Arte no es fácil

US artist Joe Miller & Cuban artist Hamlet Lavastida present a public ;lecture at Links Hall, 2012

US artist Dana Carter (left), Cuban artist Nestor Siré (right)

US artists Aay Preston-Myint & Cqqchifruit Chances Dances collective at Fábrica de Arte Cubano

ARTE NO ES FÁCIL

exhibitions & Symposium, 2008-2016
2012 Links Hall, exhibitions in Chicago, IL
2015 Fábrica de Arte Cubano (FAC), ART PRESENT- exhibitions & symposium Havana, Cuba (12th Havana Biennial)

ARTE NO ES FÁCIL facilitated transnational collaborations between 45 Cuban and American artists and ultimately included over eighty cultural workers from across the globe.These collaborations resulted in multiple exhibitions between Chicago and Havana.

The first collaborations were featured in a three-month exhibition series at Chicago's Links Hall (2011-12). Following this, and with support from the MacArthur Foundation's Artist Connections Fund, 11 of the 25 Cuban artists were brought to USfor a three-month residency in Chicago to meet their USAmerican collaborators in person.

We were invited to participate in the 12th Havana Biennial in Cuba in June 2015. We organized the symposium "Art Present: Mapping Space that Could Return to Earth Again" and the exhibition series. Over eighty cultural workers participated from the US, Canada, Amsterdam, Spain, and Qatar. Co-hosted by Fábrica de Arte Cubano and Sometimes Art Space in Havana, the event showcased interdisciplinary art research, innovative space design, community-oriented artist-run projects, and site-specific curatorial concepts alongside institutionally sponsored architectural initiatives to examine how the restructuring of art space might extend into the political, technological, and bureaucratic reorganization of other spaces in Cuba, The United States, and Canada.

This project was generously supported by The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation's Connection Fund, Wyckoff Milliman Endowment Grant at The University of Washington, LinksHall Artists LinkUp Grant, The Claire Kantor Foundation, The Hyde Park Art Center, Art Chicago & Next, El Centro Desarrollo de las Artes Visuales, The University of Chicago, UChicago Arts Council, Department of Visual Arts, Open Practice Committee, The Reva and David Logan Center for the Performing Arts, and The Center for Latin American Studies at the University of Chicago.