ICAIC and Casa de las Américas celebrate 65 years

The significance and impact in the Latin American intellectual and artistic field of the Casa de las Américas and the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry (ICAIC) were highlighted, two fundamental institutions in the cultural history of the Cuban nation, 65 years after their foundations. . the theme of the inaugural conference of the Thought Our Memory Congress, an event that constitutes the backbone of the XXXI May Pilgrimage.

Researcher Jorge Fornet, head of the Literary Research Center at Casa de las Américas, and Manuel Herrera, director and 2022 National Film Award winner, addressed the points in common between both institutions and the history of their crossed paths, since there were few days that separated both foundations, that of Icaic on March 24, and Casa, on April 28, 1959, headed by two figures of great influence in Cuban culture and politics, such as, respectively, Alfredo Guevara and Haydée Santa. Maria.

“It makes sense that after more than 60 years we continue talking about Casa, Haydée's leadership, the creation of the Hispano-American Literary Contest, today the Casa de las Américas Prize, and the cultural advances that supported it,” Fornet commented. More than six decades that also speak of the legacy of the works to the Latin American cultural heritage and the impulse of an impressive movement of creators in Latin America.

Among Casa's milestones, Fornet highlighted, the ways of rethinking the ways of creating depending on the contexts stand out, as well as common belonging as one of its purposes, by bringing together a large number of artists and intellectuals in its first years.

The Icaic and the House of the Americas, more than 60 years supporting a good part of the cultural weight of the continent from Cuba and radiating to the world. Photo: Robert Rodríguez.
Thus he gave voice to numerous personalities from the continent, including writers as diverse as Virgilio Piñera, Miguel Otero Silva, Enrique Labrador Ruiz, Miguel Ángel Asturias, Nicolás Guillén, Benjamín Carrión, Humberto Arenal, Eduardo Manet, Mario Parajón, Lino Novás Calvo. , Antonio Ortega, Roger Callois, Alberto Robaina, Alejo Carpentier, Jorge Mañach, Manolo Corrales and Fernando Benítez, Carlos Fuentes and Mirta Aguirre, who pose with Haydée Santamaría in a photograph that records the organizers and jury of the first Hispano-American Literary Contest. made in 1960.

It also brought together the Latin American writers of the boom, poets like Margaret Randall and Mario Benedetti, the Canción Protesta meetings, and the first concert together, in the Che Guevara room, of the great Cuban singer-songwriters Silvio Rodríguez, Pablo Milanés and Noel Nicola in 1968 , which was the seed that germinated in the New Cuban Trova Movement. Casa was also the reason for the birth of the friendship and collaboration between its founders, Haydée and Alfredo, and which would give rise to a project as peculiar and beautiful as the Icaic Sound Experimentation Group; or the points of contact between the life and work of creators such as Santiago Álvarez, Julio García Espinosa, Tomás Gutiérrez Alea and Roberto Fernández Retamar.

Manuel Herrera, for his part, highlighted the cultural revolution that was generated in the country starting in 1959 with the creation of several institutions such as the Icaic, the Casa and the National Ballet of Cuba, around which the thought and the action. of important personalities. “The relationship between these institutions was very close, we were integrated,” he stated and insisted that Icaic Noticias Latinoamericanas expressed a continental will; because “it was the first time that there was a strong link with Latin America, where institutions like the House of the Americas were given visibility.” Two important documentary materials thus stand out. Let's walk through the house by Víctor Casaus and Conversation with Haydée Santamaría by Manuel Herrera himself.

Icaic proposed that the young artists who make up its ranks be trained in the midst of the country's reality and inviting important filmmakers to Cuba to contribute to their training was a way to encourage them. “This is how Agnés Varda or Chris Marker came to Havana with influences from the French New Wave. They were artists who taught us how to think about cinema, but there was also the need to feel the weight of Cuban cinema at its maximum expression.”

The Icaic and the Casa de las Américas together have traveled that long path towards the light, as expressed by the Cuban filmmaker Julio García Espinosa. Both institutions have integrated the best of Cuban and Latin American thought, art and culture; more than 60 years supporting a good part of the cultural weight of the continent from Cuba and radiating to the world.

Taken from La Jiribilla