Call For Immediate Release Of Hamlet Lavastida

Warsaw/Berlin/Dresden, June 30, 2021

CALL FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE OF HAMLET LAVASTIDA

On 26 June 2021, the renowned visual artist Hamlet Lavastida (b.1983) was arrested by Cuban security authorities, and since then is being held in Villa Marista prison in Havana.

Hamlet Lavastida, before he returned to Cuba, completed his scholarship of the international studio programme at Künstlerhaus Bethanien Berlin, Germany. A few years ago he was a part of the art-in-residency programme in Center of Contemporary Art Ujazdowski Castle in Warsaw and exhibited his works in Warsaw. He is in conversation with the Albertinum in Dresden for their exhibition and research project on the relation of the GDR to socialist countries of the Global South.  

We were happy and privileged to host him in our institutions. Hamlet Lavastida is an intelligent, provocative, boundary-pushing political artist-activist who highlights the distinctly Cuban spirit of cultural resistance and an art for and by the people. Hamlet Lavastida is a courageous and outspoken artist. He makes his opinions public and open for productive discussion – he hides nothing, but shares in open conversations and exchange. 

We raise our deep concern to learn that the Cuban authorities hold him with no contact to his family and the artistic community of Cuba and worldwide. Hamlet Lavastida is kept in an isolated place to undergo “investigations” – a deeply troubling and haunting echo especially for us in places where this had happened to too many critical artists before. Hamlet Lavastida – just like these artists - believes in art’s role for a country that is inclusive, democratic, sovereign, prosperous, equitable and transnational as stated in the 27N movement manifesto.

We demand immediate release of Hamlet Lavastida and ask other artistic communities worldwide to join us in this call.

Künstlerhaus Bethanien Berlin      

Center for Contemporary Art Ujazdowski Castle 

Albertinum Dresden

Teatr Dramatyczny m.st. Warszawy 

Agnieszka Holland 

Agnieszka Wróblewska 

Renata Czarnkowska 

Agata Całkowska 

Krystyna Chojnacka 

Anna Zdrojewska 

Jowita Budnik   

Magda Sendecka 

Dariusz Olszewski 

Maria Krauss 

Ingo Arend 

Norbert Thiel 

Rachel Kohn 

Lutz Rathenow 

Prof. Renata Stih 

Anett Stuth 

Berlin Opus Cuba 

Bankleer (Kasböck / Leitner) 

Prof. Dr. Eugen Blume 

Ares Marrero María 

Katherine Bisquet Hernández 

Camila Lobon