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Manuel Mendive is perhaps the single most important Cuban artist today. Mendive, a major exponent of contemporary Afro-cubanismo in the visual arts, was born in 1944 into a Santerํa-practicing family. He graduated from the prestigious Academia de Artes Plแsticas San Alejandro in Havana in 1962 with honors in
sculpture and painting. He held his first one-man show at the Center of Art in Havana in 1964. Since then he has exhibited in some of the most important international venues. The Cuban booth at the XLII
International Biennial Exhibition of Modern Art in Venice in 1988 was completely dedicated to his works. His work can be found in Museums and galleries in many countries including the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes in Havana, the Musee dArt Moderne in Paris; as well as museums in Russia, Somalia, Congo, Norway, Denmark, Finland and the U.S and other countries.
Writing about his work, the critic Edward Sullivan says, I conceive of his work as daring, rebellious, unconventional and brave. He does not care about fashion or trends. His images, which so often
incorporate and wildly transform the vestiges of African stimulus, do not appeal necessarily to those who seek the latest trend in the art world. Instead of intellectualized minimalism or hollow conceptualism,
Mendive relies on the senses: thought, touch, color, breath, air, and fire.
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