• Submitted by: manso
• Arts and Culture
• 03 / 15 / 2011

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March 14th, 2011. Last Friday night, The von Liebig Art Center held a reception to mark the opening of its “Cuba on My Mind” exhibition. The exhibit celebrates Cuban and Cuban-American art and artists and consists of paintings, photography and mixed media pieces culled from public and private collections as well as a small number of works that are for sale.

Eduardo Miguel Abela Torras is one of the artists who attended Friday night’s reception and the ribbon cutting ceremony the day before. Abela and his vivacious wife traveled from Havana to be part of the festivities. 

Abela was destined to become an artist. Both his father, J. Eduardo Abela Alonso, and grandfather, Eduardo Abela, are accomplished painters whose works are also represented in “Cuba on My Mind.” 

Abela has exhibited extensively in Cuba, but has also participated in group and solo shows in Spain, Italy, Puerto Rico, Panama, Sante Fe, Chicago and various locations in Florida. His paintings offer a witty, often comedic view of Cuban history and social events.

 Take, for example, La Despedida (The Farewell), a marvelously-detailed acrylic-on-canvas depiction of a woman sitting in an inner tube preparing to make the 90-mile exodus to the golden shores of the United States. Strapped to her back is a wicker backpack which, no doubt, contains her life savings and provisions for the trip. In her right hand she holds a branch to which she has tied a makeshift white flag.

Infanta & Malecon (above) is an acrylic on linen of in which Spain’s Princess Margarita Teresa, known throughout history as “La Infanta” (the Infant), stands topside on a boat with three oars that cuts through a sea of mottled greens and blues. The princess and a second woman, whose visage appears in a porthole in the back of the boat, have actually been lifted by Abela  from Diego Velázquez’s famous painting La Meninas. The symbolism continues with the boat itself, which Abela has painted to look like the Malecon’s harbor barrier and breakwater. Abela paints the title of this work in the lower portion of the painting. It references Malecon and another Havana street with which it intersects, Infanta. Interestingly, he uses the amperes symbol (“&”) instead of the y used in Spanish for the word “and.” 

You can view Abela's and the other works included in “Cuba on My Mind” through April 30th at The von Liebig Art Center in Naples.  

Source: www.examiner.com/galleries-in-ft-myers/