Clowns
2021
Drawing
“In the Valley only sparrows are free”
Text by: Anamely Ramos
An artist insists on receiving drawing materials at the Guanajay Maximum Security Prison. His name is Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara. After much insistence, he gets the meager allowance of a notebook and two crayons per visit. The guards are stunned by the joy with which he receives these items. They are treasures. But it is not enough for the artist and he begins to flatten and sew cigar boxes together in order to continue to draw. Anything that he can get his hands on works.
Clowns begin to emerge. They are portraits. Almost self-portraits. Combining all the colors that he has been able to acquire, he shapes a gallery of emotions with minimal variations where human nature is recreated - the most basic and visceral that accompanies us all. Luis is stubborn. We know that. Without being able to leave, only seeing the sun once a day, looking to the sky through a small window, he connects us with his and our essential needs, with that which makes us laugh, cry, wonder, doubt, feel fear, or have desires. How do you keep feeling those desires inside a jail cell?
Some of the drawings have short phrases, such as votive offerings. Some recall previous experiences from his life: “In the Valley only sparrows are free,” one says, referring to March 2020 when he was imprisoned for 14 days in Valle Grande (Grand Valley) prison. Between the two prisons, little more than a year has passed and the country has changed. Luis knows it. His clowns are the melancholic but courageous face of a country for which change is costing lives. The clowns are the face of a painful and great labor of which we are all a part.
Luis Manuel Otero has been in prison for more than five months. While imprisoned, he has become one of the 100 Most Influential People of the Year according to Time Magazine. Throughout this time, art has been what has kept him company. For Luis, art is neither an altar nor a pedestal, just like the homeland. His clowns are portraits of a homeland today that is drowning, that is screaming, and that still manages to transmit hope.
Faces
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x 18 cm LMP01
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x 18 cm LMP02
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x 18 cm LMP10
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x 18 cm LMP12
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x 18 cm
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x 18 cm LMP15
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x 18 cm LMP17
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x 18 cm LMP24
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x 18 cm LMP25
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on cigarette pack paper. 6.3 x 6 cm LMP32
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on cigarette pack paper. 6.3 x 6 cm LMP32
Musicians
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP43
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP44
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP45
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP46
Actions
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP49
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP51
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP52
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP58
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP61
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on cigarette pack paper. 24 x18 cm LMP63
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP64
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP65
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP66
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP67
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP72
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 18 x 24 cm LMP74
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP85
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP86
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP87
Untitled, 2021. Ink, graphite and pastel on paper. 24 x18 cm LMP88