UA, Cuban Photographers ‘Side by Side’ in Joint Exhibit

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — A  joint U.S.-Cuban photographic exhibition featuring some 90 images capturing the “beauty and grace” of the Cuban people is scheduled to open May 6 in the Julio Larramendi Gallery in the Hostal Del Habana in Havana, Cuba.

The exhibition, titled “Side by Side,” features the photography of The University of Alabama’s Chip Cooper and the city of Havana’s Néstor Martí. It will run through June 17 in Cuba and is scheduled to open on The University of Alabama campus in fall 2009.

Cooper, a UA graduate, served as UA’s director of photography for 33 years and is now a faculty member in UA’s College of Arts and Sciences and an artist-in residence in the Honors College.

Martí, a University of Havana graduate, is a photographer in the Office of the Historian of the city of Havana. He covered the IX and XI Ibero-American Summits, visits to the Historic District by dignitaries, heads of state, and cultural and political personalities.

Cooper said he hopes the projects will grow into a book-length photographic publication and an opportunity for Martí to travel to the UA campus and take photographs of Alabama’s rural communities and UA’s growing campus.

The exhibit is dedicated to the late Raymundo Leonardo Respal Fina, director of the Experimental Graphic Studio in Cuba.