recicled saints angel burgaña
Recycling is an art form and also a necessity in Cuba. Seemingly, need provokes art. Cubans are experts at reusing stuff: food, the pains of love, clothes, the army, tins, tourists, streets, saints... This back street is the centre of the recycling buzz. The street was built by German arms dealer Fernando Hamel when, at the end of the 19th Century, he built an arms factory and houses for his workers. In the 50s, the residents of the area started to develop their more lyrical side and the area soon became known as the bohemian part of La Havana and the local hangout for musicians and troubadours. Pablos Milanes is a son of these streets. But one day, the rhythms of “feeling” and lost love disappeared, and the small street was recycled once more. Salvador Gonzalez’s Afro-Cuban murals replaced Tirso Diaz’s music. The painter’s local followers turned the street in shrine where they could worship his godliness (orishak).
There are alters made from almost every recyclable thing, and they all go together to form an extraordinary exhibition of saintliness in this museum of syncretism. These unpronounceable saints were the African Gods of the Yoruba Tribe. When the Spanish brought over from Nigeria as slaves, they brought their rituals and beliefs with them. It seemed that efforts to evangelise these people would fail utterly, until the Spanish hit upon an idea: they placed each Yoruba God beside the Catholic saint they most resembled, and in this way they achieved assimilation through association. The achieved religious globalisation through the recycling of Catholic saints.
Where is it? (cocaine xacobeo)
La Havana and I fell in love with each other as I wandered through its streets. It’s easy to go crazy about this city. You fall in love with the city, and not with its inhabitants for a purely pragmatic reason; the mere idea of losing my heads over four million people exhausts me. I’ll never tell you where this street is. It’s one of my secret lovers. I, as the Cubans themselves often do, invite you to do some “imaginary tourism”. I’ll give you just the one clue. To the north of this block, you can find the detox centre where Pelusa (Maradonna) underwent his rather unusual treatment during his stay in Cuba. The wonders of Cuban medicine are known throughout the world. That building also became the centre point of pilgrimage for all the most famous dealers on the island. But our cosmic little barrel is made of other stuff and can’t be recycled or re-used. It’s a non-refundable bottle. Saint Maradonna, pray for me!
When you turn onto this street, you immediately feel as if you have been transported to the cover of a Manu Chao record, and the words written on the wall bring his lyrics to mind. Ya llegó ya llego Super Changó.
There are alters made from almost every recyclable thing, and they all go together to form an extraordinary exhibition of saintliness in this museum of syncretism. These unpronounceable saints were the African Gods of the Yoruba Tribe. When the Spanish brought over from Nigeria as slaves, they brought their rituals and beliefs with them. It seemed that efforts to evangelise these people would fail utterly, until the Spanish hit upon an idea: they placed each Yoruba God beside the Catholic saint they most resembled, and in this way they achieved assimilation through association. The achieved religious globalisation through the recycling of Catholic saints.
Where is it? (cocaine xacobeo)
La Havana and I fell in love with each other as I wandered through its streets. It’s easy to go crazy about this city. You fall in love with the city, and not with its inhabitants for a purely pragmatic reason; the mere idea of losing my heads over four million people exhausts me. I’ll never tell you where this street is. It’s one of my secret lovers. I, as the Cubans themselves often do, invite you to do some “imaginary tourism”. I’ll give you just the one clue. To the north of this block, you can find the detox centre where Pelusa (Maradonna) underwent his rather unusual treatment during his stay in Cuba. The wonders of Cuban medicine are known throughout the world. That building also became the centre point of pilgrimage for all the most famous dealers on the island. But our cosmic little barrel is made of other stuff and can’t be recycled or re-used. It’s a non-refundable bottle. Saint Maradonna, pray for me!
When you turn onto this street, you immediately feel as if you have been transported to the cover of a Manu Chao record, and the words written on the wall bring his lyrics to mind. Ya llegó ya llego Super Changó.
