Hall Gallery of the University of Delawere, an exhibition of works in paper from its archives and of invited artists for the exhibition, under the title: Renderings. New Narratives and Reinterpretations, curated by Dr. Cheryl Finley. In it, works by 26 artists from different nationalities were presented, among which were the Cuban printmakers Belkis Ayón and Ibrahim Miranda, all representatives of the art of the African diaspora. Participating artists: Terry Adkins, Maya Freelon Asante, Belkis Ayon, Camille Billops, Jamal Cyrus, Andrea Chung, Letitia Huckaby, Sedrick Huckaby, Curlee Raven Holton, Valerie Maynard, Paul F. Keene, Ibrahim Miranda, Ayanah Moor, Howardena Pindell, Michael B. Platt, Faith Ringgold, Robert Pruitt, Alison Saar, Betye Saar, Juan Sanchez, John T. Scott, Clarissa Sligh, Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum, Janet Taylor-Pickett, Hank Willis Thomas, Deborah Willis.

NKAME: A RETROSPECTIVE OF THE CUBAN PRINTMAKER BELKIS AYÓN (1967-1999) Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, Missouri, United States January 25, 2018 - April 29, 2018 The traveling exhibition Nkame: A Retrospective of the Cuban printmaker Belkis Ayón (1967-1999) was inaugurated on January 25, 2018, at its third venue, the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art. A project organized by this prestigious institution and the Belkis Ayón Estate, Havana Cuba. The exhibition is curated by Cristina Vives. Exhibition Tour Management by Landau Traveling Exhibitions, Los Angeles, CA. Photographs: José A. Figueroa, Havana, Cuba, and courtesy of the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, Missouri. For more information, visit the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art website Press coverage KC Studio. Covering Kansas City's performing, visual, cinematic, and literary arts http://kcstudio.org/critically-acclaimed-show-cuban-printmaker-stops-kemper-museum-belkis-ayon Earthquake http://terremoto.mx/nkame-a-retrospective-of-cuban-printmaker-belkis-ayon-1967-1999/ Informality http://informalityblog.com/nkame-cuban-mythology-through-the-eyes-of-belkis-ayon/

PROPOSAL AT AGE 20 Belkis Ayón and Isary Paulet Servando Cabrera Moreno Art Gallery December, 1988 PIECE FOR FLUTE AND CLARINET We are simply between two worlds, where fantasy, where THE FABULOUS, have the floor. If for a moment we put aside the virtuosity of the printmaker, which are everywhere here, and evade a certain illustrative character, not because these things are despicable, but because she wanted to bring them to the center of her expression, then we would have to face a message directly poetic, based on harmony, on a lyricism that plays with reasons and beautician desires, which make a delicate piece for flute and clarinet from the vision of reality. Everything unfolds like the scenery of a story: in Isary, the characters, like crazy pixies, are distributed following the whims of the kaleidoscope, playing, I believe, the role of the only saviors of a world that increasingly needs and wishes the arrival of some representative of the magical world capable of transforming it into something else. Spielberg? Neo-infantilism? Like Isary, Belkis works with mystery in her work, drawn from such perfect configurations, of colors so peacefully pleasing, that they arouse unease. But suddenly one has the feeling that we are only facing an idealization, too much tenderness, almost in a peaceful reverie, in that unreal film that cannot continue, that cannot be, that one more moment and explodes. It may be that neither of the two interpretations is exact, it does not matter, they are only the style that fits for these expressive centers, surrounded by the deployment of an arsenal of irreproachable techniques and invoices. Because some could stay there, in the resplendent quality of the finish of their products. That finish is nothing more than the superficial of the art of these charming. The elements are well managed by the magician to integrate them into the illusion. Then the feeling is presented in the force of a very own saying in each case that in Isary and Belkis, in their proposals, they have the presentation of a meticulous structure, many times thought and calculated, destined to transmit security or very security purified that it becomes practically brittle. Aldo Menendez (Text for the exhibition catalog)

CURATORSHIP AWARD 2009 July 1, 2010 Virginia Alberdi Benitez © Granma newspaper The National Council of Plastic Arts presents the CURATORSHIP AWARD to Cristina Vives for the NKAME. BELKIS AYÓN (1967-1999) ANTHOLOGICAL EXHIBITION. Curatorship Award 2009 Personal exhibition Title: Nkame. Belkis Ayón (1967-1999). Anthological Exhibition Date: September 11 - December 20, 2009 Place: San Francisco de Asís Convent, Havana, Cuba. The general direction of the project: Dra. Katia Ayón. Estate of Belkis Ayón Curator: Cristina Vives Invited curator for collateral exhibitions at Espacio Ayón: Cristina Figueroa Graphic design: Laura Llópiz Spot: Raúl Valdés (Raupa) Sponsors: National Council of Plastic Arts San Francisco de Asís Convent Belkis Ayón Estate The City Historian Office National Museum of Fine Arts, Havana Ericsson Air Europe PREVIOUS NEWS NEXT NEWS

NKAME: A RETROSPECTIVE OF THE CUBAN PRINTMAKER BELKIS AYÓN SELECTED AMONG THE BEST OF THE ART OF 2017 WORLDWIDE BY ARTnews MAGAZINE Jan 4, 2018 Yadira Leyva Ayón © www.artnews.com On December 27, 2017, the article by Andrew Russeth, «2017: THE YEAR IN REVIEW, was published on the ARTnews website. The Year in, and Beyond, New York Galleries — Plus a Top 10 from Around the World. In the article, among other very important contemporary art exhibitions of the year, Nkame… was selected in the number 4 position among the best exhibitions in the world of the year 2017. Andrew Russeth refers: “Once you take a look at the large-scale pieces that Belkis Ayón made by assembling printed panels, you never forget. They are typically black, white, and every shade of gray (though she briefly and incredibly dipped into the color), and they feature, with supernaturally sinuous confident lines, figures with faces that only have piercing eyes, piercing eyes, performing non-ritualistic rituals. identifiable, hugging each other, and, yes, looking at us, inspired by the male and Afro-Cuban secret society known as Abakuá. The world lost the Cuban artist in 1999, at the age of 32, and this retrospective made it clear that if she were still alive, she would be one of the main figures operating today. " Nkame: A Retrospective of the Cuban Printmaker Belkis Ayón, previously exhibited at the Fowler Museum at UCLA, and then at the Museo del Barrio in New York, has been selected as the best of art for two years, as it was also chosen as the best of art in Los Angeles in 2016. Link to the article HERE PREVIOUS NEWS NEXT NEWS

MAIN COLLECTIONS House of the Americas, Havana, Cuba. José Lezama Lima House Museum, Havana, Cuba. Wifredo Lam Contemporary Art Center, Havana, Cuba. Daros Latinamerica Collection, Zurich, Switzerland. Dr.hc Wolfgang Schreiner, Bad Steben, Germany. Museum of Art / Fort Lauderdale, Florida, United States. Galerie Kho Kho René Corail, Fort de France, Martinique, France. luag. Lehigh University Art Galleries, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, United States. Ludwig Museum in the Russian Museum, State Russian Museum, Saint Petersburg, Russia. Ludwig Forum für Internationale Kunst, Aachen, Germany. Sofía Imbert Museum of Contemporary Art, Caracas, Venezuela. National Museum of Fine Arts, Havana, Cuba. National Museum of Engraving, Buenos Aires, Argentina. The Museum of Contemporary Art. MOCA, Los Angeles, California, United States. The Museum of Latin American Art, Long Beach, California, United States. The Museum of Modern Art, MOMA, New York, United States. The Norton Family Foundation, Santa Monica, California, United States. Coda Museum Apeldoorn, Apeldoorn, The Netherlands. Antonio Pérez Foundation, Cuenca, Spain. Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, Texas, United States. Alex Rosenberg Fine Art, New York, United States. Brownstone Foundation, Paris, France. The Selden Rodman Collection, Art Galleries Ramapo College of New Jersey, United States. University of Central Florida Library, Orlando, Florida, United States. Nelson Fine Art Center, Tempe, Arizona, United States. Afrika Museum, Berg en Dal, The Netherlands. The von Christierson Collection, London, England Metropiltan Pavilion, New York, United States. The Farber Collection, New York, United States.

January 2, 2020 Yadira Leyva Ayón © Belkis Ayón Estate Announcement for the IV Collography Contest Belkis Ayón. April 9-12, 2020. Cienfuegos ANNOUNCEMENT The National Council of Plastic Arts, the Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba (UNEAC), and the Graphic Society of Cienfuegos, in coordination with Espacio Ayón, the Belkis Ayón Estate, the Provincial Council of Plastic Arts, the Provincial Committee of the UNEAC and the Cuban Fund of Cultural Assets of the province of Cienfuegos, summon all interested artists and students to participate in the IV National Contest of Colography Belkis Ayón in tribute to one of the Cuban artists who marked, with her graphic and pedagogical work, a milestone in the history of Engraving in Cuba. Basis of Participation All Cuban students and artists with engravings made in the COLLOGRAPHY technique, printed between 2019 and 2020, who have not participated in a previous exhibition, event, or contest, may participate. Inscription The works must be sent unframed, through certified mail or in person, until March 18, 2020: To the Association of Plastic Artists of the UNEAC of Havana, appointment at 17 and H, Vedado. Tel. 78325781, in the case of artists and students residing in the western provinces (Pinar del Río, Havana, Artemisa, Mayabeque, Matanzas and Isla de la Juventud) To the Graphic Society of Cienfuegos, appointment at Ave. 50, # 2326, between Calle 23 and Calle 25, Cienfuegos 1, Cienfuegos. Tel. 43 517979, in the case of artists and students residing in the central provinces (Villa Clara, Cienfuegos, Sancti Spiritus and Ciego de Ávila) To the Caguayo Foundation, appointment at Calle 4 No. 403 between 15 and 17, Rpto Vista Alegre, Santiago de Cuba, CP 90400, Tel. 22 643492, in the case of artists and students residing in the eastern provinces (Camagüey, Las Tunas, Holguín, Granma, Santiago de Cuba, Guantánamo). Each artist will have the right to present three works (independent or triptych) duly signed and numbered in pencil, which cannot exceed 60 x 80 cm (paper measurements). Workshop or artist tests are not accepted. Selection A Jury will be appointed to select and award the works received. The selected and awarded works will be exhibited at the Cienfuegos Art Gallery, within the program of the 14th Feria de La Estampa, an event that will be officially inaugurated on April 9 and until April 12, 2020, making the final decision of the jury public. on April 9, at 9 pm, the opening day of the competitive exhibition. The exhibition will remain open to the public for 30 days. It will also be presented at the Casa del Benemérito de las Américas Benito Juárez of the City Historian Office, Havana, in 2020. The organizers of the contest are responsible for the care of the works sent, running with all the expenses generated by the return of the same to their authors. Prize A single and indivisible Grand Prize will be awarded consisting of 5 000.00 MN (donation from the printmaking workshop artists and the Belkis Ayón and Estate), a diploma, and a reproduction of a work by the artist to whom the contest is dedicated. The Jury will award mentions at its discretion, without a financial award. The awarded artist will be invited to the Printmaking Workshop "Magenta Rhinoceros" in the city of Toluca, Mexico, for a 10-day artistic residency. The winning works will become part of the Cienfuegos Stamp Cabinet. The awarded artist will be invited to carry out a personal exhibition at the Cienfuegos Art Center in 2022, within the official program of the V National Contest of Collography. The not-selected works must contact the Organizing Committee for their return. Participating in the National Collography Contest Belkis Ayón implies acceptance of these Terms and Conditions. The Jury's decision will be final. More information Organizing Committee of the National Collography Contest Belkis Ayón ESTATE OF BELKIS AYÓN, HAVANA belkat@cubarte.cult.cu | 7 642 3083 GRAPHIC SOCIETY OF CIENFUEGOS caceres69@azurina.cult.cu | 43 517979 www.ayonbelkis.cult.cu PREVIOUS NEWS NEXT NEWS

Today, September 11th, we commemorate the 25th anniversary of the passing of Belkis Ayón Manso (Havana, 1967-1999). Belkis radiated with her smile, talent, and dedication as an artist, curator, and professor at the San Alejandro Academy and the Higher Institute of Art in Havana, Cuba. Her enigmatic and overwhelming work earned her the admiration of the public and critics, making her an indisputable reference in 20th-century graphic art. Belkis’ work not only reflected her tireless creative spirit but also her commitment to making new generations of Cuban artists visible. Today, we evoke her generous personality and her indelible mark on the art world. We also highlight the work of her sister, Dr. Katia Ayón Manso (1964-2019), founder of the Belkis Ayón Estate in 2003. Her work over 16 years was vital for the preservation of the visual heritage of the Cuban artist and her relevant permanence in the contemporary scene. In recent years, various initiatives and cultural projects promoted by the Estate reflect our mission to preserve Belkis’ legacy and continue the path traced by Katia. We would like to thank all the family, friends, institutions, and Cuban and foreign specialists who have supported our efforts. Belkis continues to illuminate us with her smile, and her work is an inexhaustible source of inspiration. Belkis Ayón Estate Havana, September 11, 2024.

Remembering Belkis Ayón, on the 10th anniversary of her physical disappearance Isbel Alba February 4, 2015 A Date that Cannot Be Forgotten September 11 has become a date of loss and pain in our collective imagination after the terrorist attacks against the twin towers, in New York, 2001. However, although we share the grief of thousands of people for whom this day represents a tragedy, a before and an after, we have another motive to write these words. Today, I am writing about another departure, perhaps more intimate because it is ours, perhaps more questionable because it was intentional, leaving behind a mystery and the terrible sensation that accompanies bitter, inexplicable gestures. I am speaking of the Cuban artist Belkis Ayón Manso (1967-1999), who one day, ten years ago, took her own life. Belkis Ayón was an exceptional woman, with unparalleled energy and talent. Together with artists Sandra Ramos and Abel Barroso she implemented La Huella Múltiple (1996) (The Multiple Print), a project that would change forever the appreciation of Cuban print-making, an art expression that after its splendor in the 19th century due to the booming commerce of sugar and tobacco, had practically fallen into oblivion in the Cuban artistic milieu after the rise of Modernism in Cuba. Regarding the work and legacy of Belkis Ayón In some previous lectures and writings in which I have introduced the work of Ayón, I have not doubted in classifying her prints as palimpsests[3]. Using the collographic technique the artist would superpose layers of various textures to create reliefs that represented a very personal iconography, inspired in the expressions of the intangible legacy of the Abakuá[4], the different parts of the initiation ritual of the said religion or the characters of their foundational myth. In my opinion, what she did was a remake of something that had already been assimilated through oral tradition thanks to the intellectual and historical-anthropological approach allowed by books such as El Monte and Abakuá Secret Society by Lydia Cabrera, “The Ñáñigos tragedy”, by Fernando Ortiz or Los ñáñigos, by Enrique Sosa. Interpreting these works that reproduce an oral tradition, Ayón created her own imaginary graphic work. A world elegantly portrayed in the images of her prints. Although representing the Afro-Cuban legacy in our painting is constant since colonial times, her work may be considered a rarity from multiple viewpoints, since Belkis Ayón rescued printmaking in the midst of the Special Period. Engraving allowed her, among other things, to produce more with less and to exhibit a chromatic minimalism bordering on exquisiteness. During the last stage of her life, Belkis Ayón combined her work as an artist with that of being a professor at the Higher Institute of Art (ISA) and with her position as a vice president of the Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba (UNEAC). Whenever she had the chance she disseminated the work of her students and colleagues. Thus, she became an active promoter of Cuban culture on a national and international scale. However, the factor that made her work deserve recognition, beyond the Cuban intellectual circles, is the Abakuá topic around which she articulated her poetic language and the refinement of her collographies and prints in general. According to Alex Rosenberg, a prestigious specialist of international graphic arts and renowned collector, the results achieved by this artist with the collographic technique had no match in the world of art up to date [5]. This gives her demise another dimension. Thus, we may affirm that Belkis Ayón had the merit of having taken the Abakuá culture to its highest form of recognition in the world of visual arts and of introducing it into the museum spaces. It is a paradox that thanks to a woman, this centuries-old, sectarian culture achieved universality in the most demanding circles of international art of the 20th century. At present, the works of Belkis Ayón are part of fourteen cultural centers and museum collections, among which are the National Museum of Fine Arts in Havana, the Van Reekum Museum, Apeldoorn, Holland, The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York, the Museum of Fort Lauderdale, USA, el Museum of Latin American Art of California, USA, Ludwig Forum Fur Internationale Kunst, Aachen, Germany, the State Russian Museum, Saint Petersburg, among others. Her works are also in numerous private collections in various countries. Nobody has been able to explain the reasons for such an abrupt death at a moment in which her career was in full growth and when she had the acceptance of critics and other art professionals. Her physical disappearance left a void in the Cuban artistic milieu. Many of her colleagues coincide in pointing out that seldom the human and artistic values have combined in such a special way in a single person. Perhaps such departure is the only reproach that can be pointed out. However, in her gesture, there is a certain coherence with the myth that fascinated her. This allows us to draw a parallel with the philosophy of the romantic poets or other artists who have committed suicide. The figure of Belkis Ayón, therefore, is fused with the myth of Sikán giving place to a circle of meanings with a certain aura of mystery, offering thus great research material for historians and anthropologists. The Belkis Ayón Estate After her death, her legacy became protected by the Belkis Ayón Estate, an institution directed by her sister, Dr. Katia Ayón, with the advice of prestigious specialists in Cuban art. This institution, in which the family legacy and the cultural legacy of the nation coexist, has a model of management that is not widely known in the current socioeconomic context of the island [6]. Thus, self-managed for ten years by Dr. Ayón it has been developing a superb job which includes the preservation of Belkis Ayón’s works and the dissemination of her legacy by organizing exhibitions, publications, and other cultural activities. According to an invitation that I received recently, the Belkis Ayón Estate has programmed Nkame, the first retrospective exhibition of the artist to commemorate the 10th anniversary of her demise. The show was officially opened last Friday, September 11, at 6 p.m., in the Convent of San Francisco de Asís, in the historical center of Old Havana. The exhibition includes some 83 works such as collographies, lithographs, and chalcographs made from 1984 to 1999. Likewise, other graphic documents of shows in which Belkis took part, as well as texts and photographs of the artist printed on large canvases are on display. Organized by Dr. Katia Ayón and with the curatorship of Cristina Vives, the Nkame exhibition shall remain open to the public up to November 28th. During those two months and as part of the cultural program accompanying the exhibition, the halls of the convent shall take in lectures on the work of Belkis Ayón, the launching of the magazine La Gaceta de Cuba, and the launching of the projects of six young printmakers, some of them former students of the artist. Nkame is a deserved homage to the work of Belkis Ayón, a great exponent of printmaking in the history of Cuban art. [1] This fish was the embodiment of Abasi, supreme deity of the Abakuá. See SOSA RODRIGUEZ, Enrique, Los ñáñigos, Casa de las Américas 1982 Award, Ediciones Casa de las Américas, Havana, 1982. [2] Sikan’s sacrifice, which will appear in her works as a leitmotif, will bring about the Abakuá tradition in the ancient ethnic groups of Nigeria (the Efik and Efor peoples). It is, doubtless, a foundational myth that afterward, as Ortiz pointed out, during slavery – through a transculturation process-, gave origin to the Abakuá fraternity in Cuba in the towns of Havana and Matanzas (1830). See : ORTIZ, Fernando, La “tragedia” de los ñáñigos, Poligraf, Havana, 1993. [3] ALBA DUARTE, Isbel (2009) The myth of Sikán in Cuban culture: tangible and intangible heritage in the work of Belkis Ayón. Reflections on the strategies for preservation and the methods for recovering her legacy. The lecture was given in the framework of the 28th International Congress of the Association of Latin American Studies, Río de Janeiro, Brazil, on June 13, 2009. [4] An example of the expressions of intangible heritage is the figures in the parades, such as the little devils or iremes as well as the signatures or anaforuanas covering the bodies of the practicing Abakuás, the animals that will be sacrificed, and the musical instruments that take part in the various sections of the initiation ritual of this brotherhood (Author’s note). [5] In ROSENBERG, Alex and Carol, Belkis Ayón in memoriam, 2005 BACK TO CRITIQUE next article