Destruyendo

Description

Destruyendo means destroying, a Cuban once said to me that the regime is destroying Havana by not maintaining it. In 2017 hurricane Irma, which did not directly hit Havana, brought rains that caused the poor infrastructure and non-existent flood control to flood Havana.

An area of central Havana about 3.5 miles long and about a mile from the Malecon seawall flooded and some areas remained flooded for about 2 weeks.

The already poor residents of central Havana who lived on the first floor of all these buildings lost all of their possessions.  Most of these people received little or no help from the government which has proven inept and uncaring about the suffering of their people.

My inspiration for this painting was a picture I saw of a girl walking in deep water in front of a wall that had a propaganda  “Continue – Defending – The Revolution”.  The first letters C, D, R  stand for Cuba’s comite de defensa de la revolucion, this is a government sponsored organization that among other things, spies on all Cubans and tells the party officials bad things about its members and all Cubans belong to a CDR whether they like it or not. Every neighborhood has one and they keep an eye out for non-revolutionary things and report to the police or state security.  They may report that so and so bought a new washing machine, but she doesn’t make enough to afford it so maybe she got the money by illegal means. It is like a snitch, nosy organization that knows everything.

I used the letters CDR to say instead Continuing to Destroy the Region and I deliberately misspelled destroying because some ignorant communist misspelled the sign to Reparto Kohly and still left the sign up because they were too lazy to re-do it.  Ask me and I will send you a picture.

The many pictures of the flood reminded me of the canals of Venice and I tried to give it that Venice feel.  A group of Cubans are in a boat, others are in a raft,  a man gestures at the Moro Castle as a huge wave breaks over it and yet others walk down the flooded streets with what possessions they can save. Dogs huddle on a windowsill and people on balconies take in the scene. All while the government does nothing to help.

The good thing I saw was that Cubans helped each other, sharing what little they had with others in need.  The youth actually played in the water as if it was some kind of event for their fun.  And the  people later went back, cleaned up and moved back into their first floor apartments. Amazing WOW.