Artists See Increase in U.S.-Cuba Cultural Exchanges

Artists See Increase in U.S.-Cuba Cultural Exchanges
By VICTORIA BURNETT
Published: July 24, 2010

HAVANA — The venue is undistinguished: a cramped theater tucked beneath a downtown apartment block. Tickets cost just five Cuban pesos, or 23 cents. The set, for want of wood, is a beautiful creation of string.

Yet in the world of Cuban theater, the production of “Blind Mouth Singing” — written and directed by Cuban-Americans — is a rare and momentous event. Only a handful of artists from the Cuban diaspora have staged plays here on the island since the United States severed ties with Cuba in 1961.

“It’s difficult to overstate the emotional impact it’s had on me and the symbolic importance it has for relations between Miami and Havana,” said the playwright, Jorge Ignacio Cortiñas, who was in the Cuban capital for the opening at the 182-seat Basement Theater this month.

Despite little apparent progress in diplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States since President Obama took office, members of the Cuban arts community say more musicians, artists, actors and writers are traveling between the two countries than during George W. Bush’s presidency.

In June, Silvio Rodríguez, the Cuban songwriter, played a concert at Carnegie Hall, 30 years after his last visit to the United States; and Alicia Alonso, the legendary director of the National Ballet of Cuba, visited New York as part of celebrations for her 90th birthday.

Things have picked up, too, in the theater community. Two Cuban theater groups, Teatro Buendía and Teatro El Público, are performing this month in the United States as part of theater festivals in Chicago and Miami. In March, a group of Cuban playwrights and designers attended a Cuban theater conference at the University of Miami.

More:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/25/world/americas/25cuba.html?adxnnl=1&ref=world&adxnnlx=1280041252-mk489Lwt1MMeA+7A7W8+wg