1930s

View Down Dirt Road with People and Donkey in Foreground, Cuba

Finding Cuban art in New York is not easy. I searched for
exhibits of Cuban artists on Google and could only find records of past
exhibitions. I decided to go to the Met, for surely they would have some
samplings of Cuban art. Wrong! I scoured the Central and South American
galleries and couldn’t find one piece from Cuba. I did see a lot of beautiful
gold jewelry and vessels from Peru and Colombia, but I have no idea if these
artifacts would remotely resemble anything from Cuba. Next
I went to the photography floor, hoping to see some of Walker Evan’s black and
white photographs taken in Havana. Although the Met has many of Walker’s photos
of Cuba in their permanent collection, none were on view. I did find a book on
Evans in the gift shop, and decided to look at his photographs online.